From the very beginning, every club in Footium has had a stadium. Until now, it has just existed as part of the backdrop, the name shown on the match screen and a place you could view in your club, but not something managers could actively develop or influence.

We’re really excited to announce that for the first time, managers can upgrade their stadium stands and grow their ground over time, introducing a new progression system for clubs.

Alongside this comes a new currency (called FC), earned across the game and invested into improving your stadium (and more in future!).

Stadium size will also now have a gameplay impact during home matches, meaning the size of your ground can influence how games play out at home. Larger stadiums can also generate more FC from home fixtures, linking your club’s long-term stadium development with its financial growth.

Alongside stadium progression, Season 17 also introduces an AI Assistant Manager for caretakers and expanded caretaker objectives, alongside continued improvements to onboarding and the early player experience.

Your stadium is no longer just where matches happen, it’s something you progress alongside your club.

📅 Season 17 Dates

Pre-Season Begins: Tuesday, 17th March

First Matches Kick Off: Tuesday, 24th March

✨ TL;DR - Season 17

🏟 Stadium Progression Arrives: Upgrade your stadium stands and grow your club’s home ground over time.

💰 New Currency: Earn FC across the game and invest it into improving your stadium.

📈 Stadium Impact: Stadium size now has a gameplay impact during home matches.

🧱 Stadium Upgrades & Maintenance: Expanding your stadium brings greater rewards but also new responsibilities.

🤖 AI Assistant Manager: A new AI-powered assistant helping caretaker managers learn the game faster.

📋 Caretaker Objectives Expanded: New objectives guiding fresh recruits to learn the ropes.

🎮 Community Quiz & AMA: Join us in Discord this week for a Season 17 quiz and AMA where we’ll answer questions and share more details.

📖 Stadium & FC Deep Dive Coming: A full breakdown of the stadium and currency system will be released before pre-season.

🏟 The Stadium Era Begins

Season 17 marks the first time managers can actively develop and upgrade their stadium, turning it into a meaningful part of club progression.

Footium has always been about building a club over time. Growing your squad, competing through the leagues and creating something that lasts. Stadium progression extends that idea beyond your squad, giving your club a home that can grow alongside it.

Your stadium now plays an important role in home matches, influencing both your club’s finances and match performance. Managers will be able to earn the new currency (FC) across the game, with home matches acting as a key source, influenced by your stadium capacity as your club grows.

While growing your stadium can increase earnings, it also introduces maintenance responsibilities and longer-term planning, creating meaningful decisions about how quickly your club expands. Managers can also purchase FC in the store to fast track their stadiums' growth.

Season 17 introduces the first version of this system, and we’ll be paying close attention to how clubs interact with it. Feedback around areas such as stadium pricing, home match impact and maintenance will help shape how the system evolves over future seasons.

This is the foundation of a club development layer that we’re really excited about & have had in our vision for the game since inception. We’ll be sharing a full deep dive on the stadium and currency (FC) systems before pre-season begins, including more detail on earnings, upgrades and balancing.

💰 Introducing FC (A New Currency)

Season 17 introduces FC, a new currency used to develop your stadium and grow your club’s ground over time.

FC can be earned in several ways across the game. As mentioned, one of the main sources will be home matches, where earnings are influenced by factors such as your stadium capacity, division and match result.

FC will also form part of end-of-season league rewards, meaning final league placement can contribute to your club’s stadium progression. As part of introducing this system, the overall reward structure will be adjusted to include FC, alongside making higher placed finishes more rewarding with existing rewards. While being available to purchase in the store, FC can also be earned through other systems across the game, including areas such as competitions, quizzes and more!

As this is the first season introducing the system, we’ll be closely observing how clubs interact with it and may adjust certain values as needed. As mentioned above, we’ll also be sharing a full deep dive on stadiums and FC before pre-season begins, including more detail on earnings, upgrades and balancing.

🤖 Need help, Gaffer?

As more new managers join Footium, we’ve seen that many players are not Discord natives, which can make it harder for them to quickly get answers to questions about the game.

To help with this, we’ve introduced an AI Assistant Manager, designed to support caretaker managers as they navigate the early stages of Footium. The assistant can answer questions about Footium systems and guide new managers through the early stages of the game.

Examples include:

• Understanding player training
• Registering players for matches
• Learning key systems within the game
• Navigating important features

The assistant is powered by a knowledge base built from the official game guide, allowing new managers to quickly access helpful information without needing to search across multiple resources.

This is an early step for the system, but we’re really excited about the possibilities it opens up across the game. Over time, we’ll continue exploring ways features like this can support managers and inspire other features to improve the overall experience.

📋 Caretaker Objectives Expanded

We’ve seen that caretaker objectives have been a great way to introduce core features of the game to new managers, helping them quickly understand how Footium works.

With Season 17, we’re expanding and updating the objective system to further improve that experience. The updated objectives will continue guiding new caretakers through key systems while also introducing some of the newer features being added to the game.

This includes giving new managers an opportunity to interact with the stadium system, helping them understand how stadium development fits into the long-term progression of their club.

We’re also planning to eventually expand the objective system into the wider game, particularly as new systems like FC begin to play a larger role in club development.

The objective system will continue evolving as we refine onboarding and help new managers become confident club owners faster.

⚙️ Behind the Scenes

Alongside the features announced above, the team has also been working behind the scenes to streamline processes and make use of new technologies across the board.

This work is helping us improve areas such as onboarding, player support and marketing, while allowing the team to move faster as Footium continues to grow.

Last season was our largest ever for new caretaker managers joining the game, as well as our strongest season for Starter Bundle purchases. Seeing both of these grow together is a really encouraging sign for the long-term health of the game.

We’re excited about the unlocks that come from utilising these new technologies. There’s still a lot we want to add and improve in Footium, and having these tools available has been a big step forward for the team.

Just a few months ago, onboarding new managers into Footium was extremely difficult. Today, the experience is far more stable and aligned with the current state of the game, which has allowed us to bring in more new managers while also improving how they get started.

With onboarding now in a much healthier place, we are able to better balance its focus between continuing to improve the early player experience and expanding the gameplay systems inside Footium.

👋 Here we go

Season 17 introduces a new layer of club identity, progression and strategy, while continuing the improvements that have been strengthening the early player experience.

A reminder that we will be having a live AMA in our Discord tomorrow (11/03/26) at 7pm UTC with George (Co-founder & CEO) and Sam (Community & Marketing Lead) to discuss the new season! This will be recorded if you can’t make it.

As always, thank you for playing, sharing feedback and helping shape Footium alongside us.

We’ll see you in pre-season.

Forza Footium ⚽️