The latest iteration of EA Sports' immensely popular FIFA series was recently released, offering updated squads, revamped player attributes, and HyperMotion Technology, among other changes. Unsurprisingly, EA has again made the divisive decision to put the majority of their focus on the controversial Ultimate Team mode. It's not hard to see why, as EA confirmed in a recent annual report that they made a whopping $1.62bn from their various Ultimate Team modes between April 2020 to March 2021.
Despite the mode's enormous success, there are many FIFA players who are against Ultimate Team. This is usually either because they prefer to play single-player or are against the mode's gambling and "pay-to-win" aspects. Thankfully, the single-player Career Mode is still available in the game, offering a viable alternative. The mode hasn't received much attention from EA in recent years, which can make it fairly lackluster, though there are a few different FIFA 22 Career Mode challenges that are certain to add a layer of intrigue to any playthrough.
Updated on May 4, 2022, by Jack Pursey: With most leagues now reaching the end of their season, fans around the world are coming to terms with the fact that their favorite team won't be playing for a couple of months. Consequently, many people will be firing FIFA up this summer to get their sporting fix. There will also be an influx of new players to FIFA 22 this month, as the game is included in May's PlayStation Plus giveaway.
So, for those booting up the game this summer and wanting some single-player challenges to partake in, we've updated this list to include a few more of the best FIFA 22 Career Mode Challenges.
13 Over-35 Challenge
As the name suggests, the Over-35 Challenge tasks players with creating a custom team that comprises players aged 35 and over. This may sound tough, though players from all over the world and in any team are available, so Cristiano Ronaldo, Thiago Silva, and Luka Modric are all eligible.
However, the real difficulty of this challenge comes in the seasons that follow, where players must find continued success with a team that is deteriorating and having to deal with numerous retirements every year.
12 Wonderkid Challenge
The Wonderkid Challenge is similar to the Over-35 Challenge, but with youth players instead of experienced ones. Like the Over-35 challenge, the wonderkid challenge tasks gamers with creating a team from scratch but only filling it with players aged 20 and under.
The challenge can make the first couple of seasons difficult, though if the youngsters are developed well and aren't poached by other teams, then the Wonderkid Challenge will become a walk in the park before long.
11 Win The Premier League With 5 Different Teams
The Premier League has become the strongest league in the world by a fair margin. England's top division is currently dominated by Liverpool and Manchester City, though Newcastle's takeover could see them competing sooner rather than later, while Manchester United, Arsenal, and Chelsea are also able to spend eye-watering sums of cash that can have them winning titles again before long.
This challenge tasks players with throwing loyalty out of the window and reaching the pinnacle of England with 5 different teams. The task is harder than it seems, as once players build a title-winning team, they then need to leave for a different side and compete against that same side that they built. The fact that players rarely move between the top Premier League clubs also adds to the challenge, as the manager essentially has to build 5 different teams.
10 No Bookings
The no bookings challenge is exactly what it sounds like. Players must begin their managerial career with the bizarrely wholesome intent of not allowing any member of their team to receive a yellow or red card. This is far easier said than done, as along with there being the ever-present possibility of an accidental clumsy challenge, it also means that players can't intentionally bring down an opponent to prevent a counter-attack at the expense of a yellow card.
If a player does receive a booking, the match must immediately be forfeited and the booked player cannot play for the team again for the rest of the season. The challenge isn't just great for throwing curveballs at people since they can potentially lose a star player at any time, it also forces them to improve their tackling.
9 Super League
It may seem like little more than a fever dream, but in 2021, some of Europe's top and richest clubs announced that they planned to form a breakaway super league. The planned league was similar to American sports leagues like the NBA and NFL in design, in the sense that it was a select group of teams who would simply play each other over and over again, without any fear of relegation, and no Champions League spots to miss out on.
This enraged fans, who believed that it was taking true competition out of the sport, leading to a series of protests that included Manchester United fans breaking into Old Trafford and ultimately forcing a massive game against Liverpool to be postponed for safety concerns. Ultimately, the league's plans were effectively canceled.
Although the prospect of it happening in real life evidently made fans' blood boil, the super league concept has been a common FIFA career mode challenge for years. When starting a new career mode, select a league that doesn't have relegation or Champions League places and simply swap its current teams for the sport's elite clubs, thus creating a league that won't have serious repercussions for losing but will be incredibly difficult to win.
