Wycombe Wanderers is always a fun club to play as in Football Manager, but no more so than in Football Manager 26. Unlike in previous seasons, Wycombe start with some cash to spend (300k) and in Mikheil Lomtadze, an owner who will typically write off the clubs loans when they get into the negative, making for a very strong start for any prospective manager.

No more so for myself, considering I was asked to become the Wycombe Researcher for Sports Interactive, so it will be a satisfying experience seeing my work form the team I love in game.

I’ve decided to do a full playthrough with Wycombe, including a writeup here exclusively on the Quartermen to share my experiences with Wycombe, and hopefully some glory in the future.

The first thing you’ll notice if you load a save of Wycombe on Football Manager (Or EAFC 26 for that matter) is the sheer depth Wycombe have compared to previous seasons. It does make you feel for Michael Duff who genuinely has to choose 11 players out of a strong squad every week. Nevertheless, I’ve chosen to play a 4-2-3-1 in possession which will shift to a 4-4-1-1 out of possession, with Alex Lowry staying high as a creative outlet.

While this would theoretically work in real life, we run into some of the same problems Wycombe have faced in real life. Only Dan Harvie, Fin Back, Magnus Westergaard, Alex Lowry and Anders Hagelsjaer in my starting 11 have been at my club for more than a few months, as such tactical familiarity with not only my system but with the EFL in general.

This can cause issues, in a test run with Wycombe in the beta version of FM26, I barely avoided being sacked by the board as I limped to 10th place, while the board expect (if not require) the player to at least reach the playoffs in their season objectives. While there is undoubted strenght in the squad, much like real life it will take time and patience to mold it into a great team.

Just a few days after starting the game, agreeing a code of conduct and my expectations, Fred Onyedinma marched into my office and made it abudently clear he wanted to leave at the end of his contract, which expired in the next summer.

Trying to convince him otherwise only made him angier, so I now face a choice between either selling him now for a profit or keeping him and allowing him to leave for free. With no market interest in the winger, I’ve transfer listed him hoping to get even part of his £1.9 million value.

A pre-season match vs Stockton Town FC of the Northern Premier League followed, with a strong 6-0 win with Magnus, Fink, Fred, Bell, Lowry and Woodrow all finding the net. A good result no doubt, but one that should be expected.

In the meantime, I had been contending with another issue at the club, the three right backs in Jack Grimmer, Fin Back and Niall Huggins. When Matt Bloomfields Luton Town offered 250k for the 31 year old Grimmer, we took the offer to add some money back into the bank.

Whilst Jack is undoubtly an extremely important leader for the Chairboys in real life, in FM leadership isnt as major of an issue. Josh Scowen and Leahy remain as team leaders in the clubs “hierarchy”, while a new vice captain in Daniel Harvie or Anders Hagelskjaer will allow them to replace Grimmer in the longer term. We would later appoint Leahy as Captain and Harvie as his vice captain, but with Leahy not a starter the role will largely fall to Harvie on the pitch.

Loan moves for Jamie Mullins and Declan Skura followed, with both unlikley to gain significant gametime. Skura went to League Two side Accrington Stanley, while Mullins moved to fellow League Two side Bristol Rovers.

In a rather bizarre move, I also mistakenly started beef with Manchester United’s Ruben Amorim. While making a bid for 20 year old Sam Mather, he accused me of attempting to unsettle his player after I spoke about hoping to make a deal work. Strange scenes.

Four more friendlies followed in the next two weeks, with 4-5 and 4-1 wins over Paris FC and Olympic Marsielles second teams being countered out by 4-3 and 2-4 losses to SC Bastia of the French Second Tier and De Graafschamp in the Dutch second tier.

It is concerning me whilst we do score a lot, we do also concede many goals too. This may result in tactical tweaking down the line, particularly Magnus as the box-to-box midfielder who I want arriving late to crosses given his height, but we may need to ask him to sit deeper to prevent counters. One to consider.

Even more worringly, both Alex Lowry and George Abbott emerged from pre-season with injuries, with Lowry out for 5-8 weeks with a fractured metatarsal and Abbott out for 3-6 weeks with a thigh strain. Fred too was recovering from a slight groin sprain, albiet he would likely recover in time for the first league match.

In better news, young attacking mid/left winger Sam Mather did eventually join from Manchester United on a 300k with 225k over three years deal. I personally believe Mather should start at LW over Bell, given his potential, but he may play at AM while Lowry remains out injured.

And thats the end of pre-season. Not many deals considering the strenght of Wycombe’s squad, but the real tests come soon with Bradford Away to start the season. Next time we’ll cover the first few months of our journey into League One, and see if we can start better than Mike Dodds.