I spent the first hour in setup screens, sorting contracts and basic tactics, and nearly closed it before anything started. The menus just sit there while you pick through details that don't feel urgent yet.
A match finally pulled me back in when I swapped a midfielder at the half after checking the opposition's passing patterns. That single choice changed how the second half played out, even if the rest of the game stayed quiet around it.
Most sessions end up with long stretches of reading the same reports or waiting for the calendar to move. In Football Manager 26 the actual decisions come in short bursts, and the gaps between them make the whole thing drag.
Twenty minutes can disappear just shifting one slider and checking fitness levels, and I still don't know if that's worth calling it progress.
https://dfaceme.com/game/football-manager-26
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