gauging interest in secondary Fantasy League w/ player draft

This came up on the other thread beginning here: Fantasy Football League 11/12

I write 'secondary' because you can and should join the real ILF league as well. But if you might want to try this out, post here and I will keep a tally.

If you're deeply skeptical and think this idea should replace men in skinny jeans on the list of 7 Revolting Things Abt American Culture, but are morbidly curious anyway, post questions here and I will try to answer them.

interested in how to ensure budgets and all that work out but yeah sure sounds intrsting

I think this is a great idea but the process of actually putting squads together (especially bidding for in-demand players) would be very tricky to work out. My friends and I just meet in a pub and do it but that's obviously not possible here.

i dunno, ilfchatz is a growth room on aim

To address Matt's first point, I hadn't envisioned an auction-style draft, i.e. the kind where you get to sign Torres if you're willing to waste more of your £100m budget on him than anyone else. Instead, if you have the first overall pick and select him, he's yours, and his cost to you is determined by the PL site's valuation.

makes sense

Kinda fucks over whoever's last in the picking order though.

i think whoever earns the least should go first.

think boxall had a system for that based on pipecock tossing avg tbh

If there's ten of us, last drawn picks 10th, 11th, 30th, 31st, 50th, 51st and so on, right?

Yes, what Ismael said. This is called a 'snake draft' b/c it winds back on itself, and is popular in US fantasy leagues.

Alternatively we could do a random drawing for position every round.

I think a league of 8-12 teams would be ideal. The standard squad size is 15, but if time is a concern we could limit the draft to 11 rounds and fill in the team benches w/ undrafted players. It could also be split up over multiple days if one longish chatz session doesn't appeal.

You're not obligated to sign every player you draft btw - you're just gaining exclusive rights to negotiate with them, so to speak. If you think Sneijder really is coming to Utd you can risk a draft pick on him.

whut

None of that, please - sort the whole league out in one sesh imo

Fair enough. That will mean however that everyone will have to keep track of their budget during the draft, make sure not to go over. Unless we want to throw out the idea of a budget altogether.

maybe?

Yeah, I suppose that would simplify things w/o doing any harm. No one will be able to load up on £10m+ midfielders and strikers anyway, they'll be in too high demand.

sort the whole league out in one sesh imo

This can be done, and is the traditional way to conduct a fantasy draft. However, it would require very rapid picks. If we have 10 players, and only draft 11 rounds deep, and everyone takes an average of 90 seconds to draft, that's still 2 hours 45 minutes.

I've been playing around w/ templates on Google Docs and I think a shared spreadsheet could work as a low-maintenance alternative. Something like this.

The ESPN site has opened for the season and has Nedum Onuoha one of the most expensive defenders, I wonder if they have inside info on Mancini's plans.

So, here are some options:

a) I'll play provided the draft is completed in one evening so I don't have to think about it after that

b) I'll play provided the draft is completed over, say, 3-14 days, each person editing a shared Google spreadsheet in turn, so I don't have to commit to spending an entire evening online

c) [sotto voce] This is too complicated/confusing/American, you should walk away quietly now before we're all embarrassed

Post a, b or c in this thread and we'll see where we're at next week.

Would this be on fantasy.premierleague.com or on another site?

b's probably better, but organising ilxors is like herding cats.

Ah screw it, let's try a.

hth

I'm tempted, but think this is too much fuss, too difficult to get involved. No AIM/FB/G+ for one. Oh well.

I would do B, A seems like it could be too easily scuppered by one or two people forgetting or being unexpectedly busy or whatever. B has the problem that someone could forget it's their turn for days, but I think on balance it seems easier and more convenient for everyone.

I vote for 'c'.

I'll be doing the usual fantasy league, though, and join the head-to-head one if someone sets it up.

OK, head-to-head league: http://fantasy.premierleague.com/, code 501818-137752

I'm cool with doing this, I think.

Ok I don't understand that draft table. Wouldn't it start with the most prized players going down to the least? Like it would start with say Kun or Drogba or Cesc and then work its way down to the Norwich back-up keeper? And instead N.Zogbia is second choice in the draft?

That's not the list of players; it's a hypothetical table displaying the players that have been picked, who picked them and when they were picked (at a guess, the order in which these players were picked is based on the current most popular picks in Fantasy PL, hence why Marc Albrighton goes before).

The list of players from which you pick will presumably just be a list.

You want complicated, check out what they're trying to do over here: Quality Sucks: 2011 Bizarro Fantasy Football Thread

I don't think this idea has enough momentum behind it - sorry. But there is a head-to-head league, code 501818-137752, and you can just copy your same team from the main ILF league. It's set up so the last three weeks of the season are QF, SF, and final, but that can be changed if there are only 10 or so entries.

I think it is just the initial sorting process that needs momentum and one person who can be bothered to spend a day doing it. Is there an American-sport-fantasy-draft template we can borrow to make it much easier, or would it just have to be input one player at a time?

Alright then: if your interest is real, email me (boxall19, gmail) and if there are six entrants (including me) by Monday, we'll make it happen.

You want complicated, check out what they're trying to do over here: Quality Sucks: 2011 Bizarro Fantasy Football Thread

Ahhh, American Football. Ok, now I realise why that 'Passing' stuff didn't make any sense whatsoever.

In case it's not clear, that thread is attempting to devise a statistical formula to determine the worst American football player(s). Then they're all going to compete to draft these awful players and see whose squad can perform the worst. Sounds pretty fun to me.

that sounds AMAZING and if I could understand the lingo or anything to do with the sport, I'd bookmark the shit out of it. (Instead I am going to spend this year just slowly dipping my toe in the gridiron pool.)

gmail is being a dick so i ilx webmailed u

forgot to mail you and will forget again but i'm in

OK, posting here is an acceptable entry too. I was just trying to avoid clogging ILF new answers, well done all around.

just to confirm, having spent my morning on ff, i am also in.

I've kind of forgotten what we're discussing here, but whatever it is I'll be up for.

I would be up for this if there is room.

One option would be for everyone to submit a preliminary team prior to the draft and only hold a draft for the players that have been chosen by more than one person.The less obvious the players the better chance you have of getting your first choice line up and the less you rely on vagaries of system. I have not thought this through at all though.

I think I like that - then use the budget for an auction

So everyone submits a (15-man?) squad, and if you're the only person to name a player, he's yours. Then everyone submits a second list which contains bids for all the players who were named more than once. (The more frugal you were in picking fringe players, the bigger your budget, at this point.)

Am I understanding this right? I think I like it as well.

Yes, that's what i had in mind.

Something like that, yeah - a public auction might be fun too, if that'd work.

Maybe everyone gets the same budget for the auction, more lols in outbidding the guy who got no players in round one and will be left drafting Swansea reserves in round three.

Wait, what's round three?

Filling up the gaps I guess - e.g. a hoy hoy gets nobody in round one, has his £100m bid for Joe Cole accepted in round two, then has to use round 3 to draft fourteen of what's left.

In fairness, would anyone have raised an eyebrow at a future £100m bid for Joe Cole when he was a U-14?

It makes sense to think of it in three stages like that, you're right.

Still think we should enforce the budget in every round, and not hand everyone a fresh £100m when the auction begins. I think this will reward identifying players who are lesser-known and available at bargain prices but potentially valuable (called 'sleepers' in US fantasy sports, I don't know if that term is known elsewhere).

Actually that term gets thrown around a lot in ILM polls, doesn't it.

yes to 100m budget from start imo

Having thought about this some more, I'm going to suggest: 100m budget to start plus an additional 20m at the start of the auction, so we can do some real bidding.

Also think there should be a bonus payout (2m maybe?) for every player you successfully 'signed' (i.e. no one else named him) in your initial squad. Kind of analogous to a homegrown player / FFP incentive: the teams with the most to spend on 3 or 4 big names are the ones that put their faith in 11 or 12 less-heralded players.

Any objections to these basic outlines? We can juke the numbers later, but if the broad strokes are OK let's start submitting teams.

ok so

you pick a team of 11 (with normal restrictions of 2 x goalie, 5 x defender, 5 x midfielder, 3 x Att, right?)

You have a budget of 100m to do so, based on fpl valuations

we send these teams to yourself? (to avoid, shock horror, ppl frantically doing last minute 'adjustments' when they see others' teams on a 'reveal' thread)

every player not named in another squad earns you 2m for an auction

every player named by more than one enters into auction, along with all players not named in any squads.

