How To Make An Athletic Bilbao Save But For Different Countries in Football Manager

One of the most iconic challenges in Football Manager is trying to recreate Athletic Bilbao’s famously strict transfer policy: only signing players from a specific region. Whether you admire the club’s Basque-only approach or just want to add a self-imposed restriction to make your save more challenging, the Football Manager Editor makes it possible (with some caveats).

Creating a self-imposed challenge is one of the most fun aspects of FM. From mastering the moneyball save to doing a Wonderkid-less run, there’s always something to do. (Don’t forget to check out our guide on a Build a Nation save!)

In this article, I’ll walk you through how you can create your own ‘Athletic Bilbao save’, looking at how others have done it, and if you struggle to get it working, I’ll include some links to downloadable versions you can plug straight into your game. Over the next few weeks, I’m also planning to reach out to a few editor experts to see if we can build a range of examples for people to use, so stay tuned.

How You Do It Yourself

To get started, you’ll need to load up the Football Manager Editor. Now, I’m by no means an expert, so some of the steps below may require a bit of trial and error. The editor can be fiddly, and you’ll likely have to test things a few times before everything works perfectly. Thankfully, FM includes a built-in League/Rule Tester so you can make sure your database doesn’t implode.

Important note: The only way to make a save where transfer restrictions are hardcoded (i.e., enforced by the game engine rather than just by your own self-control) is by editing a club that already has built-in restrictions. A lot of people use a club called Bermuda Hogges, an obscure, defunct Bermudan team, as a base.

Here’s a comprehensive list of clubs that have hardcoded transfer policies/youth recruitment policies. If that list is a bit overwhelming, here’s a good list of the most notable teams with transfer restrictions in Football Manager 2024. Once you’ve chosen your club, you can transfer them into the league you want to start in. In the example I looked at, the FM player moved their team into the Vanarama National League North.

How to Swap a Team Into a Different League

Here’s a basic step-by-step guide on how to do this in the FM Editor:

1. Open the FM Editor

• Launch the Football Manager 2024 Pre-Game Editor from Steam.

2. Load the Database

• Click File > Load Database.
• Select the default database or a custom one if you’ve already edited before.

3. Find the Team You Want to Add

• Use the Search bar to find the team you want to move (e.g., Wrexham).
• Click into the team to bring up their editable data.

4. Remove the Team from Their Current Division

• Scroll down to the “Competitions” section in the team’s data.
• Remove their current division (e.g., National League).

5. Find the Target League

• Use the Search again to find the league you want to add the team to (e.g., English Championship).
• Click on the league.

6. Swap the Team

• In the league screen, scroll to the “Teams in Division” section.
• Click “Swap” to replace a team in that league.
• Select the team you’re removing and the one you’re adding (e.g., Wrexha
• Save changes.

7. Save Your Changes

• Go to File > Save Editor Data As…
• Name your file and save it

8. Start a New Game in Football Manager

• Launch Football Manager.
• When setting up a new career, click “Database”, then select your edited file
• Make sure the league you edited is selected and enabled.

Ones That People Have Already Made

If this all sounds like way too much effort, or you just can’t get it to work (been there), don’t worry, loads of community-made saves are already available to download from Steam Workshop or Reddit. Here are a few of the best:

• London-only Charlton Athletic save
• Scottish only save in England
• ‘Merseyside only’ save
• Portugal only save

Final Thoughts

So, yes, it is possible to make your own hardcoded transfer restriction save in Football Manager… but it’s a bit of a process. You either need to:

1. Swap an existing defunct club that already has restrictions into the league you want to play in,
   or
2. Create your own custom nation and club, with rules that only allow signings from within that nation (which is definitely more complex and time-consuming).

For most casual players, the first route, or just downloading someone else’s version, is the easier option. I’m going to keep exploring this over the next few weeks, and I’ll try to get a few custom databases made and shared around, because honestly, there aren’t enough of them out there at the moment.