There are no options in game to enable manual gearing in most wanted.
(missing a gear during an epic chase could be costly.)
I miss too manual transmission. Actually I haven't bought anymmore NFS-games (such as Hot Pursuit and the new Most Wanted) because of this lack and also because of a lack of customization features that really allowed to personalize your car in every respect, like instead it was possible in the first Most Wanted or in Carbon. New games are more and more tryng to be similiar to social networks, but they are losing the point about racing, cars, and what passionate people love about this world.
And I decided to give another chance to Criterion by buying Rivals, but I was disappointed by the game as I expected. Simply (keyboard) controls are terrible and almost completly NOT customizable. Even the storyboard give me a sense of constriction that I hate, forcing you to break up your career as a street racer to became part of police forces driving cars with (too much) unreal weapons.
All these new games seem to be totally focused on silly-children-playstation-gamers but they are nothing about driving and challenging on streets as the previous NFS games were.
And, really, I'm so sorry about it.
