Football Manager Handheld 2007

There's a theory about Football Manager Handheld that says its keenest audience isn't really hardcore fans of the PC version. It's not even PSP-owning footy nuts, although they're clearly important.

Instead, it's lapsed players. People who used to be obsessed by FM (or earlier incarnations of Championship Manager), but for whatever reason – jobs, spouses, kids, hard drugs – lost the habit.

For these people – and I'm one of them – Football Manager Handheld is manna from Heaven.

Seen in this context, its limitations compared to the latest PC version (there's no 2D match engine, no complex social interactions with players, and significantly reduced tactical flexibility) aren't as much of a gripe.

The most hardcore PC players will no doubt sniff disdainfully. But if you last seriously played FM/CM a few years ago, the ability to rattle through seasons on FM Handheld and focus on the core tasks of squad rotation, transfers and basic tactics is a Very Good Thing indeed.

That said, when we reviewed last year's FM Handheld, we were still concerned about some missing elements, including making requests of the chairman, media interaction, and international matches.

The fact that all three feature in this new edition shows how developer Sports Interactive has spent the last year taking stock and implementing the feedback of the game's fans, who'd expressed similar reservations.

Some little improvements are the most important. You can now offer your players to clubs, for instance, making it quicker and easier to shift squad deadweights off your wage bill. You can ask the board for more transfer dosh or wage budget, or even beg for 'more time to rebuild the squad' (that is, you're bottom of the league and the fans are posting Polonium-210 parcels through your door).

There's more media involvement too, such as being able to respond to transfer rumours, and you now have two scouts who, besides searching for players, also provide reports on upcoming opponents and can be sent off to assess individual transfer targets.

It's also tougher. The super-tactic that let me take any Conference side to Champions League glory within six seasons last time round (in short: 4-1-3-2 with a few tweaks, and snapping up new unsigned young players in August and January) doesn't work any more.

You have to, y'know, manage.

Actually, Lower League Management is a bit of a grind in this edition, as the flow of free transfers has been cut drastically, and there's more competition for them. More realistic? Sure, but I'd argue that in a handheld footy management sim, that element of wish fulfilment (Tamworth sticking four goals past Barcelona at the Camp Nou) should still be possible.

Still, at higher levels, the player database feels just right, with ample scope for Wenger-like uncovering of hidden gems abroad.

Talking of foreigners, international management is the other big addition to FM Handheld 2007, which you have to unlock by being successful in the domestic game. It's a welcome addition, along with the greater feedback when managing a club over when your players are picked for their international teams.

All this, plus a neat multiplayer mode – play friendlies against mates via wi-fi using your saved club side – and the ability to edit the game database to account for the latest transfers or give Walsall an Abramovich-level transfer budget. In truth, the latter is a bit tortuous, but will presumably prove its worth if other people do the hard work online, enabling you to simply import the latest database files to your PSP.

FM Handheld 2007 is noticeably improved on its predecessor, and I'd argue that the creator's decision to resist the temptation to shoehorn in a 2D match engine is a good one, for now. Above all, the new features haven't come at the expense of speed and the slick user-interface, which is perhaps the greatest achievement.