A practical Football Manager 27 save setup guide explaining how the women’s and men’s league database setting works, how to keep the leagues you want visible, and what the performance tradeoff is.
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Store links: Football Manager 27 on Steam
The key setting is in the league depth menu, not the trash icon
Football Manager 27’s advanced save setup has a specific database quirk that can catch players before their first match: selecting some nations can add both men’s and women’s competitions, but deleting from the visible league list can remove both sides at once. Last Word on Gaming reports that the safer way to trim the setup is to click the league name where division depth is normally selected, then choose “None” for the side of the game world you do not want loaded.
That is the practical answer behind the growing “FM27 remove women” search, but it applies in both directions. The same method can be used if you want to remove men’s leagues while keeping women’s competitions active. Last Word on Gaming specifically says the trash can is the wrong tool for this job because deleting the Premier League also deletes the WSL, and deleting the WSL also deletes the Premier League. The distinction is important: this is a database and save setup issue, not a statement about which side of the sport should exist in the game.
FM27 is listed in the source material as launching on November 10, with Last Word on Gaming noting that players who pre-ordered on Steam or other select outlets could play during the beta phase until launch. Because the guide is based on advanced setup behavior during that pre-launch window, players starting long saves should double-check the final build’s menus before committing hundreds of in-game hours.
How the women’s and men’s league link works in setup
The behavior described by Last Word on Gaming starts at nation selection. In advanced setup, choosing a country can populate both its men’s and women’s competitions. The example given is England, where adding the nation brings in the Premier League and the Women’s Super League, referred to in the source as the BWSL. The outlet says the same kind of pairing appears for other countries, including Spain, France, Japan, and more.
The important detail is that the nation row and the competition depth selector are doing different jobs. Removing the nation or using the trash icon can clear the wider package tied to that country. Changing the competition depth to “None” targets the side you want to exclude while keeping the other side in the save setup.
So if your Football Manager 27 save setup is built around a men’s Premier League career and you do not intend to use the English women’s pyramid, you would keep England active, open the relevant women’s league depth selector, and set it to None. If you want a women’s save in England without the men’s Premier League running in parallel, you reverse the process. Based on the reported menu behavior, the trick is to think in terms of divisions loaded rather than nations deleted.
League visibility is now easier to overbuild by accident
The setting matters because FM27 is expanding in a few directions at once. FM Scout says Sports Interactive had not yet published the full FM27 playable league list at the time of its report, but it also states that FM26 had 58 playable nations for men and 11 for women. For FM27, FM Scout reports that Saudi Arabia is the new playable men’s nation, taking the men’s count to 59, while the new playable women’s nation had not yet been named in that source.
That uncertainty changes how players should approach the advanced database screen. If the full official list is not yet published, and if nation selection can pull in paired men’s and women’s competitions, then the cleanest save setup is the one you audit manually rather than assuming the first screen reflects your intended career world.
There are also licensed-content reasons to pay attention. FM Scout reports that Sports Interactive announced the Arkema Première Ligue, France’s top women’s league, as fully licensed for FM27, with official club logos, kits, and player photos. The same FM Scout report says the Roshn Saudi League is fully licensed for FM27, with all 18 clubs having official logos, kits, and player photos. Those are valuable additions if they fit your save, but they can also make it easier to accept extra active leagues simply because they look complete and attractive in the setup flow.
Performance impact: expect a tradeoff, not a magic setting
Neither Last Word on Gaming nor the supplied setup guides provide benchmark numbers for FM27 processing speed, so it would be wrong to promise that removing a specific women’s league or men’s league will cut holiday time by a fixed percentage. What the sources do support is the broader relationship between league load and save weight.
Last Word on Gaming frames the option as a way to avoid unnecessary slowdown when players are trying to include many nations. Passion4FM’s beginner setup guide also emphasizes the need to customize playable nations, leagues, and database depth for the right balance between performance and realism. That is the practical tradeoff in FM terms: every active competition you keep increases the size of the simulated world you are asking the game to maintain.
For a long career, that tradeoff is mode-defining. If your plan is a single-club save in one country, trimming competitions you will never manage in can make the world feel cleaner and may reduce processing overhead. If your plan is a journeyman save, an international scouting project, or a career that moves between men’s and women’s football, a broader setup may be worth the extra load. The “None” option is useful because it lets you make that choice with more precision than deleting an entire nation package.
Best setup approach for different FM27 saves
For a focused men’s career, start by adding the nations you genuinely need for the competitive ladder, transfer market, and scouting environment you care about. Then check whether those nations also added women’s competitions. If they did, use the competition depth selector and set unwanted women’s leagues to None instead of deleting the country. That preserves the men’s setup while trimming competitions outside the scope of the save.
For a focused women’s career, use the same logic in reverse. Keep the women’s competitions you want visible and active, then set the corresponding men’s leagues to None where the menu allows it. Last Word on Gaming’s report is useful here because it confirms the setting is symmetrical: the guide is about removing unwanted women’s or men’s football data from a save, depending on what the player is trying to run.
For a hybrid save, do not remove leagues just because they appear paired. FM Scout’s reporting on FM27 points to more women’s football structure, including the fully licensed Arkema Première Ligue and Swiss-style Women’s League Cups in England, France, and Japan. If your save concept includes moving between competitions, tracking development across both sides of the database, or simply keeping the football world broad, those extra active leagues may be part of the appeal. The right setup is the one that matches the career you intend to play, not the one with the smallest league count by default.
What is confirmed, and what still needs final-build checking
The confirmed practical instruction from Last Word on Gaming is narrow but useful: in FM27’s advanced database builder, use the league name and division-depth control, then select None, if you want to remove a men’s or women’s league while keeping its counterpart. The same source says using the trash icon can delete both linked competitions for that nation, which is the mistake players should avoid.
The broader league picture is still partly open in the supplied material. FM Scout says Sports Interactive had not yet published the full FM27 playable leagues list at the time of its article. It reports that Saudi Arabia is confirmed as a new playable men’s nation, that the new playable women’s nation had not been named, and that FM27 includes more than 18 million database changes and 1,500 competition updates. Those figures underline why setup discipline matters, but they do not tell us exactly how every nation will behave in the final advanced setup screen.
The safest recommendation is simple: before starting your serious save, open advanced setup, inspect every selected nation, check both men’s and women’s league visibility, and change unwanted competitions to None through the league depth selector. If you are testing tactics or learning the new UI, you can be looser. If you are starting the save you plan to carry for seasons, spend the extra two minutes now. In Football Manager, database setup is the first roster decision you make.