It took me a long time just to get through all my inductions, in Football Manager 26, before I could even set foot on the touchline for my first match. That part at least is pretty familiar, for any long-running Football Manager fans. Every save takes a little while to set up, many minutes, hours, often days dedicated to press conferences, budget meetings, tactical overviews and scouting department overhauls before the first ball is kicked on the squad’s return to pre-season training. But in FM26, Sports Interactive’s big gamble on a new engine and new user interface, that’s taken to a whole new level. There is a lot to learn here – or more accurately, re-learn, if you’ve played the series before. A lot of it is the same, though within a new layout, like returning home to find your furniture’s been moved between all your rooms – maybe the odd bit re-upholstered for good measure. And some of it is properly, at first confoundingly but also potentially brilliantly, new.