Is that what we have so far?

a squad of 15, not a team of 11, obvs

Yeah, that basically. I think the limit of 3 forwards is harsh though, would do away with it.

I'll pick my team first and email it to you/somebody so you're not just trusting my integrity. (Don't open the email, obv.)

i don't understand any of this. how can you bid 100m when you've already spent it on yr squad?

because if you have a player that anyone else has he goes into the pot for bidding and the equivalent of his value returns to you, plus we all get 20m for bidding plus you get 2m for any player that nobody else had

boxall- limits on gk, def, mid and att are all built in to the fpl system, i don't know how you'd work around it

i take it we'll then be registering these teams to let the site take care of weekly scoring etc, like?

Ok... I think I understand? If you lose the bid for a player do you just choose another one?

I was going to save everybody the hassle of registering a new team by doing the scoring myself. Our final squads might not come in under 100m anyway, because we're correcting their player valuations based on what *we* think everyone's worth.

And if so, will you put up a list of all taken players? GKs gonna be the hardest imo, if every has to have 2 different ones. if we have 10 people or more do this, we won't have enough to go round!

Our final squads might not come in under 100m anyway, because we're correcting their player valuations based on what *we* think everyone's worth.

So I could potentially have Cesc, Drogba, Rooney, Aguero etc. etc. all in the same team?

I thought this was fantasy EPL?

if you lose a bid for one of your players you make a bid when your turn comes for another?

or are we allowing an actual auction, so that any disputed players get pushed up mad pricey.

scoring yourself sounds like a helluva job to take on, but yeah i was going to raise the point about squads not coming in under the 100m

I had envisioned a 'silent auction' - there's a list of players, and you write the highest amount they're willing to pay for each one. Organizing a live auction would be difficult given everyone's different schedules.

There's definitely some fantasy in it, insanity even, but in that way it resembles UEFA, so.

i've had too many drinks already to parse the rules right now, just stating my interest in joining this madness whenever it's time

yeah, that's my basic posish

the auction rules we can deal with kind of seperate to what's agreed above in terms of 'submitting your 15' i think?

(bar whether we've finalised that the teams have to conform to fpl position regs or not?)

We can keep the 5DF-5MF-3FW requirement, I just think it's kind of antiquated and implies that 4-4-2 is the only right formation. Forwards are streaky, I'd rather have an extra one in reserve.

The auction specifics can be sorted out later, yes. I'll submit my squad tomorrow and maybe we can set a deadline of next weekend.

you're the boss, i guess, given the work you're committing to.

No changes during the season I take it?

fuckin right

well

january transfer window, depending on your funds i guess

Don't think it'll be much work, just grab the scores off the FPL site and plug in to a spreadsheet, don't have to calculate them myself.

None of this 'you're the boss' attitude though - all objections should be made now while there's time.

to whom?

To everybody, in this thread.

nicely done

Just send our £100m or less initial squad to you Boxall through ilx webmail?

Yes, that's fine. If you wait till tomorrow when I'll have mine finished and sent, you can be certain I haven't cheated by glancing at yours.

Yeah, but you're trusting darragh though.

I'm trusting he won't be looking to copy my Koscielny-led defence.

ok so what

all of our original 15 man squads are to be revealed in a dedicated thread? auction to follow?

boxall my mail is my ilx username @gmail.com, i promise i'll be good

OK, submitted my squad to d'mac. Everyone else can send theirs to me, via ilxmail or boxall19 at gmail.

I ended up going with 2 GK - 5 DF - 4 MF - 4 FW. AFAIC as long as you have the minimum numbers needed at each position to field a real-life formation (1-3-3-1), that should be acceptable.

Would a Saturday kickoff-time deadline be reasonable? We'll see how quickly they come in I guess. Post here or email me w/ any questions.

is there space and time for me to get involved here? planning on doing my squad tomorrow but then i'll be gallivanting around on tuesday and wednesday so won't be able to do this mad stuff here till around midday thursday.

Absolutely there is. The complicated part won't happen till next week I'm sure - our season will open later than other leagues'.

So, it's £100m limit and we're using the values on the FPL site? Sorry, I'm thick.

Correct.

Nice one, I'll get it sent asap.

Btw, is it max of 3 players from any one team?

Yes, I think that's a good rule.

will get on dis ting

done and sent to your gmail boxall, cheers.

yeah ilxmailed you boxall, give us a shout if i did it rong.

Sent to your Gmail, boxall. Let's know that you've got it - had some problems with my email of late.

Have received squads from a hoy hoy, pandemic, and Chris so far.

so if none of yr squad of 15 are picked by anyone else, you get 20m + a further 30m to spend at auction

But

You don't have any spaces left to fill, right? You can't go swapping at that stage, like.

Think it's extremely unlikely that you'll have 15 unique players - 10/15 would be difficult.

So far we have four squads, and the number of unique players in each are: 11, 11, 10, and 7. These numbers will only go down as more entries come in.

you've not seen my squad yet tbf

well you should still be free to change your mind at that point i guess? all of a sudden with all that cash lying around you realize joe cole isn't untouchable anymore

just because you play it well in the first round shouldn't mean you can't improve in the second round?

Yeah, we can allow for that I think.

seems like you'd be gaming it tbh, you could pick the shittiest players, have prob 20m left over to begin with, then get 50m at auction and cherrypick with more cash than everyone else

Every submission I've received so far has looked like a competitive squad, given the 100m budget.

just know joe cole's gonna storm it this season.

like, after all the lols.

actually who the fuck am i kiddin

Am I the 7?

I don't think we should be allowed to change. It's enough as it is.

Still waiting on the following (though anyone else can join too, there's no limit):

darraghmac
Ismael Klata
Merdeyeux
ShariVari
sonderangerbot
Upt0eleven

It's a Friday deadline, right? Will get onto it once the U2 thing is finished.

as i've said before, 2 gks means there must be a limit.

There are 45 keepers listed on the FPL site right now, I don't think we'll have to worry.

whoa that many? shit why did i just pick some randomer for my #2

Yeah, I think Sunderland has a three- or four-way battle for their starting GK at the moment.

I've been too caught up in the riots and packing to get this done, but I'll get it to you on Thursday once I get back from signing my lease in OH SHIT HACKNEY. If I don't make it back someone can do a team in tribute to me.

Yeah, that is some real unpleasantness - dampens the excitement of a new season even for those of us far away. Good luck with your move.

Anyone else?

(Do I need to start a new thread with "deadline 15 August" in the title?)

sent you my team, boxall - thanks for yr efforts here.

Oops, I'll get onto it when I get home. I'm torn between being clever and going for unsung heroes, or blowing dis ting open by aiming for a XV made up entirely of other people's picks.

I am doing this now. Thanks for the reminder.

Tempted to start with the same team as I've got for the main league tbh.

yeah I've just done that, I'll wait until the draft before I compromise its purity.

The head-to-head league (501818-137752) looks like it could be doing with a few more people, none of this SPL-style playing the same teams over and over malarkey.

Just joined the head-to-head.

when does the draft take place?

7 squads now, excellent - thanks Merdeyeux and Upt0eleven. Ismael & two others would make 10 which seems like an ideal number, I hope we can get there.

a hoy hoy: tomorrow I'll email everyone the results of their initial squads - which players they've successfully won, which have gone into the auction, and how much their auction budget will be. (We may need to tweak the figures until they look reasonable.) Then next week everyone should email me their bids. I don't think getting everyone together for a live draft over the course of one evening is realistic.

Doing one of these with some friends and the draft's gone well - managed to get a midfield of Bale, Adam, Dempsey and Malouda which should do well. Also an amusing front two that reads Drogba-Ba.

Bale on the right will be the tactical talking point of the season, no doubt.

I also did a friends league, which got a little overcrowded, so much so that the best strikers I could get hold of after my early pick of Chicharito were Anelka and Adebayor. If the latter doesn't go to Tottenham after all I'm in trouble.

Spurs to pay £75k of his wages I read earlier, City the other £100k. I should be well over being shocked by players' wages by now, but I mean come on.

can't be right

just joined the head to head

yeah me too, gonna try and get a team sent to boxall too in a minute or two...

I can't log on to my team at all. Even when I do the 'reset password' thing, it still won't let me in.

