We love a decent footie game. Even a half-decent footie game, like this one, gets a pretty big hug.

The predecessor to current chart stonker Manchester United Europe, Manchester United is a similar management-cum-arcade football game. The main difference is that it's set in the gutsy domestic league, rather than glamorous Euro competition.

The arcade section is more or less identical to its successor, with the sprites being slightly smaller. It's a bit slower too, but bearing in mind that's it's a third of the price of the new game, it's still got to be a shopper's choice best buy!

So what do you do? The game is split into two sections: the icon-driven management section, and the arcade game section. Loading up the former, you can select teams, buy and sell players, train your bunch, and so on and so forth. Once you feel ready for the match itself, load up the second program and get set to start booting that ball around.

The two separate sections arrangement is going to cause a fair amount of irritation, seeing as it does mean you get five minutes of play followed by five minutes of loading, five minutes of play followed by five minutes of loading, five minutes of play followed by five minutes of loading, and so on.

The arcade section is nothing to write home about, the scrolling is jolly, the play is sluggish, but at least it's easy to control and the computer opponent is a sturdy one. Nothing special, but not bad.