
Expanded Board Confidence - Learn about squad harmony and club stature as you take in whether the board is happy with your performance.Media Management & Press Conferences - Get into the heads of your rivals by using the media to your advantage.Assistant Manager Feedback - Top managers can't do it without top support, and FM09 let you draw on the experience of your number two directly.



Widescreen Support - It's funny to think this ever wasn't a thing! But as the tech became widespread, so we adapted the game to take advantage.Developed with support from SEGA Sports R&D, the new match engine let you watch your team in action as never before. 3D Match Engine - This was the big one.Away from the pitch, press conferences let you fire up the mind games more than ever, while you could dig further into the board's confidence levels too, learning their take on squad harmony and club stature. Your Assistant Manager would now pop up before and during games to help you judge performance, player motivation levels and tactical efficiency. The addition of widescreen support for the first time in FM (remember when everything was 4:3?) added to the sense of new horizons.Īll this focus on the 3D Match Engine didn't stop us getting stuck into other areas. Naturally FM09 made as much hay as it could from this new feature, including a special TV View that let you watch matches in full-screen with custom widgets docked to the image showing you information on player performance, action zones, pitch radar and scores from other matches.

After years of text commentary or watching 2D circles, seeing your motion-captured players take to the field for real was a special moment. Developed over three years with support from SEGA's Sports R&D Division, the 3D Match Engine was the headline addition to Football Manager 2009, revolutionising the way managers saw their team in action.
