Tired of winning trophies or achieving your vision too quickly? Discover the wonders of non-league football by going from zero to hero. Passion4FM.com gives you 7 FM24 Lower League clubs to manage that will certainly put you to the test.
The arrival of Football Manager 2024 reaches closer day by day and for some of us, it means the procular task to find out who to manage on Football Manager 2024. Last time, we took a closer look at 16 clubs to manage on Football Manager 2024. To follow up on our clubs to manage series, we bring you a handful exciting FM24 lower league clubs to manage.
In this event, we have looked at non-league clubs around Europe. Some are semi-professional or amateur clubs with a long and rich history but has struggled in the lower leagues for decades, and needs a revival.
Others are probably pretty unknown to you, as they have no prior history of huge relevance to speak of. Regardless, we hope you will find a new interesting lower league save for Football Manager 2024 with our team recommendations.
Without further ado, here are 9 FM24 lower league clubs to manage that will certainly put you to the test!
READ MORE | Discover more clubs to manage recommendations for FM24.
9 Lower League Clubs to Manage on Football Manager 2024
Oldham Athletic – Vanarama National League
The English Vanarama National League includes a number of former clubs who have participated in the English Football League at some point of their club history. However, the only club to have played in the Premier League is Oldham Athletic.
The club was founded in 1895 and play their games at Boundary Park, a stadium with a capacity of 13,512 spectators. Nicknamed The Latics, the club were one of the founding members of the Premier League in 1992 but soon relegated to the second and third tier.
Since 1997, Oldham has been followed by one financial crisis after another. It ended with a relegation to the Vanarama National in 2021/22 – becoming the first former Premier League club to end up in non-league football.
After their relegation, Oldham was bought by English businessman Frank Rothwell who appointed former Everton player and caretaker manager David Unsworth.
Despite of being a non-league team, Oldham’s future seems more promising than ever as they have managed to buy their own ground. However, the current situation at the club can’t get any worse.
So far this season they have only won one out of 7 matches and finds themselves on the 18th place, three points ahead of the relegation spot.
Oldham’s trophy cabinet is fairly meagre. It’s only been a few League Championships. However, they finished as runner-ups in the 1989-90 EFL Cup when Joe Royle had a fairly decent spell as the manager.
Therefore is Oldham a great candidate for a FM24 lower league rebuild save. In fact, an Oldham save combines the historical background with the challenge of turning the club upside down and build the club from the ground up to try to win the club’s first ever major trophy in their nearly 130 year long history.
Koninklijke HFC – Dutch Tweede Divisie
If you’re up for a typical lower league save, then managing one of the smaller clubs in football Europe could be a wonderful affair, whether it be starting in the bottom of the English pyramid or selecting one from one of the lower levels of top 10 leagues.
In Netherlands, you have the prospect of managing the oldest football club in the country.
Koninklijke Haarlemsche Football Club was founded 180 years ago on September 15th and is one of the smallest clubs based in Tweede Dividie. Their stadium, Spanjaardslaan in Haarlem, has a capacity of 1000 spectators.
HFC has won the KNVB Cup on three occasions, 1904, 1913 and 1915, and have three national titles. All unofficial as the Eredivisie wasn’t yet established at the time.
For the moment, HFC holds the records for the most goals scored in a competitive match – beating VVV 25-0 in the 1903/04 Cup competition.
Getting Koninklijke HFC promoted to the Eredivisie seems like an impossible task. But with great dedication and smartness in the transfer market by using loans and free agents to your advantage, everything may be possible.
It will take years to build the club from the ground up but can be the challenge you need to fully embrace how captivating the adventures of Football Manager can be.
Frem – Danish 3. Division
When thinking about Danish football clubs your first thought might be FC København, Brøndby or FC Nordsjælland. Eventhough the first two are among the most successful clubs in Denmark with respectively 13 and 11 Danish Championships, there are a few who have won the Danish League more than five times. One of them is Boldklubben Frem.
BK Frem was established in 1886 and is one of many Copenhagen based clubs. They call themselves the Authentic Copenhagens (Ægte København) and play their matches at Valby Idrettspark – a stadium with a capacity of 12000 spectators where 4400 are seated.
For the last 40 years, the club have been on the verge of bankruptcy on several occasions. Once resulting demotion to the sixth level of the Danish pyramid.
Last season, Frem ended on the 11th place in 2. Division meaning, they had to play relegation play-off. The result was relegation to the 3. Division.
That’s far away from their golden era. Outside a Danish Championship title in 1923, they dominated in the 1930s by winning 3 titles in 6 years and four runners-up between 1930 and 1938. In total they have 6 Danish Championship titles in addition to two Danish Cup trophies (1956 & 1978).
Now it’s been 20 years since they participated in the Superliga for the last time.
Managing BK Frem on Football Manager 2024 gives you the chance to challenge FC København to become the best club in the city, as well as in the nation. Turning BK Frem into a title contender will be far from easy as they lack both the coaching staff and facilities to maintain a Superliga status for a longer period. However, it could be the lower league journey you need to fell in love with managing a new country outside the big 5 we traditionally opt for.
Piacenza Calcio 1919 – Italian Serie D
Piacenza Calcio 1919 is one of many phoenix clubs in Southern Europe. Piacenza was re-founded in 2012 and acquired the rights to use the branding of Piacenza Calcio, who participated in the Serie A between 1993 and 2003.
In that period Piacenza produced several Italian internationals. Simone and Filippo Inzaghi, Alberto Gilardini and Alessandro Lombardi was just a few players in an all-Italian squad. This was quite unordinary these days as the Italian top division featured world-class players like Ronaldo (Inter Milan), Gabriel Batistuta (Fiorentina), or Oliver Bierhoff (Udinese).
After going bankruptcy in 2012, Piacenza was disbanded and forced to start from scratch in the fifth division, Eccellenza Emilia-Romagna – one of many regional divisions.
In the last ten years, Piacenza has established themselves in the Italian third tier by competing on that level for seven seasons until a relegation to Serie D for 2023/24 season.
This gives you the chance to build the club from according to your preferences with the historical backdrop of the former club’s achievement.
The current squad is filled with under-21 youngsters that have recently entered the team. Despite of an average squad age of 23.1, Piacenza is far from having the youngest team in Serie D. That title goes to Club Milano (20.8, according to Transfermarkt).
Continuing with the club vision to develop youth is all up to you but could make an interesting scenery to revive the club from the ashes.
Truro City – English Vanarama National South
One of the wonders of Football Manager is to create your own story by taking a non-league club up the leagues and create history. By managing Truro City, you’ll be able to do just that.
Despite bring founded in 1889, Truro City has never played at a higher level than the sixth tier of the English Football League. Based in the historical landscape of Cornwall, which features castles, the wonderful scenery of the steep cliffs at Land’s End or the beautiful coastline, football is probably not the first thing we think about for this region of UK.
In fact, Truro City is the highest ranked club within the county.
The White Tigers had their best era 12 years ago when they achieved five promotions in six seasons – from level 10 to level 6.
After gaining promotion from Southern League ahead of this season the short-term challenge is to remain in the Vanarama National League South by avoiding relegation.
Then you can build momentum over the next couple of seasons to try to advance up the tiers.
The long-term ambitions is to create history at the club by winning the club’s first major trophy. They have never reached the second round of the FA Cup nor won the FA Trophy. However, they won the FA Vase in 2006-07.
As you build the club into a Premier League candidate, you should aim to get approval from the board to build a new stadium that they own. At the moment they are forced to play their matches at Bolitho Park, as they share ground with Plymouth Parkway FC.
Managing Truro City in FM24 is probably going to be one of the hardest challenges in England. Are you up for a English non-league save for FM24?
Royal Cappellen – Belgian National Division 1
Despite being founded in 1906, Royal Cappellen has never won a major trophy. They promoted to the Eerste Nationale ahead of this season, and could face a tough challenge to retain a spot in the third tier of the Belgian football system.
Throughout their history this this semi-professional club has mostly been playing in the Belgian fourth level regardless of the structure and the league’s name.
They had a quick spell in the third tier in the beginning of the 1950s but got relegated as quickly as their promotion. And, it would take another 50 years to replicate the feat.
For the last 20 years, they have struggled to get out of fourth tier, until now.
Based in Kappelen in the northern parts of Antwerp, and close to the border of Netherlands, managing Royal Cappellen can be a chance to write history in one of the most traditional minor clubs in Belgium.
Their close proximity to Royal Antwerp FC gives you the challenge to try to become the best club in the region. You’ll be able to take advantage of their close location to Dutch city Roosendaal, and try to sign talented players from the region of North Brabant, or who has come through the Academy of Royal Antwerp, NAC Breda, KAA Gent and Club Brugge, as these clubs are located not too far away.
