Manager Career Mode Needs Meaningful Evolution
Dear EA Sports Team,
I’m writing as a long-time player who has been with the franchise since FIFA 09, and someone who has played Manager Career Mode religiously for the past four years.
Every year, I buy the game hoping that Career Mode will take a meaningful step forward. Unfortunately, it feels like the mode has remained stagnant—and in some areas, even taken steps backward.
People who play Manager Career Mode want to live the life of a football manager. That means more than just matchday gameplay. It means strategy, identity, long-term planning, accountability, and standing by your decisions. Over time, many of these elements have either been limited or removed altogether.
Some examples:
- We no longer have the freedom to create our own formations and tactical ideas.
- The removal of requesting funds took away an important managerial responsibility. It would be far more immersive to allow managers to make a case to the board—based on performance, vision, squad needs, or long-term plans—and stand by that justification rather than having budgets be static.
- Out-of-game animations have barely changed for years. Individual creators using AI can now generate better animations than what we see in Career Mode—let alone a company of EA’s scale.
There are also many realistic systems that could dramatically improve immersion:
- Buy-back clauses and more advanced contract structures
- Multi-club ownership, where a “sister club” can be used for player development (similar to Man City and Girona), including shared academy philosophy and long-term group identity
- A manager career leaderboard based solely on real-life managers, allowing players to compare long-term achievements against legends like Sir Alex Ferguson or Pep Guardiola
- A proper manager contract system, where contracts have fixed durations and must be renewed. Managers should be able to resign voluntarily, fail renewal negotiations, or allow contracts to expire. In these cases, the game should continue along the same timeline, allowing the manager to remain unemployed—without access to club operations—until a suitable role from their job watchlist becomes attainable
- Club legacy leaderboards, enabling comparisons between a player-built club and historic giants like Real Madrid in terms of trophies and achievements
- Smarter scouting, driven by player profiles and positional needs rather than generic results
- Tactical support tools, offering guidance on how to approach or counter an opponent’s style or formation for players who may not fully understand tactical matchups
- A meaningful use for manager wages—right now they’re just numbers. In reality, some managers prioritize legacy and trophies, while others value financial success. Reflecting that choice would add depth and personality to Career Mode.
Honestly, it often feels like Career Mode is no longer a priority at EA. While gameplay continues to receive attention, a set of focused, relatively minor updates like these could completely transform the experience for millions of players who prefer an immersive single-player mode over Ultimate Team.
Career Mode has enormous potential. Many of us simply want to see it treated with the same ambition and care as other parts of the game.
Thank you for taking the time to read this. I hope this feedback reaches the teams responsible for shaping the future of Manager Career Mode.
Kind regards,
Long-time EAFC Player