Are you using your full email address? New stipulation

Yeah. I entered a team about a fortnight ago. I know my e-mail address and password - and they were both stored on the page anyway - but mysteriously they didn't work. So I clicked on the 'reset password' option which sent a new password to my e-mail address. I tried using this (repeatedly) and it still claimed it didn't recognise it. So I reset it again. This time, after freezing for about five minutes, it let me in and took me straight to my settings so that I could personalise my password again. When I did this it crashed and said something about a server error.

Can't even get the log in page now, it just says "The requested page or resource is not available on this server."

I had 'Anonymous' take down the site to drive up interest in this unaffiliated apostasy we've got going itt. (Actually I can't get in either, it's quite annoying.)

me neither now but i managed to send my picks earlier anyway, did you get it?

I did, thanks. We now have 8 teams. So far we're averaging 6-7 unique players per squad.

Sorry boxall, I've been trying all evening but haven't been able to access the site at all. I'll try again in the morning but it's not looking good.

what happens next? You submit bids out of yr remaining pot for any player left available to fill the squads places freed up by duplication, highest bid for each player secures?

It took some work but I've just got in, registered, and sent you my squad.

The head-to-head league's doing well with 13, but the main league's well down on last year. As a reminder, these are the codes:

423657-117660 for the main league
501818-137752 for the head-to-head

will be joining the main league

what happens next? You submit bids out of yr remaining pot for any player left available to fill the squads places freed up by duplication, highest bid for each player secures?

That's right. Now Ismael's joined I have nine teams, going to hold out one more day for an even 10, then start the bidding.

I think it would make sense to accept bids first for all the GKs, then all the defenders, and so on, instead of everyone at once.

sounds great

One last bump for that elusive 10th squad ... ShariVari essentially came up with this idea in its current iteration, would be a shame if he didn't get to play.

jeez no presh

so

I got to bid for two goalies.

Under serious time pressure here.

Everything going great so far, but i dunno about being able to bid as much as you like in the knowledge that it'll be knocked down to .1m over the next bid if you win.

Potential for abuse imo.

potential for darren bent to go for £50m imo

ok a question: do i bid for the gk i chose first time round or do i now bid for any keep? can i say bid for 2 different ones and keep the first i win?

will submit a squad for this at lunchtime, if it's not too late....
a group of us have something similar, but after the initial submission of bids there is a live auction at a pub for the remaining players, it got pretty heated this year and my squad doesn't look too good, so hopefully I can improve on that here.

ok i actually read the email lol

Tempted to start with the same team as I've got for the main league tbh.

― Upt0eleven, Friday, August 12, 2011 12:24 PM (3 days ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah I've just done that, I'll wait until the draft before I compromise its purity.

THIS WENT WELL. at least i'm loaded.

Jose Enrique and Kompany the most popular players I see and looks me and Chris, among others, will be battling for the best of LFC - Suarez, Downing, Enrique.

i sure managed to overspend in the first round. it's funny you were able to easily pick your agüeros and your drogbas and instead we'll all be fighting over al-habsi.

peligro I'm afraid it's too late! Sorry but this lot submitted their squads so slowly that I was afraid we'd never get our season underway if I didn't close entry.

bah! cheers anyway!

potential for darren bent to go for £50m imo

Not impossible - We're doing strikers last and there might be a lot of money left to throw around.

I've received GK bids from all but one person now*, will let you know the results and start accepting bids for DFs as soon as I get one more email.

*excepting Chris who doesn't need to bid this round

sorry bout wait, cant get in at work

you cant email?

It's no trouble darragh - but just to be clear, you don't have to access the fantasy site at this stage. You can just name players you rate and assign your own values.

off top of my head? Not my strength

OK, emailed you a full list of available keepers.

Set peligro free, I say. Or at least let him select a lol-XV from the pool left after we've signed all the decent players. Imagine the delicious shame in finishing behind that.

Wait - I've only bid for five keepers, what if all my bids fail?

ha, I like the sound of an ugly duckling lol-XV which ends up winning as Norwich and Swansea finish in the top 4. I wouldn't mind just throwing peligro into the process now either - maybe there's some element of unfairness in some direction as I think we all submitted our squads before the first set of games (in my case when e.g. there was still the possibility of Barton going to a good team), but i'm sure ~it all evens out in the end~ somehow.

Explain this thing to me again

Happy to take a Dan Shittu shaped handicap for being so late to the party, though if it's too much of a hassle don't worry about it boxall!

Basically we tossed the player valuations and are determining each player's worth by bidding against each other. Also we are as rich as Venky's. In the end we will each have a squad of 15 unique players instead of the usual league where everyone has Cech, Van der Vaart, Rooney.

peligro, you can email me (boxall19 at gmail) and I'll send you the lengthy instructions I emailed to everyone else.

wait i fucjed up forgot i'd want a sub gk lol

Are there transfers once you have the team set up or does it all stay in place? And who keeps track of the scores?

nbs- we picked initial squads and of the players unique to your team, you keep. the rest of the money left over from the websites 100m (plus 20m), you use to bid on players. highest bidder wins and we eventually end up with 9 (or now 10) unique teams for ff.

sent you an email a wee while ago boxall, thanks for being such a gent, I'll be sure to be prompt with my bids...

it stays in place at least until january (we dunno about jan lols yet), to keep the teams unique. and box said he'd keep track, although i'm tempted to add a ff website team so i can look at mine minus a week.

peligro - really sorry, my spam filter took it! But I've recovered it and will get you in.

boxall can you treat my lol vote as a 4m vote for my gk #2 please, on the off chance he's not taken

Ha, that's what I took it to mean in the first place.

I've been sidetracked a bit by adding a 10th member, so you can submit a revised bid list if you like.

five a side now, then speech!

I'm considering a protest against this tenth member nonsense incidentally, as contrary to the hallowed traditions of the league and reminiscent of the shenanigans that let Arsenal in back in 1919.

Sorry if this messes things up, but I won't be able to get to a computer after about 1pm tomorrow.

Good work picking up Reina btw.

As long as you don't mean "after 1pm tomorrow, until September", Chris, it shouldn't be a problem.

lol, no, I'll be in tomorrow night/early hours of the morning.

We are delighted that Pepe has joined the club. He admitted that the lure of Champions League football was too good to turn down.

Emailed around the results of the GK auction, now taking bids for DFs.

I can live w/ De Gea as my #1

wait what happens now if you still only got one keeper? should i just assume darraghmac will go with gomes and pick whoever else is left?

That sounds like an eminently reasonable assumption re: Gomes. Yes, you can pick from whoever's left, cost will only be 4m.

lol at darragh getting robinson. o shi at me spending 6.6m on my sub keeper.

darragh picking robinson has made my day!
bah a hoy outbid me for De Gea *shakes fist*

lol

i literally cannot fathom how i've ended up with these two gk's

my bid for robinson just actually said 'lol' instead of a figure.

lol

going for a 'pay big bucks for big names' for the bidding, f tha hataz. (helps that i got journeymen like bae, moses and aguero in the first round.)

yeah you have phat cash to fill very few positions, this is looking grim

yeah but otoh i have leroy lita

Astonished no-one else had journeyman Aguero in their initial squad tbh I managed to get Rooney first time round as well, but only because Darragh couldn't find him in the list of defenders tbf.

it's the problem of minor celebrity- you know my flaws, i still get all youse scousers confused.

d'ya think, boxall, that if people don't have enough picks to fill their slots they should have to add more before it's all totted up? the alternative - where they're able to choose for £4m after the draw - could end with nifty bargains of players who just happened to not get picked for whatever reason, rather than accidentally spending £10m on jermaine pennant. or am i missing something?

^^^this

or maybe have like a 5 pick minimum or something

Nah, adds an element of risk for us shrewd types. The 4m's a red herring at that point anyway, as there's nothing else to do with the money. Might as well call them free transfers and let darragh use what's left bail out his nation.

I'd just like to let it be known that Jermaine won't be leaving this summer, not for £10m, not for £100m. I don't know where this story's come from.

instead of having it be 4m, why not have it be the website price of the player they choose?

^^yes

don't think it would make much difference either way regarding keepers, i save a total 0.5 million on getting a third try. but yeah with forwards and midfielders it might be more suitable to go with the FPL price perhaps

That's fine with me, you pay the FPL-assigned price if you missed out in the auction.