8 Random Signings
For some people, buying and selling players is one of the most exciting aspects of management in FIFA 22. However, in real life, managers are having less and less say in a team's comings and goings, with a club's board members like the Chairman, Director of Football, and Head of Recruitment now dictating the team's transfer business. Unlike the Football Manager series, FIFA 22 doesn't have an option to let a board member control transfers, but that doesn't mean that the player has to control who comes and goes.
The random signings challenge requires players to select the maximum Financial Takeover option at the start of a new save file, effectively giving the team unlimited money. Then, they must play Russian roulette with their side by randomly picking five of their players to be sold and five new players to replace them. Players may luck out and significantly improve their squad, or they may sell their star players for a bunch of bench warmers.
7 Newcastle Takeover
The majority of entries on this list will consist of challenges that add extra difficulty to the game, though it's hard not to include the biggest story in the sport right now.
Newcastle United has recently been purchased by a Saudi Arabia-led consortium for $415 million. This has instantly made Newcastle the wealthiest team in the world, as the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund is valued at an eye-watering $429 billion.
With big money takeovers becoming more and more popular, particularly in England's Premier League, FIFA's Career Mode implemented a Financial Takeover option a few years ago. For this challenge, simply choose Newcastle, implement the largest takeover possible, and use their new riches to transform them into a trophy magnet.
6 Only Sign Academy Players
On the complete other end of the spectrum to the Newcastle takeover challenge is the academy players challenge. Ideal for clubs with a financially tight owner, this challenge bans players from making incoming transfers and challenges them to only sign players by promoting them from their youth system.
FIFA 22's Career Mode lets players hire youth scouts, sign youth players to their academy, and then promote the best ones to their first team. With high-quality scouts, a well-thought-out plan, and plenty of patience, players can potentially build a title-winning team using only homegrown talent.
5 Rebuild Barcelona
Barcelona is currently going through one of its worst periods in recent memory. The club reportedly has an astonishing debt of $1.56 billion, which is being blamed on the club's former president, Josep Maria Bartomeu.
The club's debt has caused a plethora of issues to Barcelona, with the departure of Lionel Messi being the most prominent. So, for those wanting to take the club back to its days of dominating the sport, the challenge of rebuilding Barcelona and taking them back to the heights of world football provides an intruding challenge.
4 Rebuild Sunderland
Barcelona isn't the only team in need of a rebuild, as former Premier League mainstays, Sunderland, are still in League One following their brutal double relegation, which was partially documented in the popular Netflix series Sunderland 'Til I Die. To make matters worse for the northern club, their biggest rivals, Newcastle, have just become the richest club in the world. Suffice to say, Sunderland is in desperate need of some success.
Rebuilding Sunderland won't be easy, but taking the League One club back into the Premier League would be a fantastic achievement, and a victory over Newcastle would top it off.
3 Win The League Title In The Top Five Leagues
This challenge is a great choice for those who get bored of only playing as one team and like to frequently switch between jobs. This indecisiveness usually sees players starting a new Career Mode after a couple of seasons, though this challenge offers a way to switch teams while sticking with the same save file.
According to the UEFA Country Coefficients, England, Spain, Italy, Germany, and France are home to the current top five leagues. This challenge could take well over ten seasons when picking a high difficulty setting, making it one of the longest challenges on this list.
2 Win A Major Club And Country Trophy In The Same Season
FIFA 22 continues the trend of allowing players to manage a club and country team simultaneously - offering great variety by letting players compete in multiple competitions. Winning with multiple teams at the same time can be tricky, however, as players need to adjust to and from different playstyles and different sets of players.
So, a good challenge for any career mode is winning a major trophy with a club and country. Which trophies to realistically aim for depends on the teams being managed, though the World Cup and Champions League offer an enticing target.
1 From League Two To Premier League Champions
Without a doubt, the toughest challenge on this list, taking a League Two team to the top of the English pyramid could take a multitude of seasons when played on a high difficulty level. Players shouldn't expect any instant success with this challenge, though taking a League Two club to Premier League champions would be well worth the effort and should keep players busy enough to ignore the temptation of Ultimate Team.
For those who want to make the challenge as tough as possible, they should set Negotiation Strictness to Strict and Financial Takeover to Disabled.
FIFA 22 was released on September 26, 2021, and is available on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch.