Squad Vision

Start

From install to your first capture

Set up your save once, take your first capture, and learn the days you can't afford to miss.

  1. 1InstallSquad Vision for Windows, and what it adds to Football Manager 27
  2. 2SetupYour team, its squads, and the month its season starts
  3. 3First captureOpen Squad Vision's views in FM, press Capture, and step through
  4. 4Keep capturingOnce a month, and before the days FM wipes your figures

Install

Squad Vision is a Windows desktop app that runs alongside Football Manager 27. It adds a plugin to the game, so the app can read it, and the views you open in FM to capture from, such as SquadVision.Squad.PlayerDetails.

Each release is built for one version of Football Manager, and the app and its plugin update together. Against any other version capture is refused, and the header says so. Every save still opens, and everything already captured reads as normal.

Setup

One career is one save. Setup gives it its shape: the teams you manage in it, each team's squads, and when their seasons start. It's where the app opens until you pick a team, because every other tab needs one.

  • Add your team: type its name and the month its season starts. A new team starts with one squad, First Team.
  • Name its squads your way: nothing Football Manager sends says which squad a view shows, so call each one what you call it: U21s, U18s or a B team.
  • Star the primary squad: your first team. Squad depth scores players against it, and a capture of it never asks about a youth intake, because new players there are signings.
  • Set the month your season starts: July for most leagues, December for Brazil. It decides which season every capture falls in.

Names are typed by hand and never checked against Football Manager's, so Manchester United and Man Utd both work. Renaming a team or a squad changes its name and nothing else.

Compared with

Each squad has its own league to be measured against, because a club's squads don't all play in the same one. A player's card compares him with his squad's league, at that league's latest capture this season, so you set it once rather than every month.

Leagues lists each league you've captured, with a season start of its own. Unlike a team's, that one can change at any time: it just files the league's captures again by date.

The choices are the leagues you've captured in League mode, and No league for a squad Football Manager keeps no league figures for, such as an English club's U21s. Squad Vision never guesses, because nothing captured says which league a squad plays in.

Your first capture

Pick the squad on Data capture and press Capture, named for Football Manager's date, such as Capture 2 Sep. The first time, the defaults take every player and every step, and the session walks you through Football Manager one view at a time.

Each step names the view it needs. Open it in FM for that squad, press Fetch from FM, check what it read, then Capture & next.

  • Squad view first: it says who's in the squad, and every other step finds players by their Football Manager ID.
  • Saved as you go: each step is stored when you capture it, so stopping halfway loses nothing.
  • Fewer players than FM lists? FM only sends rows it has drawn. Drag slowly down the list in one pass, then Re-fetch.
  • Then positions: you're asked once where to file each player who can play more than one position, with the strongest already picked.

Every capture is filed under the date Football Manager shows, so a save has to be loaded. Capture again on the same date and it replaces that capture; any other date adds one beside it.

When to capture

Football Manager wipes figures on a schedule and never says so, and Squad Vision can't give back a month you didn't capture. Capture each squad once a month, and each league you compare against, and don't miss these days:

  • Early in the new season: a season runs from its first capture, so the sooner it's in, the less goes uncounted. Until a league's first capture of the season, there's nothing to compare against.
  • Before a loanee comes back: the moment he's back, his figures from the loan club are gone from FM for good.
  • Before the season rolls over: rollover zeroes every player at once, so capture the final month first.

A capture on the 1st belongs to the month before, except on a season's first day. FM has only just turned the page, so 1 September holds August's games and sits under August.

What FM does to your data

Almost everything surprising about Squad Vision comes from one fact: Football Manager wipes a player's figures on a schedule, and says nothing when it does. His statistics and metrics go when he changes club, and everyone's go again when the season rolls over.

Checking a loan against FM's squad view? On Loan From is filled in for both directions, so Squad Vision goes by Playing Time, which reads Out On Loan for a player who's away. It's the only column that says which way a loan runs.

  • A loan out

    His figures are wiped when he comes back. Capture while he's still away, and Squad Vision keeps them under the club he played for.

  • A loan in

    Nothing is zeroed. He plays your matches, so his figures are yours, and there's nothing to race.

  • Season rollover

    Every player is zeroed at once. A capture taken after it holds zeros for a season that had real figures the day before.

  • The stars

    FM draws them against the squad you're viewing, so signing someone better lowers everyone else's. Read them within one capture, not as progress.

Good to know

Get the season start right before the first capture: once anything is captured it can't change.

Moved club in the same career? Add the new club as another team in the same save, not a new save.

Anything that changed between one season's last capture and the next's first counts in neither, so capture early.

Works well with

Data capture → How does it all get recorded?

Every step of a capture session, and what each one reads from FM.

 Summary → What happened this season?

Your latest capture against the month before, as soon as it's in.