N.B. the only way you risk this is if you only bother to name 5 players for 4 spots, you're going to be outbid on many if not most, so give me a longer list of players please.

With the GKs, I set the price at 4.0m whenever there was only one bid, even if the bid was much higher. I figured this would save a lot of money for a huge bidding war once we get to the forwards and have nothing to lose. Are we OK with that at least?

you get my defender choices?

i was caught out on gk's, that was my bad and not cycnicism, but tbh it really could be a huge advantage to get to pick and choose some good filler mids/atts so let's put something in place there

the one bid thing seems okay to me, yeah. and i'm agreed with going with the website price for people who have to choose after the draft: with e.g. ~60 solid midfielders to choose from rather than ~15 solid goalkeepers then getting a nice bargain by choosing someone who slipped through the cracks after the draft-proper seems more probable.

Bah, I got all my fwds in the first round, no bidding war fun for me. I'll end up blowing £60m on Jordan Henderson instead.

Jeez, I've already done that. Bébé then.

boxall check yr mails

wtf

wtf

ismael wtf

that team, christ

this isn't going to be a contest

i underestimated the value of going large early doors i think

Pfft, Drogba and Berbatov aren't even first-choice, ditto Henderson and Modric if he moves, Rafael is hurt. This league is wide open.

feel like sonder and n1ck are favourites.

pandemic looking good to me also

I've never had even a decent fantasy team, the pressure's off tbh. The chance to visit a hoy hoy and boxall, see sonderangerbot in the flesh - I'm just happy to be here.

fap?

fappy to beef here

glass of red after the game, yeah, chance to soak up some wisdom

When I got Sam's DF picks and saw that he had already been outbid on every player (with 5 ballots still to come), I let him raise his bids & add more players.

So anyone who's already emailed me can do so as well, though so far I think you'll all will be able to fill their squad places.

yeah

we need to formalise the bids process for next year i think!

Making this up as we go, a learning experience. But we're all equally clueless so the playing field is level at least.

i dunno lots of fuckers seem not to have gotten landed with fatty fattyson as their goalie so i'd imagine there's a bit of sharking going on tbh

oh jesus aguero

shit why would you go for any venkys

i told you it was a lol vote

i misjudged the bids going in for the gk's tbh

Just noticed Boxall's picked up Szczesney for £4m, I think everybody's misjudged that one.

hmmph

Sent my DF bids, but no idea if I've sent enough or if I've gone about it the right way.

ah almunia will be first choice again by the end of october.

(i misjudged the bidding terribly, rly - thought i would end up with szczesny for big bucks after being outbid for the people before him.)

Chris I got your email, you've done it right but you might want to add a few names to the end of your list in case you're outbid left and right.

Think I bid £6.5m for Szczesney but had Foster ahead of him in my list cos I'm an idiot, and cos I trust in Hodgson to get a team that can grind out some dire 0-0s

I've forgotten, is this a straight league or a head-to-head, or both? I'm quite taken with the idea of visiting each other's virtual stadia, sharing a bottle of plonk, unleashing the ultras, etc now.

Haven't even gotten to the scoring yet. Since we have 10 teams we can do head-to-head if that's most desirable.

I was thinking of just scoring everyone's best-performing XI each week, so you don't have to bother with checking injury reports and deciding who to start.

Yeah, the less to think about the better afaiac

copout to both suggestions!

apparently i left aguero on the bench in the regular fantasy league this round so yeah to hell with that.

XP: Argue your case then, darragh.

Re: the team sheets, I'm OK with handling weekly substitutions but I foresee ppl forgetting to email me, then moaning when they've left a goalscorer on the bench.

As for head-to-head, I like it because you know exactly which players you're up against and can applaud their miscues.

tbf the subs is a bitch for you so i got no prob w/that

Head to head's just no fun!

mailed you boxall, though I think I might have to come up with a few more names once all the bids are in

Agree with you there. We have 15 player squads so subs can be made and while it does make it more work for boxall that's gonna be the case with injuries anyway, isn't it? Surely if we just Post itt, or email if easier, by cob on the Friday of gameweek it's relatively manageable? NB it would not be relatively manageable for me and I'm glad I do not have the responsibility because I would surely fuck it up kthx.

Agree with darragh, to be clear. Not that I disagree with Peligro, just that h2h is zzzzz.

Lineup changes are no trouble for me, I've been doing all the work on company time regardless.

Upt0eleven I still need a list of DFs from you, also pandemic, before we can move on.

I'm not a big fan of head to head either, I don't want to have to limit my hatred and swear-words to 11 players on any given week when 99 would be so much more satisfying

Sent it earlier boxall, but have re-sent.

Will send mine from work in the morn. This is the kind of task that needs serious study and reflective contemplation that can only be found when I'm being paid to do something else.

Not bidding on any players I named in the biases thread btw.

i am gonna be counting cash in a safe-room for the next ten hours, so please bear with me- i'll get out every now and again and try to bring up my mails on my phone.

it's not for real, son

PS I've been looking up this whole boxall/Taman Shud affair - it's the craziest stuff.

jesus where d'you ppl get yr mental energy from

what happens if you are successful in more of your bids than you'd figured and don't have the cash to follow through?

I'm assuming you miss out on the remaining picks in that round, get yr pick of what's left at site prices, but what if you're bankrupt before filling a squad?

Am i showing my hand to early re: 40m rooney bid?

swapsies?

I was thinking of bidding £1 for Heskey just because. Can we all agree that no-one is going to try to outbid me?

I'll throw in a packet of crisps on top.

have to pay site price minimum iirc

I was wondering that myself. I've tried to stagger my bigger bids so they shouldn't all come off, but the bankruptcy point is a good one...

I say the remeining squad places are filled either by names out of a hat or by committee of the other league members.

Rooney's gone, pandemic got him in the first round.

We'll fill all the squads no matter, but you might be limited to the cheapest players available in that position.

(Sorry for the delay, next round of emails should go out in a few minutes.)

and, just again hyperthotically,

What if a player is signed and becomes available on the ff site after bidding ceases? Are we saying lockdown until jan 1st here and now?

Heskey is not worth £5.5m of anyone's money. I say everyone gets his points in order that we can collectively root for him for the duration of his eighth (wtf wtf) consecutive season in teh Premiership.

Sorry, not eighth, more like sixteenth. WTFINGF

Nah, I'll allow trades among owners until 1 September, then maybe one final round of bidding on newcomers to the Prem, then nothing till January.

awes

We can swap like for like values of players from our squads for newcomers that arise so?

waiting for the players to come in is quite exciting.

Email sent, spreadsheet updated, etc.

Would like opinions on how to divide remaining squad places between MF and FW - leave it up to each of us individually, or stick with the usual 5 + 3?

Wooh, Smalling for £4.1m! Lol Terry for less. Darragh on some kind of Wenger tip otherwise.

4+4 so I can join in the forward frenzy & play an epic spoiling role, but morally 5+3 is the way to go.

howd i do i'm away from mail

This is awes

Your squad is threadbear at the back again, but you did snare JT.

how did smalling go for 4m thought we had site value as minimum??

Only for the washup. Don't complain - Terry only cost you four.

fairy nuff i guess

4m is bonus for being the only one bidding on a player, as in the first round. right?

OH SHIT I paid nearly 4x the price of Terry for Cashley. If he gets buggered this season i'm not gonna be happy.

should have worded that differently, as cashley being buggered seems like it could be a daily occurance.

darragh you did quite well given that you appear to regard spending proper money as somehow beneath you, hence 'Wenger tip'.

there is no value in the market but terri is a player of super quality

is there a list of what midfielders are taken?

ok boxxy tell me in thread if i need to bid for more players

feel like i may be left bidding £1 for emile heskey after this :S

uh

Didn't i bid more for smalling and samba than what they went for?

or what have i missed?

Yeah seems I fucked up. Or had a sinister agenda w/o knowing it.

its like ebay. just because you bid £100 more for some ugg boots doesn't you have to pay £100 more, just like 50p more than the 2nd highest bidder.

