I can still remember the first time I ever played this wonderful game, but I was somewhat late to the party. It was sometime during the 1998/99 season, because Ibrahima Bakayoko was at Everton in real life, and I was baffled when my mate Alex, who introduced me to the game, told me that the Ivorian was absolutely class on the game. Looking back, you can see why this left me scratching my head…

Going by that timeline, I would have been 14 years old, and here I am writing this as a 41 year-old Dad, who still plays the game to this day. I stayed over Alex’s most weekends, and one of us would play Champ on his PC, while the other played whichever football game we’d rented on his PS1, and we’d alternate a few times before watching Match of the day at 10:30, a fond memory as a Man Utd fan because we were actually good back then.

Naturally, the first team I managed was United, and as Alex supported Newcastle, he took control of The Magpies. I can’t really remember how it went, but vaguely remember trying to sign Denilson, and Alex craftily trying to sign some free transfers for me when I left the room to go to the toilet, one of which was Korma Hislop – a name I have never forgotten since…

From then on I was hooked, and back then you could just borrow the disc from your mate and install the game on your own computer, which I obviously did, and after getting my brother into it, we spent countless evenings sat at a 90’s pine-effect home computer desk swearing at the screen (and each other) when results weren’t going our way…

I should add that this was all on the out-of-the-box version. I’d heard of the patched version, but didn’t actually play it until 2013 after Norbert Beerten kindly e-mailed it to me, as I wasn’t on Twitter back then, and there weren’t many CM97/98 websites around. The main reason I wanted to play the patched version though, was because of one man…

The next few years were a bit quiet, I still played the game occasionally, but it wasn’t until 2018 that my passion for it was fully reignited by this very website that you’re reading this on, which feels very surreal. I was doing one of my regular Google searches for recommended players and tactics, and up popped Dave’s site, which I’d never seen before, and I was fascinated by it. This is also when I first discovered the 2-3-1-2-2 formation, which has been a game-changer…

I’d been on Twitter a couple of years by now, mainly for football news and betting tips, but then discovered the CM97/98 community who were keeping the game alive, so I wasted little time in diving right in. My first dealings with Dave were when I messaged him during a Man City save asking for tips on conceding less goals. If my memory serves me correctly, his advice was to sign Arsenal’s Matthew Wicks…

Wicks wasn’t interested, but I still got City up to the Premiership, and went on to dominate Europe, so it all worked out in the end. The City save is particularly significant in my story because I used to tweet regular updates on it, all of which I tagged Dave in. Looking back, I’m sure I must have pissed him off at times, but if I did, he’s certainly never told me (sorry Dave!).

As the City save drew to a close, I’d been reading the blogs by Dave and his team, and decided that I’d like to have a go, and started thinking of ideas for a good story, and this led me to Basque Boys, which involved managing Athletic Bilbao and following their real-life club policy of only signing Basque players. I pitched it to Dave, he liked it, and I was now part of the blog squad!

Basque Boys seemed to be a hit with readers, and I’ve since written “2001 – An Ace Squad-ysee”, where I created a squad of CM01/02 legends to see how they’d do in CM97/98, in “A Cock and Red Bull Story” I created RB Leipzig and worked within their real-life restrictions, “Portuguese Men o’ Wolves” involved only signing Portuguese players for Wolves, and most-recently, I resurrected Basque Boys in France, which I promise I’ll finish soon!

As well as blogs, I also started creating classic squads and matches in the style of CM97/98 around COVID time, initially for fun and as a bit of a gimmick, and they were well-received, so I started doing more, and taking requests. I still do these when I have some free time, and recently did a World Cup Classics series, which you can find on my Twitter account.

Nostalgia aside, the thing I’m most thankful to this game for is meeting the blog squad boys. After initially meeting Dave, I met Andy, Deano, Matt, Nath, Phil, Rob, Ross, and Zak at various points along the way, and then had the idea of doing a multiplayer league in which we’d all manage a team and meet on Zoom one night a week to play the matches.

That league was called “Champions League Manager”, and we all managed a Champions League-winning side from 1991 to 2001. It was great fun, and off the back of it, a group chat was born, and we all still talk daily about our beloved game and other important footballing and life matters. They’re a great bunch of boys.

What I like most about this game is its simplicity and speed. I’ve dabbled in newer versions, but in my opinion they’re way too in-depth, and it can take you a whole evening just to set things up, whereas on CM97/98, you’re up and running in a few minutes, and can whizz through a season or two in one night. It also serves as a welcome escape from the footballing world of today, (which I mostly hate) back to a much simpler time, and for those reasons, I don’t think this game can be beaten.

I must admit that I’m a bit of a purist with the game as well, and although I’m all for tidying up the database to correct some anomalies etc, I don’t like to see too much being changed or messed around with. I’ve seen several fan mods and updated databases over the years, and while I can appreciate the hard work that goes into them, they’re just not for me I’m afraid.

I’d like to finish with my CM97/98 dream team. Not necessarily the best players on the game, but ones who have brought me success, and become my favourites over the years…

The No. 1 spot was a toss-up between this man and Richard Wright, but Mick just edges it…

Getting consistently high ratings as a full back is tough in the 2-3-1-2-2 formation, but not for this man…

We all know how good the Scandinavians are on this game, and the first one in my side is this versatile Dane…

An absolute rock, who I can’t ever recall having a rating below 7 every single time I’ve signed him…

No introduction necessary. I normally play him in midfield, but I had to get both him and Emmers in the team…

This man should be in Serie B with Perugia, but thanks to a database typo, he’s available to anyone. Their loss is definitely our gain…

An absolute god. I knew he was good, but I saw just how good during my Basque Boys blog…

Knutty could be better off the ball, but he’s equally adept up top and on the wing, with plenty of goals in him…

My favourite player on the game. He can be snobby with which clubs he’ll join, but well worth £1m (ish) if you can get him…

This fella certainly lives up to his real- life nickname of “Danish Dynamite” – An absolute goal machine…

And lastly, I had to get a United player in here. It’s a shame he wasn’t as good in real life, but in fairness he did have Cole, Yorke, Solskjaer, and Sheringham to compete with…

So that about wraps things up from me. Thank you for joining me for my trip down memory lane. I’d like to thank those of you who follow me on Twitter, and for all the likes, retweets, comments, reading of my blogs, and generally interacting with me over the years, it’s been great fun. CM97/98 forever!