In Football Manager Live we can show our willingness to play a match any time we want to. However, if we do not join any games, we will be able to face other teams only in friendly matches – the game may be pleasant, but boring in the long run. We will take care of the match and preparation for it in the further episode of Road to FM Live. Today, we will focus on federations and competitions.

We should go back to the beginning, to the tutorial, which is supposed to help us during the first contact with the game. Its last point is join one football association using a tool named Football Association Finder.
It will welcome us kindly and then start asking questions – the first one concerns time of day during which we think we will play most often (additional option is weekends), and the second one is about anticipated intensity level. According to our answers, FA Finder will try to find suitable association for us (however, it will not always manage ).
We ought to know that the name is not the only difference between them – every association is described with the set of parameters such as reputation, wealthiness, number of matches, which AI can perform instead of us, maximum number of teams, or the time of playing matches. Prizes which we can win will depend to a large degree on how rich our association is, but of course, the further we go, the more we earn. To which games in association we will be assigned is not up to us – moderators are the people responsible for assigning teams to leagues or cups. Moreover, in the game we can find superassociations , which lead the most prestigious competitions between teams from different associations. At the beginning, we do not have to worry about it because it is not very easy to get there. FA Finder is only one method of selecting association – we can do it ourselves as well. We just need to browse the list of all available associations and after we check all details about them we should pick the one most suitable for us..

We ought to join an association before the start of the season – date of the beginning of the season is announced few days before it – then hosts have enough time to assign us to suitable competitions. When the season starts, schedules, which state the ultimate date of every match, are created. If we exceed this date, the game lets the manager, who was available for longer lately, play the match. He is given 24 hours for it. He can wait for the rival or just play with the team lead by AI. Unless the match is played within 24 hours, computer simulation is performed (with AI in both teams).
These guidelines also concern properly configured unofficial competitions. Except of leagues and cups, which take place in the association, and whose advantage is that they are free of charge, and we can earn pretty well, every player can create one's own competitions ! Maybe they lackthe afore mentioned advantage as nobody will suddenly pull the money out of the hat for us ,but it does not mean that the we play only for satisfaction or honor. We collect the appropriate sum from competitors – we state the number of participants and the entry fee and we have enough money to distribute. Anyway, configuration of our own league or cup can be really advanced. Apart from creating stages (e.g group and cup stages) and rules of dividing prizes we can also choose the rules of games such as the number of substitutions, required reputation or even pitch size. Appropriate classification is also very important – if our competitions are for seniors or the youth. What is more we can select availability of competition – public or private. In the former case, anyone who meets the conditions will be able to join our game. In the latter case we will have to send invitations to other managers. When everything is done, we just need to wait for required number of participants.

In the proper place in the game we can find not started, started and finished competitions. It rescues us from failing to take part in any official league or cup if, for instance, we oversleep the beginning of the season and we do not join any association by mistake, Competitions created by players is enough for us not to be bored – we can participate in as many competitions at once as we only want. We just need to filter the index according to particular criteria, choose the position on the list that we are interested in, enter competition and wait for the announcement about the beginning of it.

And then start playing! You will get to know what it all looks like in the next episode of Road to FM Live.