Will have to go back and redo - really sorry everyone.

actually quite pleased with this round, 17 m for kompany is madness when you can get ivanovic for 4 imo

xp i curse you darragh

i'm not tryin to be a bollix :(

darragh I'm going to go through very carefully this time, but on first look, I think you succeeded in raising Smalling's and Samba's costs for your opponents but still lost out on both of them.

looooool

wait i checked again, you didn't outbid me on samba

xp yes you just doubled the price lol

that is nonetheless a result though!

the old 'obi mikel' trick eh

all for the venkys

But I also missed a competing 4m bid for EBJT, so you'll have to stump up an extra 100k to get him. Was it really worth it?

amid all this excitement I have emailed you my 2 picks boxall...

Ismael's defensive captures this round make me envious. He must be offering 'inflated' wages. Curse my board's wage structure.

also the wide choice of restaurants in I-town as opposed to your two Subways

xxp Yes got them, thanks.

Will send corrected results around now. No players have changed hands, but Ismael's had to spend an addtl 6m for Smalling, sonderangerbot 3m or so for Samba.

I seem to have left myself £45.7m to sign 2 players. Come to daddy my favourite Uruguayan cheaty biter.

£6m??!!! Court of Arbitration for Sport here I come.

if anything I think darragh is due a bonus of £2m or so for double-checking my work.

every little hinders

Think upt0eleven has got a good signing in Richards. Will get plenty of clean sheets, and if last night is anything to go by, the odd assist as well. I don't know how the scoring works in FF so just assume you get points for clean shets, goals, assists, wins? and deductions for bookings, sending offs, goals conceded.

just looking at my options for defender # 5

and fyi for the wenger jibes i was next best bidder on a few of the players that got snapped up there

Darragh's threadbare squad so far is an intriguing mix of players he has repped for (tiote, Walker, Carroll, Doyle) and ones he has mercilessly slated (Robinson, Terry) and Gomes who is in a category of his own. Awaiting his signing of Jamie Carragher as his extra defender with interest.

is shawcross really still available? if not then yeah carragher!

I was surprised and delighted to see that Sagna was available. Snapped him up along with Coloccini

OH SHIT I paid nearly 4x the price of Terry for Cashley. If he gets buggered this season i'm not gonna be happy.

Don't know how you could bring yourself to do it tbh.

Largely happy with my lot and amused by £4m for Terry.

Corrections issued via email.

i am gereing over dresses did i get shawx?

You did, yes.

Everyone will get MF email at halftime of the CL match.

ah, my cheapskate scamming almost came off with Terry, Darragh ya bas. 12.7m for four pretty good defenders isn't too bad though.

This is fun, I'll miss it when it's done and we get into the proper game.

submitted

terrified that all of my big bids will land and i'll be paupering for heskey come next round

terrified that i'll lose all of my big bids and will end up with karl henry

this is great

totally.

i initially had cahill for about 14m and then forced myself to acknowledge that he still, for the moment at least, plays for bolton. not sure that was the right call but we shall see.

i'd a bit on him as well, didn't lose out by much in the end iirc

I think I ended up with Cahill iirc. Over priced and I'm not sure Bolton will be that sound defensively. OTOH I had a lot of money and not many spaces to fill and Arsenal defenders are dropping like flies so he might end up there.
This whole process is great fun.

pandemic, you've the best squad so far imo

Happy so far, tho if we're counting all 15 players each week I'll lose out from one of my goalies being a back up, whereas boxall has Hart and Szcesney and you've got 2 first teamer's as well I think.
Will be really really gutted if I don't get one of my top 3 picks in midfield as the ones I listed after that were done more out of necessity than desire.

Glad everyone seems to be enjoying it. Though I'm now afraid of making more errors, tabulating the bids as they come in is fun, in much the same way as watching songs rise and fall while administering an ILM poll must be.

A few people have 3 players from the same club in their side already, and one has somehow ended up with 4 Arsenal players - OK, it's me. Forgot I'd bought Gervinho, didn't really expect to end up with both CBs. Should we have a limit of 4 per club, 3 (I'd have to make a swap I guess), or no limit?

we said a limit of three but tbh i don't see why

Nah, we'll be scoring XIs not entire squads I think, two points-scoring GKs feels wrong.

(That was XP to pandemic re: keepers.)

Limit of 3/club makes sense in the regular FPL game, where you can choose carefully, but our version is so unpredictable I'd just as soon discard that rule.

Right, I'm back home. Will go through those emails and send you my bids asap.

No need to rush, we've set a quicker pace than I had anticipated, can afford for everyone can take a day or so to think on it if they like.

PS I've been looking up this whole boxall/Taman Shud affair - it's the craziest stuff.

― Ismael Klata, Tuesday, 16 August 2011 08:49 (14 hours ago) Bookmark

we've a thread iirc

Tamam Shud Case

This thread is amazing. I actually have no idea what's going on.

So is it 5 midfielders + 3 forwards, or 4 + 4?

oh shit

i didn't think to nominate, but for me it's 5 + 3

I went with 5 + 3.

Yeah, 5+3 seemed to be consensus. In the last email I listed how many each of us still needed in each position - all squads at a glance are here.

Lovely.

5+3 it is then. makes sense. will have to think about this for a while, this round is gonna be gruesome

ya, 5+3 seems to be the best way. I've gone with some odd mix of bold and cagey here, I could either end up spending loads and be stuck with Owen up front or get two chumps for next to nothing and have loads of money for the next round, and NOTHING IN BETWEEN.

I could either end up spending loads and be stuck with Owen up front or get two chumps for next to nothing and have loads of money for the next round

alex ferguson's last three transfer windows amirite

Emailed two of you this evening w/ words to the effect that you could miss out on filling your MF places if you don't a) increase your bids or b) add more players to the end of your ballot.

If the auction 'went live' right now, one of you would be fine and the other would not - but there are still two squads that haven't been submitted, and I've learned from the past few days that just one is enough to affect nearly the whole league.

Of course there will be undrafted players to sift through at the end, but who knows if they'll be any good.

just sent you my picks boxall. i have absolutely no idea how this will play out.

Yeah this is really quite exciting, like seemingly everyone else I have no idea if I'm gonna have any money left for my strikers or if my midfield is going to be comprised of a load of old tat (and Jermaine Motherfucking Pennant)

my only plan was not to engage in a bidding war with pandemic since he's got more money than god but i fear i might have failed at that even

I'm hoping that pandemic has earmarked 90% of his funds for a certain forward and that he has bid no more than £4m for any midfielders...

he can only buy one mf & suarez, it's me you need to worry bout

I just hope you haven't outbid me on Jenas

given that so far i've acquired robinson, terry and gomes, nothing is impossible.

Last time I looked Darragh had a transfer kitty of around £80m which certainly gave me pause I can tell ya.
Jermaine M'Fing Pennant was actually on my list of (budget)bids until I realised he'd already been taken. I'm trying to be sanguine about possibly being outbid for my preferred midfielders, all the more cash to throw at any one of suarez, dzeko or long.

Sadly I have already snaffled Long as well!

Crouch/Heskey '11 - BELIEVE

carroll doyle for 16m the pair is looking good imo

No doubt. Aguero and Rooney being picked up without a bidding war looks like pretty good business too...

No Long!!!!!!!!! crestfallen.
doyle can do carroll's running for him, someone has to.

yeah the players that went unchallenged are p astonishing

All part of the fun though, especially when Rooney's hair plugs go all Tobias Fünke and he misses half the season

Multiple 20m+ bids for three or four midfielders, all from the northwest, are making this round difficult to calculate. I'm going to get more coffee to make sure errors don't creep in to my work. Should have an email around before the Clasico tonight.

Multiple 20m+ bids for three or four midfielders, all from the northwest..

Hands off Aquilani!!

Getting concerned I may have over-extended myself here! Off to the pub after work so looking forward to whatever insanity will greet me on my arrival home...

Found this round much easier having only to go for one player. Would be quite happy with any of my bidees.

just tell me straight doc. Have i gotta chance?

When I looked at the scores the players got for the whole of last season it seemed like midfielders were way more likely than any of the other positions to score big, so when I only got one of my picks first time around I was concerned... I fear I have over-compensated!

Assuming wages commensurate with these bids, it's a great time to be a petulant androgynous-looking creative dribbler, unless your name is Samir.

Hey Dirk's not petulant! ;)

MF results sent.

Final round should be fun, with a few teams still able to offer 30m / striker, and a hoy hoy over 50m to spend on just one player.

