You may have clicked on this review looking for an appraisal of a title that holds genuine interest for you. Or you may have thought 'Pro Cycling Manager... what the?'. To be honest, I thought the latter when I saw this up for review, but then when I think about it, I once had a compulsive addiction to a horse racing game ('Just one more race... oh it's 4am... two more races then'), so it's probably about right that I review this.

Pro Cycling Manager is much as you'd expect – you take control of a cycling team, and guide them along season by season, trying to help them to as much success as possible. When you outgrow the team, or fancy a new challenge, you can move onto another team. You have to organise your various riders to go and train, enter them for the right races each season, and buy equipment for them, as well as signing new riders and organising the contracts of the existing ones and gaining sponsorship for the team. Most importantly you actually instruct all your riders about their effort levels and tactics in real time while watching the race in full 3D. The game seems to have the current cycling teams and tours in it, along with the correct coloured jerseys for the riders, but the rider names are mostly misspelt.

Before that though, you'll have plenty of management of your team to do outside of races, but unfortunately this side of the game really inspires more boredom than enjoyment. The interface is passable, although more information could have been packed into each page, saving clicking between various pages, but apart from actually picking your team for any particular race, the management tasks you face are pretty dull. Take, for example, getting sponsors for your team – you just go to a big list of sponsors, sorted by industry and size, and then pick those you wish to approach. The following day you'll get an email from them saying whether they want to sponsor you or not. It's a chore rather than a pleasure.

I think that the problem that lies with Pro Cycling Manager is that it targets the cycling nut – there's not a lot of cycling games out there, and this is certainly going to provide an enjoyable experience for those that have a love of the sport, and will be able to forgive the game's rough edges. For the rest of the world though, there are better sports management games that will give you a better management experience (Football Manager) or a tactical sports experience (G1 Jockey series).