Konami has been doing all sorts of deals with Italian football sides in recent years, and the latest team to get the exclusive treatment is Atalanta, which will no longer be officially licensed in FIFA as of next season.

This means that eFootball PES 2022 will be the exclusive home of Atalanta within "real-time football simulation games," applying to the team name, crest and kits. The players, however, will still have their real names in FIFA 22.

Here's what Naoki Morita, President at Konami Digital Entertainment B.V. had to say about the deal:

“As we prepare to unveil the future of the eFootball PES series, I am delighted to announce this exclusive partnership with Atalanta B.C., a truly formidable club with an exciting future at the highest levels of European football. Working side by side with our Partner Clubs is an important element of our strategy to deliver industry-leading video games to football fans all over the world.”

Konami has previously announced deals for the PES series with the likes of AS Roma, SS Lazio and SSC Napoli, and the big announcement a couple of years ago was that Juventus was becoming exclusive as of eFootball PES 2020.

We're still waiting on the first official bits of information about this year's game, which technically has been in development for an extra year following last year's 'Season Update' for 2021. All that has been revealed to date is a small teaser trailer along with the news that the game will be migrating to Unreal Engine from the outdated Fox Engine.

What do you make of this news? Excited for eFootball PES 2022? Let us know down in the comments below.