Miles Jacobson: FM 2011 is «the best football management simulation that we have ever made»!

Miles Jacobson, Sports Interactive Studio Director

Here it is, finally, our exclusive interview with Miles Jacobson, studio director at Sports Interactive, the company that makes our beloved Football Manager game. As you all know Football Manager 2011 was announced yesterday, the game will be released before Christmas 2010, and Miles seems to be as excited as we are about that.

I want to thank all of you again for submitting your questions. Unfortunately not all of them made it into the final interview, many were taken out because Miles can not comment on FM 2011 features that were not announced yet. Here’s the interview, I hope you will enjoy it!

Johnny Karp: Hello Miles and thank you for this interview. I know that you have been a fan of the game before joining Sports Interactive, could you tell us more about that period and how you joined the team at SI?

Miles Jacobson: I’ve been involved since CM2, so a very long time. I was a big fan of the first Collyer brothers game, and got involved as a beta tester on CM2, which I actually had to go out and buy a new PC to play which, at the time, was the most expensive thing I’d ever bought (and on hire purchase, which was a very bad idea!).

Whilst beta testing, I started doing my own data updates, which a few friends thought were good, so I put them online, being taught how to do so by a guy known as Boah who made the first editor for the game. After a while the website became too much for me to manage, so someone called Marc got in touch and put my updates on his website instead. Both Boah (aka Svein Kvernoey) and Marc Duffy ended up joining SI too, and have both been here for more than 10 years!

Over the years I became English head research, UK head researcher, SI’s business consultant and then Managing Director of SI when Ov Collyer left to go travelling, all whilst working in the music industry.

Eventually things at SI got too busy to continue doing my other job, so I left that and went full time in 2000 or so.

Johnny Karp: You have worked on several versions of the game so far but which one is your favourite?

Miles Jacobson: My favourite always tends to be the latest version of any of our games.

Johnny Karp: Here’s a question from our reader Matthew: “With so many players on FM how do you find the time to watch each of them and gain accurate attributes on each player because you would need to employ thousands (possibly tens of thousands) to effectively do this surely!?!”

Miles Jacobson: I don’t personally! We have over 50 head researchers in different countries and regions, and well over 1,000 scouts around the world who are watching players week in, week out, at first team, reserve team, B team, C team and youth levels. Most of the researchers have been with us for many, many years.

Johnny Karp: Our friend from Singapore, Lye Kuek Hin wants to know about your FM skills: “What is your biggest achievement in FM10? What type of approach and tactics do you use?”

Miles Jacobson: I’m quite proud of my record as Watford manager in my main career game on FM10 as by 2026 I’d won everything I could, was top of the hall of fame, and England manager too. I stopped playing that game to move onto testing FM11, but only once my legendary striker Nathan Steed had become England’s record goalscorer, topping Wayne Rooney’s record.

Johnny Karp: Mariano from Argentina has seen a lot in South American football, so he asks: “Will FM include at some point situations like fans throwing a stone to the referee, managers threatened by hooligans, bribes to refeeres, positive doping, players that divide a team because of a girlfriend and all that kind of stuff that happens in real football?”

Miles Jacobson: No. It’s not something that we approve of, not something that should be part of football, and we don’t want to promote it in any way.

Johnny Karp: Now a few quick questions about your football favourites. Which is your favourite team?

Miles Jacobson: I support Watford, but also have a season ticket at Arsenal, and go and see AFC Wimbledon too. I also admire any team who play fast, passing, attacking football.

Johnny Karp: The football player that you like the most?

Miles Jacobson: At the moment my favourite player to watch is Leo Messi, but that’s not really a surprise. He’s one of the few players in the world that can really be called world class.

Johnny Karp: Your favourite football moment?

Miles Jacobson: John Barnes, a player who I saw make his debut as a substitute for Watford, scoring for England against Brazil. An amazing goal from an amazing player.

John Barnes

Johnny Karp: How would you describe England’s performance at the 2010 World Cup in a few words?

Miles Jacobson: Not good enough.

Johnny Karp: How would you describe FM2011 in just a few words?

Miles Jacobson: The best football management simulation that SI have ever made.

Johnny Karp: The last question comes from the Republic of Ireland, Sears asks: “What’s your opinion about this website, the ‘My Football Manager Story’ blog?”

Miles Jacobson: I enjoy reading a lot of the FM stories that are on the net, and enjoy pointing them out to people too – it shows how far the game has come that people really do treat it as an alternative reality, and that people really enjoy reading about their stories. It also shows us how wonderful our community are to take the time to write them!

That’s about it, I would like to thank Miles yet again for being so kind to take the time to answer to our questions. I know that many of you wanted to know more about the FM 2011 features but, as I said, you will get that information from here as soon as it will become available. Until then, you can watch the Football Manager 2011 announcement video if you haven’t done that already, you’ll get all the FM 2011 details that are available up to this point. Last but not least, now comes the best part of the interview, commenting on what Miles has said! :)