The idea of the game is to use your footy managerial skills to take your team to the highest level you can. Use your judgment to buy the best players, run training sessions, pick the team and decide on tactics/formation.

You can choose whether to play Arcade mode or Career mode.

In Arcade mode you can choose which team you manage, what division to start in and the level of difficulty (Easy, Medium or Hard).

Due to the simpler nature of the game, Arcade mode is probably the best choice for beginners or for those just wanting to try out the game.

Your attendance depends on your current position in the football league and is not limited by real world restraints such as your stadium's capacity. This means in Arcade mode it is possible to take Accrington Stanley (the team with the smallest stadium) to The Premiership and get gates of over 50,000!

The other advantage of playing Arcade mode is that it is almost impossible to get sacked (unless you get relegated from League 2 that is!).

Finally, although you can choose any starting division, the traditional challenge in Arcade mode is to select your favourite team, start in League 2 and see how long it takes to climb to the top division and win The Premiership. Once you've acheived this on the Easy level why not try again on the Medium or Hard levels?

For a more involved challenge, try playing Career mode. In this version of the game, you can only manage teams who are prepared to offer you a job. Your reputation as a manager will affect the teams willing to employ you. The better you do as a manager, the better the teams from which you'll receive job offers.

Each season you will be told what your target league position is. Failure to achieve this will result in you being sacked.

When chosing which job offer to accept you should therefore take into account the stadium capacity, average attendance and financial position of the club and assess whether the target league position is achievable given the club's situation.

Attendance is related to your club's normal average gate and is limited by your stadium's capacity . If you are doing well you will attract higher crowds however, if you are languishing at the bottom of the table you'll struggle to attract a decent turn out.

Between matches you have the opportunity to buy/sell players and train your players to keep them fit and improve their effectiveness.

Each player has four attributes:

• Fitness
• Skill
• Agression
• Versatility

A player's Fitness ranges between 50% to 100% and to get the most out of them, you should aim to keep players' fitness as close to 100% as possible. A player may be less than 100% fit either because they are out of shape (i.e. not match fit) or because they have played too many games and are over tired. Shading indicates the status of a player's fitness and varies from Blue (not match fit) through Green (optimum fitness) to Red (over tired).

Skill is simple. The higher a player's skill, the better player they are.

A player's Aggression (0-10) governs how effective he is (e.g. an attacker with high aggression will score more goals than a player of the same skill but with lower aggression). It also affects how likely a player is to pick up red and yellow cards and also to get injured.

Finally, Versalility (1%-100%) is a measure of a player's ability to play out of position. For example, a defender with a skill of 10 and with 50% Versatility will have an effective skill of 5 if played in a position other than defence.

Each week you can wheel and deal on the transfer market to buy and sell players. The harder the level you are playing the less frequently new players come on the transfer market. To enter the Transfer market, click "Transfer" from the menu bar on the main page.

The Transfer Market page is split into two halves - you can see players available to buy on the left and your current squad on the right. The going rate for a player depends mainly on their skill but is also influenced by their Agression and Versatility. You will soon get a feel for what is a reasonable price for a player.

The purchase price for players available to buy is displayed in the table along with the weekly wage they are demanding. Select the player you wish to buy and then click the "Buy Player" button.

You have a Scout who will help you look for players. Select the position of the player you are looking for and then click "Brief Scout". The next time new players come onto the Transfer Market you will be guaranteed at least one in the position you specified.

Note, it is important to keep an eye on your bank balance. Be aware that you do not get any gate money from away games (except cup matches when the revenue is shared) and if you exceed your credit limit the bank has the power to force the sale of your best player to repay excess borrowings.

To sell one of your players select that player and then click the "Sell Player" button. You will then be told who is interested in that player (if anyone) and what price they are prepared to pay. If the offer is not acceptable you may reject it and then repeat the exercise and see if another club is prepared to make a better offer.

Note that although it is possible to sell a player who is injured the price you will be offered will be considerably less than if they player was uninjured.

You can run a training session before every game where you can attempt to influence any one of a players four characteristics.

