Championship Manager: Season 97-98

Championship Manager 97-98 is a game in the Championship Manager series of football management simulation video games. The gameplay remained very similar to other games based on Championship Manager 2 but offered far more than a simple database update. It was a clear indication of Sports Interactive's intent for the future of the franchise in two ways: the inclusion of a database editor with the game showed that Sports Interactive were actively encouraging users to modify and customise the game, and the inclusion of nine playable leagues from across Europe was a clear sign of things to come, in terms of the growing depth and global scope of the game. The game featured nine playable league systems, three times more than in the previous version. It was also the first time ever that players could run more than one league concurrently (up to three in this edition). For example, the English, Spanish, and Italian leagues would all be simulated and players could manage a club in any of these nations and move between them. It also allowed the user to view results and league tables in these selected leagues, adding to the sense of realism. This was also the first time in the series that the Portuguese football league system had ever been a playable league. Aside from the added playable leagues, bug fixes, and updated player data, there were also other new features in the game. Club squads could now contain 32 players (two more than the previous version), the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Cup formats were changed to reflect their real-life counterparts, added control over tactics (including selection of set-piece takers) and international under-21 matches were now simulated fully.