Football Manager 2022 Review: 8 Ups And 2 Downs

Rampaging centre-backs, slick animation, stats upon stats, and a giant Newcastle budget!

by Andrew Pollard
Football Manager 2022
SEGA

With the new FIFA now out and with Christmas not yet here, it's the time of the year where long-time gamers and football fans are eagerly awaiting the release of the next installment in the Football Manager series.

As of this writing, Football Manager 2022 is just days away from officially hitting shelves and online stores, and we've been fortunate enough - thanks to SEGA and Sports Interactive - to grab an early look at this new FM.

With certain changes promised, franchise fans have been keen to see whether FM22 takes what works so well about Football Manager and add new kinks to it, or whether FM22 will ultimately end up being a Jamie Pollock-esque own goal from SI.

The copy reviewed for this piece was the BETA version of Football Manager 2022, meaning this may not be entirely indicative of the final game when its released on 9 November. Remember, the whole point of such BETAs is so that developers can see what does and doesn't work, and for any creases to be ironed out.

With that in mind, then, let's take a look under the hood and see what makes FM22 tick.

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Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.