FIFA 21 players are using a 'Golden Goal' rule to avoid grinding for rewards

FIFA 21
(Image credit: EA)

The FIFA 21 community has come up with a 'Golden Goal' rule to help players avoid a significant Icon Swaps grind. 

Recently, the first batch of Icon Swaps - tokens that can eventually be swapped for powerful, Icon player cards - arrived in-game. To earn them, you'll need to complete challenges, the first 11 of which are already available. Of those, eight are completed by taking part in Live FUT Friendlies, but to earn everything currently on offer, you'll need a total of 45 wins. That represents hours and hours of game-time, even if all you do is win. Assuming a roughly 50% win-rate, you could be playing for more than 24 hours before you earn everything.

To help avoid that grind, however, players have adopted their own, unofficial, Golden Goal rule. As reported by Eurogamer, the first player to concede a goal will immediately concede the entire match, granting their opponent a legitimate win in a fraction of the time a full (truncated) 90 minutes would take to play out.

As these matches are only friendlies, the losing player doesn't really lose out on anything but pride, but the community-driven approach isn't universally popular. While the FIFA subreddit has plenty of posts celebrating the community's efforts, there have also been disagreements when players choose not to abide by the 'rule', as well as concerns that it could lead to EA moving the goalposts by implementing caps on the number of games players can play at a time. How long this situation is allowed to continue remains to be seen, but with more Icon Swaps seemingly on the way, it seems that a large chunk of the community will be keen to keep it going.

What's better than an easy win? Securing the perfect from our list of the best gifts for gamers, of course!

Ali Jones
News Editor

I'm GamesRadar's news editor, working with the team to deliver breaking news from across the industry. I started my journalistic career while getting my degree in English Literature at the University of Warwick, where I also worked as Games Editor on the student newspaper, The Boar. Since then, I've run the news sections at PCGamesN and Kotaku UK, and also regularly contributed to PC Gamer. As you might be able to tell, PC is my platform of choice, so you can regularly find me playing League of Legends or Steam's latest indie hit.

Latest in Sports
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3+4 screenshot showing three skaters performing tricks in mid-air
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3+4 could be making a major change to Pro Skater 4, with the apparent removal of free-roaming in favor of "streamlined goals"
WWE 2K25
WWE 2K25 DLC guide to all Season Pass wrestlers
Image of the box art for Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4 on the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S with an orange GamesRadar background.
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4 pre-orders include Doom Slayer and an actual full-sized skateboard
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4 launches this July with new parks for "for the first time in 10 years," and you can pre-order to get a demo in June
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 and 2
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3+4 rumors have just been upgraded from podcast mentions and Call of Duty map teasers to a full countdown on the official Activision website
FC 25
FC 25 FUT Fantasy FC tracker and February promo guide
Latest in News
The Witcher 4 screenshot with Ciri using sword and sorcery to fight an ancient monster
The Witcher 4 devs explain how Ciri's fighting style will differ from Geralt's: "He's nimble, but he feels like a block...she's liquid"
Challenging The Manacle in Balatro, which limits hand size by -1 and playing two Jacks
From "I stopped working on the project entirely" to "we are so back," Balatro creator says the roguelike's development was always about passion and taking breaks was essential
InZOI screenshot from creation studio demo which depicts a shockingly realistic character model rendered in Unreal Engine 5
The director behind The Sims competitor InZOI spent 20 years making MMOs, but he ditched the massive RPGs after playing life sims with his son
Demon Slayer season 4 episode 2
True to the anime, Stardew Valley's hottest mod adds two romanceable Demon Slayer dudes who are both "rude and standoffish" at first
A group of Men wearing armour during the TV show, Vikings.
Vikings creator is heading back to his Norse roots with this new historical drama on Amazon
Balatro screenshot showing an assortment of joker cards
Balatro creator intentionally avoided roguelikes but did eventually play and "steal from" Slay the Spire anyway: "Holy s***. Now that is a game"