FIFA Ultimate Team (FUT) has been the most popular model in Electronic Arts’ FIFA series for years. But what is it all about? How do you get your own first team? What do you have to keep in mind? Our beginner’s guide provides useful tips and tricks. Part 2 is about the first games, modes and the transfer market.

In the first part of our FUT beginner guide we already collected the basics of the popular game mode in FIFA 21 and clarified what it’s all about and what you have to consider when building your team. In part 2 we dedicate ourselves this time to the first games, introduce the modes and reveal what there is to consider on the transfer market.

• Read more: Click here for part 1 of our guide

FUT: What kind of team should it be?

We have already revealed how the team chemistry works. In the FUT mode of FIFA 20 everything starts with the creation of your own team. Navigating to FIFA Ultimate Team in the main menu for the first time, you’ll be asked to create your own club and add a name and logo.

The first team comes free of charge with the game – including home and away jerseys as well as the club crest, of course. You can then get started right away with this motley crew – at least in theory.

Before you start, however, you should decide what kind of team you want to build in FUT 20. Do you concentrate on a certain league, such as the German Bundesliga? Do you commit yourself to one nation? Or do you venture directly into a hybrid team from several leagues? However, this decision is not final, because you can change your own team at any time according to your mood. For the beginning, however, we advise you to commit to a certain league.

Especially a team from the Bundesliga or the Italian Serie A is recommended at the beginning, because even top-class players are comparatively cheap here. Especially the English Premier League or the Spanish LaLiga are much more expensive in direct comparison.

Values, card types and meta of FIFA 20

Every player in FIFA 20 has a card in FIFA Ultimate Team. The lower divisions get a bronze card, middle divisions like the 2nd Bundesliga get silver cards and the top leagues and players get gold cards.

• Read more: These are the 10 best players in FIFA 20

The values of each card are divided into 6 categories, which in turn are divided into further subcategories. These are the same for each card, which is why players are great to compare with each other.

• Pace (speed)
• Shooting
• Passing
• Dribbling
• Defense
• Physicality

At the start of the – Season there are only gold cards. Gradually more special cards will be added. These are for example Team of the Week (TOTW) cards. If a player has played a good game during the weekend, he receives a TOTW card, also called an Inform card. Here, his total value is increased by 1 point, while other values have also received an upgrade.

There are also various promo events throughout the year where players collect special cards. Examples of these would be Shapeshifters or FUT Birthday.

Which values are important? The meta of FIFA 20

Now, which stats are important changes regularly. For example, header goals are almost impossible in FIFA 20 due to the gameplay change. This looked different last year. So instead of big and physically strong strikers, this time smaller, lively dribblers dominate the meta (i.e. the style of play that is currently strongest and/or most popular).

So the most important stats for offensive players are mainly speed, dribbling (especially agility and balance), shooting and passing while for defenders it’s mainly dribbling, defense and physicality. Players like Neymar, Son or Lionel Messi are especially popular this year. Due to the changed meta, the Argentine in the service of FC Barcelona is stronger than CR7 (Cristiano Ronaldo) for the first time in FIFA 20.

The first games in FUT 20

Once you’ve decided where you want to take your FUT team, you’re ready to hit the pitch. You can choose from the following game modes, among others:

• Friendly match: Here, in addition to the classic game, there are various fun modes to choose from, in which, for example, only volleys or distance shots count.
• Squad Battles: Here you compete against an AI-controlled team in a classic match.
• Division Rivals: Classic matches like in Squad Battles, but online against other players.
• FUT Champions: Also known as Weekend League. Here, players compete against each other every weekend in a maximum of 30 matches in order to climb up the ranks and get particularly valuable rewards.

If you’re a complete newcomer, it’s a good idea to get some practice by playing friendly matches. At the same time, you can also start directly in Squad Battles: since the difficulty level can be perfectly adjusted to your own abilities, even followers will achieve their first successes.

You should start with a low level and gradually increase the difficulty. At the “World Class” level, there are significantly higher rewards in the form of coins than at “Beginner” or “Semi-Pro”, for example.

In addition, weekly rewards await you in the Squad Battles, which are always distributed in the night from Sunday to Monday. With each game, you collect points and thus rise in rank: The higher the rank, the better the rewards in the form of coins or card packs.

In Division Rivals, you are challenged much more right from the start. First, you have to complete five placement matches, which the game uses to determine your own rank. FIFA 20 then assigns you a rank and ensures that you always meet players who play at roughly the same level.

Here, too, there are weekly rewards that are always distributed on Thursdays at 08:55. These differ depending on the game class (divided into division 1 to division 10) and weekly rank (rank 1 to rank 5). In most cases, there are also three bonuses to choose from, such as coins or packs.

FUT Champions is primarily aimed at advanced players. In order to be eligible to participate at all, you need 2,000 FUT Champions points. Per week! And these are available as Division Rivals rewards.

