There is a saying, "Money doesn't buy happiness." If you are a football club owner with the biggest budget on the market, you can buy the best players. That can make you happy. If those players didn't bring you good profits, wouldn't that make you happy? Not if you're a billionaire. What are millions compared to billions?

How does this affect the reality of football?

In the real world, billionaire owners have reshaped the football landscape. A club that generates tens of millions in annual profit can still be a rounding error to an owner whose net worth runs into the billions. The financial scale is fundamentally different: where a typical club measures success in trophies and modest operating surpluses, a billionaire may view the entire enterprise as a passion project — or a long-term asset play.

The emotional calculus shifts too. A mid-table club's board might agonise over a £20 million signing; a billionaire-backed club can absorb that risk without blinking. But does that detachment from financial consequence make ownership more satisfying, or less? The question sits at the heart of modern football's identity crisis.

How does this affect the game of football?

Football Manager has long mirrored these real-world dynamics. In FM 2012, managing a club with a sugar-daddy owner changes every aspect of your save: transfer budgets balloon, wage structures loosen, and board expectations recalibrate. The challenge shifts from scraping together funds to managing egos and delivering instant results.

Yet the core question remains: does unlimited money make the game more enjoyable? Many FM veterans argue that the most rewarding saves come from building a club organically — developing youth, finding bargains, and climbing the leagues through shrewd management rather than financial doping. The billionaire game offers a different kind of thrill, but it may not be the one that lasts.

For a look at how earlier editions handled these dynamics, see our 2011 Football Manager article.