Hahaha - oh man :(

(well played a hoy hoy btw)

wow some bargains were certainly made. not by me though.

your team's looking pretty good ismael, despite the overinflated price of home-grown talent in that round.

4m for nasri would be pretty good if he wasn't going to pick up more arse-skelfs than goals this year.

ooh, quite the bidding war for vdv between me and darragh there. and yet he can still spend 30m on a striker.

At least I've ruined pandemic's budget - there's a lot of satisfaction in that, I won't deny it.

IK filled up nicely, that's a team and a half
boxall's team looks light on mf points to me
N1ck's got a very good team
Sam can sign Suarez but the team looks only ok to me beyond the superstars up front, bargain midfield aside.
sonderangebot solid as fuck but light up front?
pandemic awes but some drop in quality to the subs bench
merdeyeux: not convinced by guttierez and barton as pointgrabbers, best be spending that cash up front imo
chris- really good so far imo, might be outbid for the star strikers tho
dmac- happy enough tbh
peligro- solid but again imo will struggle to outbid for that all important quality up front

WTF 'light', did you not see I got Anderson?

yeah had to choose btw Silva and suarez really, and figured someone would outbid me on Suarez so went all in. Already have rooney so he'll have to be my main points scorer up front.
A hoy's team is good, only my anti gerrard prejudice kept me for going for him, suspected he'd be cheap.
Ismael's team v good but not convinced that his strikers will play tbh.

even a shit gerrard season would be worth 4m tbh

anderson won't get ffl points to match eg etherington.

boxall, IK, and DMac have the strongest benches I think. That'll end up being important.

i've tried to avoid injury prone players like gerrard but then i've got terry, bale and vdv so...

It was just a fat joke really, but depending on Fletcher I think Anderson could do quite well.

yeah if he gets a cm------>am role this year he'll do well

i put a quite hefty bid on anderson, figured if he doesn't do good this season then never, but i think i'm better off without

Do we need another email soliciting bids for strikers, or can everyone use the spreadsheet link to see players already taken / millions left in the bank?

I see no problem with allowing players to be traded between squads until the 31st, if there's any desire for that. But we'd have to decide how it affects their monetary value.

for what they cost the current owner imo

I make it 13 frwd spots to fill. At least 8 good frwds left in the pot, hmm not too bad.

lol i put what i thought would be a tiny bid in for gerrard, in a 'oh well i guess he has to be 13th on my list' sort of way. same with obertan and eagles - damn you all for bidding higher for nani and silva etc.

shit do i go suarez? or is there a better choice?

are we doing jan transfers? and if so, would i want to keep some moolah?

suarez v. van persie staying injury free lol v. ??? tevez ???

tevez not a cert starter/stayer

Oh well if I end up with the last name on my list I can look forward to actually sympathising with Darragh when a certain tall CF fails to get on the end of a perfect gareth bale cross.

and i you for carroll!

Hold on - there's no point keeping cash free for January, right? Because if so I am wrecked (& will be querying Ashley Young's price, but that's by-the-by).

we are doing jan transfers but if my count is right you can pick your striker of choice and you will still have about 20m left you sneaky bastard xp to sam

Leftover funds should transfer to January, I think. Ismael all of your assets will be fluid once the window reopens, everyone will have in the region of 120-130m to wheel and deal with, depending on how badly your players depreciate.

I don't want to open my gmail and see anyone's bids before I've made mine, so here's this:

Manager                     FWs needed                        Budget                       Avg cost / player
a hoy hoy                              1                             51.4m                             51.4m
Upt0eleven                             2                             36.1m                             18.1m
Ismael Klata                          --                              --                                --
boxall                                 1                             20.8m                             20.8m
sonderangerbot                         1                             21.4m                             21.4m
pandemic                               1                             16.5m                             16.5m
Merdeyeux                              2                             61.1m                             30.6m
Chris                                  2                             46.4m                             23.2m
darraghmac                             1                             31.2m                             31.2m
peligro                                2                             32.2m                             16.1m 

No Suarez for you, pandemic.

Fitness guru Raymond Verheijen has basically put a hex on Suarez's colon, maybe pandemic won't regret missing out.

he should be happy with n'gog at this point xp

must send my bids in, will we be done tonight?

Tonight or tomorrow, no great hurry.

Wait what's this about the gaucho gut?! Strictly fantasy only I hope.

how are you working running out of money, boxall? will i be able to e.g. bid 50m each on five strikers and 10m each on another five, and if the first 50m bid succeeds you skip to the first 10m guy?

ey

What's the stats with overbidding? Someone with 21m can only bid 17m for any one player?

fwiw I bid the full (total minus £4m) for everyone last round - I presume boxall cut those back to £4m once I'd got Young

sent my list.

total minus 4m as long as you have a squad place to fill after, obv you can bid total for yr last player?

so can i just bid x large sum for everyone and then when i pick someone up my bids will be reduced to budget-x?

I'll clarify in a moment how this works for those of you who still need 2 strikers (Upt0eleven, Merdeyeux, Chris, peligro).

If you only need one, your max bid is your total, unless you really want to have money sitting in the bank until January for some reason, in which case set it lower.

nah i'll be bidding total in order of pref, nothin else makes sense imo

Last round Ismael needed 2 MFs, and had no FW places to fill, so he could use his entire budget of 33.1m. Since every player costs at least 4m, the most he could bid on any one player was 29.1m.

As it turned out, he needed the entire 29.1m (plus the draft-order tiebreaker) to prise Ashley Young away from peligro. But if the next-highest bid for Young had instead been 19m, then Ismael would have paid 19.1m and the remaining 10m would have automatically transferred to his next choice.

Righto, thanks for clarifying. I lobby for peligro's inclusion and that's how he repays me.

will i be able to e.g. bid 50m each on five strikers and 10m each on another five, and if the first 50m bid succeeds you skip to the first 10m guy?

― Merdeyeux, Wednesday, August 17, 2011 3:16 PM (19 minutes ago)

Yes, that's fine. You can bid 50m on all ten if you like, but if bidding on your first pick goes up to 40m, all subsequent bids will be reduced to 20m because the money's just not there anymore. Does that make sense?

alright, got it!

pondering whether or not to go with a big money spoiler by bidding above everyone's budgets, potentially sacrificing a decent second striker...

knock yourself out, i'll be happy with whichever of my top 2 i get tbh

lol no wait i knew that wasn't right

whichever of my top 5, right?

theoretically, i can't get any worse than that.

just gave away my bid but ye knew that anyway

true tragedy for darraghmac fc that keane is gone.

never even placed a bid for crouch/defoe, some kind hearted soul will pick them up- pity matt_dc isn't in the running imo

Pretty fuckin' glad I didn't go an extra £.1m on Ashley Young (thanks Ismael!) or I would have a devastating Downing/Young/N'Zogbia triumverate in midfield and naebody up front to finish off all of their good work.

Still pretty worried that I'll be outbid on everyone but hey, I have faith in Shane Long putting in a 30 goal season.

Emailed you btw boxall.

who's yr back up goalie peligro? Cech out for 4 weeks.

I'm not sweating it, Tim Krul can make the step up no bother. Good old, safe, dependable, tight-at-the-back Newcastle.

fyi i didn't go for suarez, so y'all can go crazy.

REGRETTING IT ALREADY.

was it the colon curse that put you off?

Oh, I didn't mean that literally, but Verheijen did predict Suarez will be injured before Christmas due to being rushed back from the Copa for the start of Liverpool's season.

Hopefully relegation will be off the agenda by then this season.

never forget

i did go for suarez. and heskey, of course.

Just need one more ballot - Chris if you've sent yours, it disappeared somewhere b/c I don't have it.

Sorry dude, just doing it now.

Sent.

Hmmmmm ... running into a sort of logical conundrum trying to allocate these players properly. Bear with me.

Sorry to keep people waiting. The difficulty has to do with the few ppl who need two strikers, and how their 'available funds' roll over to their next bid after they've successfully bought a player. Until now we've been conducting the auctions as if all players were being bid on simultaneously, instead of one at a time, and that may no longer be feasible.

Ohh exciting stuff. It's like Transfer Deadline Day.

I shall be tuned to Sky Sports News throughout the night, alerting my medical team to be on standby, and ensuring that my fax machine is working.

20,000 #9 shirts have been readied with only the name to be attached.