• Fitness - Select "Inc Fit" to increase a player's fitness. This will improve their fitness whether they are over tired (red) or out of shape (blue).
• Skill - Select "Inc Sk" to attempt to increase a players skill. Note repeatedly attempting to increase a players skill will be effective but is likely to have a negative affect on their versatility.
• Aggression - You may choose to either increase (Inc Agg) or decrease (Dec Agg) a players aggression. As noted above the more aggresive a player is the more effective they are and the more likey they are to both get injured and to feature in the ref's book.
• Versatility - Choose "Inc Ver" to increase a players versatility. Similarly, repeatedly attempting to increase a players versatility will have a negative affect on their skill.

N.B. Selecting "None" will leave all that player's characteristics unchanged.

If you want choose the same training for every player you can do this quickly by clicking on the appropriate heading at the bottom of the page where it says "Click to select all".

There is a limit to the amount you can increase a players characteristics in any one season. The section to the right of the players show how the selected characteristic has changed compared to the original value (i.e. when you bought them/started at the club), their maximum ever value and their value at the start of the current season. As a player reaches the end of their career their skill will inevitably start to decline.

Once you have made all your selections, click "Execute training plan" and you will be taken to a page showing the training results.

Before the match starts you can select your starting 11 players, your tactics and what events during the match will trigger a break in the game and enable you to make substitutes.

Once you have made your selections click the "Play Match" button on the Pick Team screen to start the Match.

Select the players you want to start the match by clicking the boxes in the "Pick" column. The formation and strength of your team selection is displayed on the right together with the oppostion team's strengths. Your team's strengths depends on the skill and fitness of the players you select.

Small arrows to the left of a players fitness indicate whether a player is currently out of shape (blue left arrow), over tired (red right arrow) or 100% fit (green dash).

The number of yellow cards a player has received so far is also displayed. Players are suspended for 1 game after every 5 yellow cards they receive.

If you want a player to play in position other than their normal one, select the appropriate letter from the drop down box alongside that player. Their skill will change to show their effective skill in the new position.

If you have less than 11 players available, the rest of the team will be made up automatically from your reserves. Reserves do not contribute to your team's strength.

As well as selecting your starting 11 you should also select your tactics for the game. You can choose between Defensive, Balanced or Attacking tactics.

Your final decision is to choose up to three events that will cause the game to pause during a match and enable you to change your tactics and make substitutions. Note it may take a while for you to attract the refs attention so the pause in the game may be a couple of minutes after the time of the event you select. If you choose no events the full 90 minutes will be played without a pause meaning if a player is sent off or injured early in the game your team's strengths will be severely reduced and you will have no way of making any changes.

Once you are happy with your selections click "Play Match" to start the game.

When one of the events you specified occurs in the game, the game will pause and you will be taken to the Tactical Change page.

The layout is similar to the Pick Team page with the addition of match details so far and the list of available substitutes (if any). If a player has picked up any cards or an injury this information will also be displayed.

To make a substitution, simply select which player you wish to take off and which substitute you want to replace him. As with the Pick Team page you can change the position of either an existing member of the team or a substitute about to come on by selecting the appropriate letter from the drop down box next to their name.

Once you have made all your required changes click "Back to game" to return to the match.

In certain competitions, if scores are equal after extra time, the match will be decided on penalties. When this happens, you will be asked to select the order you wish your players to take the penalties. You must select the first 5 penalty takers followed by those to take the sudden death penalties should they be necessary.

Once you have done that there is nothing you can do other than click "Start Penalty Shootout" and watch the drama unfold!

Find out about other features of XL Footy Manager in this section.

Can't decide whether to play Arcade mode or Career mode? Why not do both? Once you have purchased some Game Time you are entitled to set up a Second Account. This would then enable you for example, to play your favourite team in Arcade Mode with your Primary account and use your Second Account to work your way up the slippery managerial ladder in Career Mode.

When you first set up a second account you are asked how much Game Time you want to transfer to your Second Account. However, it is easy to move time between accounts at any time by following the link from the home page once your Second account is set up.