Squad Building Challenges can be worthwhile

Apart from the matches, the FUT mode in FIFA 20 offers so-called Squad Building Challenges (SBCs). These are smaller puzzle tasks that, with a bit of skill, can bring a lot of coins into your coffers or reward your efforts with a strong player.

Basically, it’s about exchanging players from your own club for new rewards like packs, coins and jerseys. Gone players are therefore gone, which is why you should never use players from your own starting eleven or substitutes – unless the reward is a reinforcement in the respective position.

FIFA 20 comes up with a huge SBC catalog. For the beginning, the beginner SBCs are recommended, which give a good feeling for the tasks. Of course, in the rarest cases you have all the players necessary for an SBC in your club, many cards have to be bought on the transfer market.

This means that every SBC initially involves expenditure. But if you are clever, you will not only get the invested coins back, but also make additional profit. But not only that, because many special cards in FIFA 20 can only be earned via SBCs. These are improved versions of the normal gold cards.

We have already presented a few of them in our SBC guides:

• Player Moments Alex Sandro
• Flashback Jérôme Boateng from FC Bayern Munich
• The flashback card of midfield star Arturo Vidal

Here it is often also worthwhile to have a look at community websites that deal with FIFA Ultimate Team. Sites like FUTHead or FUTBIN not only information about new cards but also offer solutions to the SBCs.

The FUT Transfer Market: Big Money Beckons Here

The best way to get coins in FUT 20 is without a doubt the transfer market. By clever trading you can gain an enormous advantage here, which in the long run leads to a better team and thus more victories in the games.

Getting 1 million coins for a strong icon just by playing games would take forever. Luckily, though, there are some extremely affordable legends out there.

Three tips for the FUT transfer market

1. never discard players

You open a pack and in it are players who do not fit into your team and are not useful for any SBC. But you should never sell them via the quick sale, because they are ALWAYS worth more on the transfer market.

2. watching soccer can be worthwhile

The real sport has an enormous impact on the FIFA Ultimate Team – at least if it doesn’t come to a standstill due to a global pandemic. For example, if a player just delivers an incredible performance and helps his own team to victory with a hat trick, this means the following for FUT: the value of his card increases! And it increases rapidly.

If you buy the card during a match (even in multiple copies), you can make enormous profits. Especially if the player makes it into the Team of the Week (TOTW) of the next week.

3. additional cards are also worthwhile

But not only the sale of players can be profitable. Additional cards are not to be sneezed at either. Especially Team Fitness cards increase in price during the Weekend League, while Chemistry styles like Shadow or Hunter can bring in several tauend coins of profit.

Web and Companion App

By the way, FIFA 20 also comes with a useful web app for the browser and a companion app for the smartphone. From managing your own club to the transfer market to SBCs and – Season tasks, everything can be done without starting the game. And it’s even more convenient than using the game. More information about the app can be found on the homepage of EA Sports.

• Download FIFA 20 Companion App for Android
• Download FIFA 20 Companion App for iOS

With our FUT beginner guides, newcomers are now perfectly prepared for the start in the FIFA Ultimate Team mode. What the icon swaps are and which legends are worthwhile, we have already revealed in our guide. If you prefer to watch a match on the live stream instead of picking up the controller yourself, you shouldn’t miss our kicker Home Match Cup for amateur clubs.

FIFA 22 – FUTs

What could be cooler than just relaxed gaming and doing some sofa sports on the side? In FIFA 22, the player is on the move fast, but without getting sore muscles. With the Ultimate Team Event cards, the collecting instinct is now also satisfied. However, the FUT Heroes keep creeping into my mind, so here are the best Ultimate Team Event cards that are definitely worth adding to your collection.

Heroes cards selected by EA for top qualities

Admittedly, the FUT heroes will cost quite a bit of coin, but it turns out that EA has once again brought some top-class players into the game when it comes to selection. As a collector and hunter, it’s an added attraction for FIFA gamers to now include their own favorite heroes in the portfolio and benefit from their individual skills. Both in the game and in team building, the FUTs will revolutionize the game once again.

EA SPORTS FC: FIFA GAME SERIES TO BE CONTINUED UNDER NEW NAME

Of course, the soccer simulation game series will not be discontinued completely. After FIFA 23, EA will relaunch the game under the name EA Sports FC and market it independently. Old FIFA hares should now become quite an ear, after all, the EA Sports Football Club used to be a part of the actual game for years. A lot of playing was rewarded, points could be collected and items, boosts or balls for the individual game modes could be unlocked.

In this context, there could also be a complete revolution of the classic game. There is a heated discussion in the FIFA community about whether the game, which is expected to be released in the fall of 2023, will be free-to-play. This option is said to be on the table for the game makers from EA, because: It seems that EA earns most of its money with the purchases of FIFA Points in the game mode Ultimate Team and not with the sale of the game itself.