Ways to make your Football Manager save harder and give yourself a serious challenge

With Football Manager 2025 cancelled and fans facing a long wait until FM26 rolls around, we’re all stretching FM24 far thinner than we expected to. With awesome match engine mods and new formation tactics, FM24 is still an amazing game, and our induvial self-imposed challenges makes the game even better.

After helping popular FM YouTuber Clayts come up with a very brutal season challenge, releasing today at 3PM, I got thinking about other ways to make Football Manager saves much harder. The game can sometimes feel too easy, especially once you’ve figured out the optimal tactics and player recruitment strategies, so we can introduce our own custom rules to add a bit more of a challenge.

The bonus? When you do succeed, the satisfaction will be even greater. And if you can’t be bothered to come up with your own custom rules, I’ve got you covered. Here are some ways to spice up a save that’s gone stale.

Free Transfers Only

Especially if you’re managing in the Premier League, the game gets too easy once you figure out how to spend big on the best wonderkids and then sell them for massive profits. You can rinse and repeat this cycle until you’ve suddenly got a billion in the bank and can afford any player you want. But this challenge completely eradicates that advantage. None of the top wonderkids will ever be available on free transfers, so you’ll have to think outside the box to progress. With such a limited pool of available players, assembling a good squad becomes significantly harder. But if you love a bargain and enjoy finding hidden gems without spending a penny, this could be the perfect challenge for you.

Challenge: No spending money on transfers—only free transfers allowed.

Extreme Rotation

This is the challenge I suggested to the content creator when they messaged me—and it’s brutal. As he confirmed to me after the video was made, it’s a nightmare to pull off. In this challenge, no player can play more than two games in a row. That means you have to make massive squad rotations every game and ensure you have a whole starting XI and B team of the same level—otherwise, the drop-off will be too big. The only team that could manage this in real life without a noticeable difference is Chelsea. But for 99% of clubs, this challenge will be extremely difficult. Even if you have the squad depth, it’s going to be a serious test to maintain team cohesion with this much rotation.

Challenge: No player can play more than two consecutive matches.

Forced to Use a Young or Old Player in the Starting XI

There are two ways you could approach this one. First, you could force yourself to sign and play an old player. Let’s be honest—most of us avoid signing players over 27, let alone someone pushing 40. But what if you were required to always start a player aged 38 or older? On the flip side, you could be forced to play a young prospect who isn’t ready yet. We all love a good wonderkid, but they usually don’t peak until their 20s. So, being forced to start a silver-starred 17-year-old at left-back could be a serious handicap. Either way, having an age-restricted spot in your starting XI is bound to make things more challenging.

Challenge: You must have a youth intake player under 18 in the starting XI and/or a player aged 38 or older.

One country, or one region, club

There are two levels of difficulty to this challenge. The first is restricting yourself to signing players from just one country. How hard this is depends on the nation you pick—assembling a squad of French players is fairly straightforward, but sticking only to players from Turkmenistan? That’s a nightmare. If you want to take it a step further, you can restrict yourself to a single region within a country, like Athletic Bilbao does. Some players have tried London-only saves, but imagine attempting this with players from somewhere like Cumbria. Whatever location you choose, it’s going to be significantly more difficult than a standard save.

Challenge: You can only sign players from a specific country, or a particular region within a country.

Strikerless Only

Unless you’re Pep Guardiola (well, not this season), coming up with a good strikerless tactic on Football Manager is HARD. Trust me—I’ve tried. Most tactics revolve around a striker, and the current Football Manager meta leans toward formations with two up top. The game heavily favors having a big presence in the box, which makes going strikerless even tougher.

But that’s exactly what makes this challenge so satisfying—if you can get it right. You’ll need to be creative with your tactics, and if you’re tired of relying on the same overpowered formations, this could be the perfect way to shake things up. If you want a reverse challenge, you could force yourself to play a rigid 4-4-2 low-block Dyche-ball system, which would be just as tough to get right.

Challenge: Only play with a strikerless tactic for the entire season.

Negative net spend

For those who love the moneyball approach, this challenge won’t be an issue. In this save, you must always maintain a net transfer spend of £0 or lower every season. That means every signing must be funded entirely by player sales—no exceptions.

This forces you to master squad turnover, selling high and buying low while keeping the team competitive. No splashing cash on the next big wonderkid unless you offload a key player first. This challenge requires patience, long-term planning, and strict financial discipline, but it can also be one of the most rewarding saves you’ll ever do.

Challenge: Keep net spend below £0 for the entire save.

Sell Your Best Player Every Season

Success in Football Manager is often built around a core group of star players, but this challenge rips that foundation apart. Every season, at the end of your campaign, your highest-rated player by average match rating must be sold, no matter how crucial they are to your squad. Just led your team to the title thanks to a talismanic striker? Say goodbye. Finally developed that wonderkid into a world-beater? Time to cash in.

This challenge forces you into constant squad rebuilding, testing your scouting, recruitment, and tactical adaptability to the absolute limit. You’ll have to identify replacements before they’re needed, work on succession planning, and be ruthless in how you build your team. If you love a relentless, moneyball-style approach where no player is bigger than the system, this challenge will keep you on your toes every season.

Challenge: Sell your highest-rated player by average rating at the end of every season.

Final Thoughts

If you’re stuck for a save idea or just want to make the game harder, one of these challenges could be perfect for you. Do any of these sound right up your street? Are there any blindingly obvious challenges I’ve missed? Let me know in the comments!