Really need to avoid this sort of situation: http://www.football-italia.net/jun25u.html

I realise and regret how my p lazy bid strategy may not have made things simple for the compere. Still a £32m bid for Emile had to be done.

fuckit i did't bother to bid for suarez i don't think.

have severe bidders remorse about the order of my mail tbh

Someone's getting Suarez for 4m eh.

\o/

The rly big names (Suarez, RVP, Torres) went early and for big money. It's a little further down that things get confusing, specifically sorting out who landed Bent, Odemwingie & Tevez.

Vaguely suspect I'll come to regret calling Tevez second-rate though.

am i sorted am i

a hoy hoy	Van Persie		31.1m
Upt0eleven	Torres, Heskey		31.3m, 4.0m
boxall		Dzeko			16.6m
sonderangerbot	Tevez			4.0m
pandemic	Anelka			4.0m
Merdeyeux	Suarez, Ba		30.1m, 16.6m
Chris		Odemwingie, Sturridge	4.0m, 4.0m
darraghmac	Bent			28.3m
peligro		Klasnic, Zamora		4.0m, 4.0m

This time the Google doc is going to have two more sheets, one for raw data (the bids I rec'd) and one for my methodology.

The only way I could get it to work was by dividing the players into two tiers, taking bids for the most popular five (RVP, Suarez, Torres, Bent, Dzeko) only, then doing the rest separately w/ the remaining funds. I'm happy to be corrected if someone can work out a better way.

ah not bad, though I now kind of regretting not pushing up Balotelli to form the ultimate ~lol bad boy~ frontline.

i wanted bent, i got bent

OK, updated.

darraghmac with his spurs reunion squad
first fatty robinson, now bent!

suarez,ba is a formidable frontline

chris has a £38m 'warchest' for January.

Carroll/Bent a good points scoring combo I reckon.

Man, made a bit of a mess of that. Odemwingie should do alright. I like Sturridge but hmm. Goodwillie.

outbid by 0.5 for dzeko by boxall. curses.

ugh what was i thinking

oh never mind, he went for that, but was out bid by more.
xp

If anyone wants to grapple with the apparent knot I found at the center of these bids, you can find it by following this thread: Odemwingie *and* Bent to Chris -> Tevez to darraghmac -> Odemwingie to sonderangerbot?

eh?

my move for bent to fill the only striking gap i had left makes sense to me, but i'm not looking closely at anything else

so did balotelli and crouch end up clubless? :(

i don't see how chris could have outbid darragh on bent. if that's what you're saying...?

a series of polls to fill a squad of the best players left in each position would result in a team that would not finish close to last imo

xp Chris had 46m to spend, he just didn't bid very high on any one player. Picked up Odemwingie on the cheap, plenty left over to outbid darragh. But then darragh would move on to outbid you on Tevez, and your next choice would be ... Odemwingie, who would suddenly cost Chris a lot more $ and rule out Bent.

Yes we should do that, I'll score the lol XI each week and see if it avoids the drop zone.

Bravo boxall! Thanks for all the hard work.

Long - Klasnic - Zamora may not have the star quality of some (well, most) of the other forward lines, but I'm pretty pleased with it, especially for £14m.

I'll be interested to see if everyone's 1st teams end up starting every week for their respective clubs. Think darragh has the strongest set of players but I hope he has a couple of world class physios...

In terms of selecting our teams for the week, shall we just email you by a certain time boxall or what? And are we mucking about with captains/vice captains? Apologies if this was all covered upthread...

yes. Bravo Boxall for all your hard work! Hugely enjoyable.

Maybe post our subs in public on this or the official new thread? It might be a good way of keeping things fresh (and with any luck a huge source of embarrassment).

Do we need a new thread? Will start one if it's helpful, I just didn't want to spam the board.

Post them or email them, either one is fine. If you forget I'll go with the previous week's team.

vidic out for another month, hernandez gone for a while too and who knows what the hell will happen to tevez. i should just take my remaining 17.4 m and buy myself out of my contract.

Moron question: what's the form re substitutions? I never do them, I always just pick my squad at the start of the season and let the website do the rest. Should I just, every week, name one guy in each position who should be on the bench, is it as simple as that?

yes. doesn't have to be one in each position though, you can play whatever formation you like.

There seems to be some resistance to the idea of flexible formations. If everyone does 4-4-2 you don't need to make any decisions, you'll have one sub in each position. However if we allow a MF to replace a DF/FW, then you'll need to prioritize your bench.

Boxall - Please rest the following on the bench for me this week:-
Park
Dyer
Hall
Marshall
going with a 4-3-3

If we're doing captains then
Rooney C
Lampard VC
Tho really if anyone should be the vice-captain it's rooney amarite
Cheers mate

Subs this week:

Hennessey (Wolves)
Rafael (crocked)
Modric (for 'is own good)
Davies (Hernandez out means Berba in, right?)

Playing 3-4-3

Subs: Cech, Coloccini, Sagna, Tchoyi

Captain N'Zogbia
Vice Captain Rodallega

fuck am I on about, Rodallega in my other FF team... Vice Captain Distin

Are we doing captains Y/N? Don't have a strong opinion about them either way.

yeah I cant say im fussed. maybe we can just each nominate a captain now and that will be our captain all season, rain or shine?

i'd prefer that tbh

Minimum of 3 defenders in the XI, as per the FPL site?

Yeah, minimum 1 GK, 3 DF, 3 MF, 1 FW.

Yeah not fussed if we don't have captains. If we do then I'll stick with Rooney unless he's injured.

I've chosen my captain based on this weekend's fixtures, went for Scott Sinclair. But if we're sticking with one for the whole season I'll want to change to Dirk!

I'll go with the new lad, Ashley Young, as captain. It's a big responsibility to add to his crushing pricetag, but the boy's got big shoulders and can take it imo.

my subs, playing 442:

sorensen
hernandez
vidic
marveaux

i'll go with yaya as captain.

343

subs:
jaaskelainen
gibbs
senderos
whitehead

torres as captain.

Reina
Bosinga, Enrique, Evra
Sinclair (C), Hoolahan (VC), Kuyt, Brunt, Kalou
Odemwingie, Sturridge

Subs:
GK. Bogdan
1. Goodwillie
2. Huth
3. Steinsson

Subs: Mignolet, then in order of preference, Bothroyd, Reo-Coker, De Laet.

Captain can be Ba if it's just for this week, Suarez if it's permanent. Vice captain being the vice versa of that.

holy shizzle my front 5 of wilshere, gerrard, obertan, rvi and kun gonna destroy teams once they all get lol fit.

this week:
c - rvp
vc - kun

subs - gerrard, wilshere, whoever my second choice keeper is (the one who isn't de gea), gohouri

WHERE'S BA AAAAAAAAAH.

OMFG WHERE'S SUAREZ??!?!?!?

lolz

THERE'S SUAREZ!!

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY

But also EMILE!

Anelka stating ahead of Drogba. I approve Andre.

Never heard from dmac - I think he's at a wedding - so I had to choose his XI. Hope he enjoys Aaron Ramsey's own goal as much as I did.

fucker

Your subs: Gomes, Walker, Etherington, Doyle, captain Carroll. All decisions made in good faith before matches began, I assure you.

12 fantasy players on the pitch for Utd-Spurs right now, could well decide first week's results.

League table

Don't believe in looking at the table until 8 matches in tbh (looks at table) GET IN!!

solid first week. thanks to emile.

thanking u boxall for sabotaging darraghs subs, or i would have been dead last

it's a learning week imo, had four spurs players

At least everyone managed to get 11 players who actually played - except me. Going to need a transfer if I'm outbid on Juan Mata.

eh?

Once the transfer window closes, I mean. We'll auction the late arrivals then.

boxall - here are my subs this week

Marshall
Fabio
McCarthy (he better actually be injured or I won't be happy, wait that sounds wrong)
Holt

Gambling on Park actually getting a game this week.

Captains same as last week

cheers mate

i'll make suarez my permacaptain, ba vc, and stick with the same subs.

Does our league have a name yet?

Subs this week -

Cech
Sagna
Zamora
Riise

Permacaptain: Downing, Vice captain: Long

Does our league have a name yet?
It does not - I find the conventions of naming FF teams bewildering enough, so you're welcome to suggest one.

