Have you ever wished you could own your football team? Did you know that you could make your dream come true without spending a fortune? Have you ever heard of fantasy football (or fantasy soccer)? If you have a little bit of Alex Ferguson, Arsene Wenger or Jose Mourinho in you, then hurry up, the new season is about to start.
Fantasy sport is a virtual game where participants assemble an imaginary team made of real individual players or teams of a professional sport. Participants score points based on the statistical performance and the contribution of the real players in real games.
The origins of Fantasy Sport can be linked to Wilfred Winkenbach, an american businessman, who created the first ever fantasy golf in the 1950s. Since then, Fantasy Sport has evolved and grew to become a multi-billion dollar industry. There is a fantasy variant of most of the popular sports such as tennis, cricket, football, hockey and even surfing.
The rules of Fantasy Football (Soccer) are quite simple. As a manager, you have a budget of £100 million to spend on 15 players to make up your squad. Just like a real life football manager, you should take into account talent, age, health, fitness level and of course costs. Each week you select 11 players to start the game, nominate a captain and vice-captain and manage your substitution list.
Each player in your squad scores or loses points based on their performance in real life games played weekly. There are many matrix used for scoring. As an illustration, a player will win points for saving a penalty, assisting a goal, and playing the full 60 minutes. A player loses points when they miss a penalty, gets a yellow or red card, and score an own goal.
Fantasy Premier League is the biggest Fantasy Football game in the world. With many incentives such as monthly and quarterly prizes, it attracts over 3 million players every year. The Fantasy Premier League starts on the 16th of August 2014.
So what are you waiting for? I’m really interested to hear your thoughts about Fantasy Sport. If you’ve ever played, then feel free to share your experience with us.
Leave a Reply