First-ever Football Manager World Cup crowns inaugural winners

Any Football Manager player has dreamed of showing off their prowess at the game to the wider world. 

While we all like to regale our mates of FM stories of leading Harrogate Town to Champions League glory or winning back-to-back World Cups with England, the truth is that no-one is queuing up to watch us play the game. 

That’s not the case for the planet’s best gamers however, as they have been taking part in the first-ever FIFAe World Cup that has seen 20 two-player management teams from across the world competing in Liverpool for a share of a $100,000 prize pool and the title of the world’s best Football Manager player. 

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The five-day event saw the 20 teams drawn into four groups where each of the five players in that group were all given the same club team to manage. The first-place finisher in each group qualified for the knockout stages, which used the Football Manager Fantasy Draft mode to create teams.

Germany, South Africa, Indonesia and England made the final four, which featured two two-legged semi-finals for a place in the final.

Germany’s Sven Goly was able to see off South Africa’s Enzo Bento in one semi-final, while Indonesia’s Ichsan R. Taufiq took down Arron Falloon in the other semi-final to set up Sunday night’s title match.

And it would be the Indonesian team that took home the title, winning the first leg 3-0 before a 5-2 victory in the second leg.

The win for Taufiq was even more remarkable considering the fact that Football Manager doesn’t even support the Indonesian language - something the game’s makers will no doubt review for the next iteration of the game.

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