What are you on about? FIFA needs better physics and defensive AI, not to allow me to buy virtual items...

so I guess you're going to be a fan of FIFA 12 ?

I believe they both tried something like this before and it was merely a nice distraction. This is all unneccessary though, because people play sports games to play that sport.

um.. what's a manager game???

In sports games, you play as a regular "god player" (i.e you can control individual players)  but in manager games, you are restricted to the role of a manager (or coach), you run the day to day of the clubs, set the teams, micro manage the team's finances and so on, but when it comes to match day, you can't control anyone only make subs and tactical changes.

Sorta like this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJwywF-yR84&playnext=1&list=PLA9C5028C1DAF25BF

What you're suggesting is player management, i.e. manage the life of one chosen player, not managing the destiny of your favourite club. Wouldn't be successful imo as only few people would only want to manage the life of one player.

Manager games work very well on a club level though and while I don't play them anymore today I had a lot of fun with football manager games in the past (Bundesliga Manager, Anstoß, Hattrick, Fußball Manager aka FIFA Manager).

Transfer market, team and player morale system, detailed contract negotiation, improving player skills, press interviews, keep players motivated during a match (halftime speech) as well as between matches, player punishment, individual training and financial micromanagement (how to earn your club more money with yearly sponsor negotiations, adjusting ticket prices for every single match and spend the money on e.g. stadium improvements, national and international scouting, training facilites, medical department) are features that have been included, refined, removed and re-included in football managers over the past 20 years.

Latest example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2JEdzEbIoE

You could also couple a FIFA manager and FIFA game (or Anstoss and Anstoss Action) to play the games yourself.

I don't know if it's possible in the more recent FIFA games though.

Pro evo Soccer (and fifa)  already does something like that called "Be a legend" and it's amazing

dude you're from the UK, you should know the top EU PC selling game for the past decade... Football Manager... where 75% of what you do is manage money ^^

If I play a football game I play it for the game mechanics. I could care less about buying Messi a bandana.

That would be pretty sweet though, but not in the way you describe it.