A Week In The Life Of A Database Lead

Have a peek into the life of the FIFA Manager 07 Lead Database Researcher

The following article documents my working week from Monday 14th August 2006 to Friday 18th August as I prepared the UK and Ireland database ahead of the first database deadline.

The previous Friday I had set the research team the time of 9am on Monday morning to send me their final updates ahead of our first deadline. That would give me a week to merge their work together, and check everything was OK. I began the week by logging into my email on Monday morning hoping that all of the researchers had remembered to send their work. Thankfully they had! I then imported their files into the master database. I now had the task of checking that the data for each of the countries in the UK and Ireland was OK, as well as adding any missing data that was essential to the first deadline. My first dilemma was where on earth do I start!?

I decided to start with the Competition data for each country. I checked the league structures in England and encountered my first problem. The “C Division” has been extended to 24 teams this year, but the editor would only allow 22 teams. So before I could fix this I needed the editor software to be upgraded. I was then able to import the 2 new teams Weymouth and St. Albans City into the league.

My next problem was with “The LDV Vans Trophy”. It has a new sponsor from this season on and is now called the “Johnstone’s Paint Trophy”. I changed the name of the competition on the database only to discover there was also a problem with the fixture dates. The final was occurring a month earlier than it should have been. So I had to update the fixture calendar to fix this problem. I then had to carry out the time consuming task of checking the fixture dates for every match, in every league, in England, to make sure they were all OK. After several hours I finally finished.

Next I checked the league structures for the other UK countries. In Northern Ireland I’d discussed with the researcher about adding the First and Second Division this year, in addition to the Premier League. The problem was that most of the clubs in these leagues didn’t already exist on the database. So I had to create each of them and fill in the essential club data with the help of the Northern Ireland researcher before I could add the clubs to the leagues.

In Wales I faced a similar problem. I wanted to include the Welsh Premier League for the first time this year so that we have at least 1 complete league for every UK country. The problem was that most of these clubs didn’t already exist on the database. So I had to create them all and research the essential data myself given our lack of a Welsh researcher. After this was completed I had to spend several hours double checking everything to make sure all club and city names were spelled correctly.

I then had the task of checking that the fixture dates of every match in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, and Ireland were correct in the calendar. Naturally this went on long into the night……..

The next problem I faced was kits, or rather the lack of them! For all of the new clubs I’d created I needed to make accurate home and away kits for them. I also had to check the kits for all existing UK clubs to ensure they were correct. The fact that most clubs change their away kits every season to something completely different than what they had before meant another long night was in order….

After making the kit of Wakehurst in Northern Ireland’s Division Two I finally finished the task and was able to move onto the stadium names. Sponsorship means that many stadiums have changed names this year, while capacities are constantly changing. All of these things were updated. Hopefully this will please the many fans who had wanted the new stadium names such as the Emirates Stadium in the game.

Finally the rating of each player on the database had to be reviewed and updated as necessary to ensure it was realistic in relation to other players on the database, and that no researchers have overrated or underrated their clubs. This was a massive task! I had to consult my own knowledge of each player, their stats, as well as profiles on websites and from fans to ensure every player has a realistic rating. For example I didn’t want players in League Two being rated as good as Premiership players. I also wanted to better emphasise the difference between good and bad players within each team, and between the clubs within each league. This took many hours to complete, but hopefully the work will be appreciated. This was something the fans on the forum wanted, and hopefully they are happy with the new ratings. I certainly think the new ratings are a lot more realistic than they have ever been.

As Friday afternoon drew to a close and I submitted my update to Adrian to combine with the rest of the world’s data I was finally able to rest my eyes away from the editor for a while. But not for long though! There is only 1 month to go before the final deadline!!


FIFA Manager 07 Lead Database Researcher