I just got off the phone with EA help.
I explained to them it's simply a code mistake.
when it worked the code read
enable_practice_arena=1
and now that it does not work it looks like this
enable_practice_arena=0.
1kb of patch space needed to fix this. I made a post in the beta FIFA forum and kept it at the top with this information. I called twice last year and explained it to EA Help people who were surprised it wasn't in and said they would pass along the info.
And now once this year.
I do not understand why they can't make this simple fix.
Part of the issue is they put the swap EA trax button on the practice mode menu button. So I am certain instead of making the practice mode button something else they just turned it off and assigned EA trax change to the button.