Sports Interactive founders given MBE's

Oliver and Paul Collyer, founders of Sports Interactive, originators of the ideas that have become Football Manager and Football Manager Live have been awarded M.B.E.'s in the New Year Honours List for their services to the UK games industry.

Next we have a statement from Oliver and Paul:

"We are really proud to have been given this honour, which is something we never thought would happen to us.

We first started working on the ideas that have become the Football Manager series over 20 years ago because we wanted to make football management games that we wanted to play. That the games have been so successful was never part of the master plan, and we have to thank everyone on the team at Sports Interactive for all their work over the last 2 decades, as well as our teams of researchers, testers, moderators, SEGA and our other publishing partners, and our community for everything they've done, as we certainly wouldn't be able to be accepting this honour without all of their hard work.

We're still heavily involved in the games, with Paul heading up the match engine, and Ov heading up Football Manager Live, and we look forward to many more years making games with the rest of the team that so many people out there enjoy to play.

We feel really lucky to be receiving this honour because we've been lucky enough to spend our lives doing something we enjoy, and indulging one's passion is easy - therefore we dedicate the awards to everyone who has helped us along the way - thank you to all of you."

:beer