Your task is to avoid relegation in the first season and eventually hunt for promotion as you revolutionize the club with a clear football identity and a club vision that can make the club prosper both financially and on the pitch.
AS Cannes – French Championnat National 2
After four seasons in the fifth tier of the French football league system, AS Cannes has started their rise to power. Founded in 1905, the club has played 22 seasons in Ligue 1 but has not competed on that level since 1997/98 season.
Over the next 10 years they were slowly declining until they were excluded from professional football by DNCG in 2014, due to their financial situation, making the matter worse. Since then, it has been a battle in the lower regional divisions until the promotion to Championnat National 2 ahead of this season.
AS Cannes is probably best known for their youth Academy and for developing French legends like Zinedine Zidane, Gaël Clichy, Johan Micoud, or Patrick Vieira, rather than their trophy cabinet.
Les Dragons have only won the Coupe de France once but it is now 91 years ago. In 1932-33 they achieved their best performance in Ligue 1 by finishing on an honorable second place.
After Friedkin Group, which also owns AS Roma, bought a majority share in AS Cannes, future looks more promising than ever! With a billionaire as President, AS Cannes will be one of the new sugar daddy clubs in FM24 – something you might profit from both in the transfer market and when upgrading training facilities to develop better players.
Falkenbergs FF – Swedish Ettan Södra
It’s been 10 years since Falkenbergs FF qualified for Allsvenskan under Hasse Eklunds leadership for the first time in the club’s history. Over the next two seasons, Falkenbergs FF should struggle in the relegstion zone until they finally relegated at the end of 2015 season after 18 matches being involved in some high-scoring games where they narrowly lost 4-3 to both AIK and Malmö.
But they would soon promote to the Allsvenskan again. Between 2017 and 2020 Falkenbergs FF fought in the relegation zone until their faith was eventually sealed.
For the last three years it has been a steep decline. Relegation from Allsvenskan 2020 was quickky folliwed up by a relegation to Ettan – the third tier in the Swedish football pyramid. Actually, that’s the level they have competed at the most since being founded in 1928.
Falkenbergs FF stand out for their good youth and training facilities – making them an ideal club for a youth development save in the lower leagues. Their current squad has an average age of 23.7.
Based between Gothenburg and Halmstad, it gives you a great chance to try to poach released youth from their youth intakes. Or, you can try to consistently create golden generations to build a squad of players from your own Academy, season after season.
The challenge for the first season is to build upon their second place in Ettan Södra and try to promote to Superettan. Then, it will be a matter of finishing in the upper half in Allsvenskan and eventually qualify for one of the European competitions for the first time in the club’s history.
Whatever follows will be writing history as they have never finished better than 13th place. Nor have they won the Swedish Cup.
TSV 1860 München – German 3. Liga
1860 München was a regular Bundesliga team in the 90s and early 2000s. However, after relegating from the Bundesliga 2003-04 they competed at the second level until they were unable to obtain a 3.Liga licence following relegation that resulted in both the Managing Director and President resigning. When the new owner didn’t pay the necessary fees, 1860 München was demoted to Regionalliga Bayern.
Despite immediate promotion to 3.Liga, they have been unable to get out of this dark period for the club. Die Löwen’s best position in 3.Liga has been a fourth place – miles away from former glories.
1860 München golden period came in the middle of the 60s. They became Bundesliga Champions in 1965-66. One year after ending as runner up in the European Cup Winner’s Cup 1964-65, which they qualified for after winning the DFB-pokal 1963-64. That was their second Cup trophy.
In FM24, you could set yourself the challenge of only signing under-23 players to revive 1860 München into a Bundesliga club. Then, you should aim to become the best club in the city by finishing above their main rivals, FC Bayern München – a nearly impossible task considering their dominance over the last 50 years.
Honorable Mentions
Torquay United FC – Vanarama National League South (England)
Lyn 1896 – PostNord-ligaen (Norway)
Grazer AK – 2. Liga (Austria)
Académica de Coimbra – 3.Liga (Portugal)
Amazonas FC – Serie C (Brazil)
Dumbarton FC – cinch League 2 (Scotland)
L. R. Vicenza – Serie C (Italy)
Racing Club de France Football – Championnat National 2 (France)
Have you ever managed any of these lower league clubs in Football Manager? Tell us about your best non-league career from FM23.