Liverpool Won't Win the Fantasy League 2011/12

or maybe we can cruelly turn that vein of analysis inwards, e.g. Ismael Klata Won't Win the Fantasy League 2011/12.

harsh, but accurate

arsenal fan iirc

Emailed my subs to you, Ben. Just incase...

GK. Bogdan
1. Sturridge
2. Hoolahan
3. Steinsson

Captain: Goodwillie
Vice-Captain: Odemwingie

Villa Boas YOU FOOL! Anelka - on the bench Alex - on the bench. Trying to crush my title aspirations before they've even started!

I sense the malign influence of one Mr Klata.

wahahaHAHAHA *thunder & lightning, curses keeping Schwarzer in for Hennessey*

Boss Winger!

anelka and alex on bench is hardly unexpected tbh

Holt you fucker. Oh well. Bravo Norwich!

ffs ivanovic!

Holt you fucker.
Alex DNP, McCarthy DNP, if Fabio sits against Arsenal you'll get Holt's points.

Holt you wonderful wonderful man! Lampard as well.

who ended up signing dzeko?

That was me, and I'm kicking myself for not naming him captain this week, it did cross my mind at one point.

nobody?

i don't have dzeko in anyone's team in my latest spreadsheet boxall?

Idk what to tell you, I bought him and he's listed.

Did you do a ctrl-F? Because he's in there as Džeko, maybe that's why he didn't show up for you.

and fuck, there goes Hart (my captain)'s clean sheet.

my bad, was looking at pandemic's for some reason

kicking myself some more ... if I'd made him captain I'd have first place locked up through Christmas.

well given that you just draften him in on the sly i'm sure nobody's gonna call you on retroactively changing

so who had chesney/kos/djourou?

wenger

boom.

lolled at 'boom'

Course, easy for me to laugh from the bottom of the league

Stupid website changes its points valuations day-to-day it seems, they take their time deciding Man of the Match or something.

So the table looks different today (you're still bottom though, d).

early days

Oh yeah sweet. I'm down to the bare bones up front now though - one forward an invalid, one an unperson, and the third an old man at Bolton.

You can still make transfers, at least until Wednesday when I leave on holiday, and again when I get back Tuesday.

how do we do that, and on what valuations?

The fantasy website's valuations. You email me who you want to pick up, and who you're dropping from your squad. If you drop someone you had to win at auction, say Bale, I'll offer him to the next-highest bidders in order, then everyone else.

Adebayor: should he count as a free agent who anyone can claim, or should he go into the 'new player' auction w/ Mata, Lukaku et al? Which is the fairest solution?

declaration- i've made a bid to swap him for carroll

Would feel uneasy doing so unchallenged, tbph. Maybe one last round of bids, though how would that works as players from other squads become available?

I'm doing much better with this team than with my actual team, bugger changing anything.

considering my three forwards have earned me a total of 4 points i'm prepared to 'ave a go at anything that moves at this point

One transfer approved so far: Phil Jones DF Man Utd to pandemic, replacing Fabio, who is now a free agent (5.0m).

Transfer pending: darragh, swap of Carroll & Adebayor, only Adebayor does not appear on the fantasy website. If 'arry's loan doesn't fall through, Carroll will be available for 10.0m. /drudge siren

drudge indeed

so i may not be all that attached to Torres. who can I swap him for?

You mean, among unsigned / free-agent type players, or are you soliciting a deal with another (fantasy) team?

I'll take Torres off your hands if you fancy taking your chances with Berba or the Drog.

Made three transfers myself:

Koscielny out, Roger Johnson in.
McEachran out, Fabian Delph in.
Pavlyuchenko out, Welbeck in.

hmmph you're good to yourself while i sweat on adebayor

I like to imagine the fantasy experts are deep in consultations about whether he's got the right temperament to succeed at a midtable club on City wages, prices anywhere from 6.5m to 11m being proposed.

loan fee 2m

Which one out of Darragh and Dalglish has given up on Carroll quicker?

tbf, i'm only basing things on dalglish's apparent judgement. Doyle and bent will play every week, can't waste 10m on a player that may not, adebayor in imo

Yeah that's fair enough. I'm pondering just how many games Anelka is going to get at Chelsea, and whether or not to trade him in for Rodallega.

I think I've already asked this but I can't find the answer... max. of 3 or 4 players from a team?

Don't think we're applying that rule Chris.

we tried and then darragh ended up with four spurs players and we were all like aww.

Ah right ok. Boxall's away now until Tuesday isn't he?

No limit on players / club.

Just to approximate our own deadline day, you have 4 hours left to make transfers - until next week, I mean, the window's not shutting for good, I'm just not going to be around to approve them.

I'm hoping it projects confidence and boosts morale when a team owner goes on holiday during the frenzied last hours of the window.

ok then how much money do i have left over?

because fuck a leroy lita

Check the rows at the bottom of the 'Squads' tab.

if gyan goes to fenerbahce do i get a refund of £8m to spend on... idk... jenas?

Yes.

I'll offer you Gervinho & Nani for Torres & Walcott, btw.

more tempting than the drogba offer but... i think i'll resist.

wait are we just throwin out offers now

All the good strikers are gone aren't they.

The 'best' I could find, not already in squads, were rodallega and hoillt. So yes.

Rodallega now picked up, by Chris, who has jettisoned David Goodwillie.

how much would it cost to swap lita for arsenal's new signing Park?

also gohouri for mertesacker? (this would have me at 4 arsenal players, which isnt over the rules, right?)

You'll have to wait til next week for that - Juan Mata and anyone who signed after him are going to be auctioned once the smoke clears.

i would prob want nutsacker for gibbs tbh so you're gonna have to put up a fight for that one.

'nutsacker for gibbs' sounds like the kind of offer you see scratched on toilet walls

Where are you going on holiday boxall? Top marks for coinciding it with international week.

I'm going to sit by a lake in the woods of central Ontario. The timing is fortunate, you're right, but not planned.

WELCOME BACK BOXALL.

for this final reshuffle, what kind of format would you like our bids in? something like:

[amount of free money we want to bid from our WAR CHEST] + [amount we spent on player x] FOR [player y]?

Thanks. I spent five days reading, drinking, fishing and doing little else, it was great. How were the int'l matches?

To answer your question: just put the amount you want to bid, then work out how to finance it yourself after you've won the player.

pompey way

lol

For anyone who doesn't check their email: deadline for bidding on new players (Mata, Mertesacker et al) is in 24 hours. Deadline for squads (and permanent C & VC) is 48 hours.

I should've added Scotts Parker and Dann to that list of players as well, both technically new to the league.

hmmm

I've done my business early, got a nice settled squad, and the chairman's tightened the pursestrings - I'm sitting this one out.

you think you're utd. you're everton.

an unsure Merdeyeux makes a cumbersome last second dash into the transfer market, is he betraying an instability in his squad masked by their solid start to the season?

cant decide to stick or twist with this shit

i was unsure. decided in the end that anelka wasn't gonna get enough starts so offered a new home to an abandoned, unwanted and unloved Andy Carroll, once of DMac's parish.

May be suffering from buyers remorse. i really like anelka.

btw, this you think you're utd. you're everton.

Ice Cold.

New free agents: Anelka, Tevez. (sonder switched the latter for Agbonlahor.)

wait? tevez!!! Can I switch again?

If so Carroll for tevez please.

poor old andy carroll his stay at my club may end up being shorter than david unsworth's at Villa iirc

New free agents: Anelka, Tevez Carroll.

hurrah! he may not play more than anelka mind you, but one can't have everything in life.

Farewell Andy, it's been real.

big clubs be hoarding legit talent it's a shame

put my bids in, goodbye leroy lita, still hope you have a great season

a h h : Park Chu-Young, A. Santos, Mertesacker
N1ck: Lukaku
sonder: Ruiz
Merdeyeux: Drenthe, Parker, Stracqualursi
Chris: Mata (29.7m!)

I took Santon, Coates and Crusat.

lol @ sam
Dammmmn @ merdy
Wau @ mata

Yeah I was desperate to get Mata in - no confidence in Odemwingie (West Brom???), Rodallega (Wigan???), or Sturridge (gonna get a game?), and my other midfielders are Kuyt (happy with Dirk), Brunt (West Brom???), Kalou (gonna get a game?), and Hoolahan (???).

Next season - don't select so many ?????????????????????s

i'd be happy with guys you know will get a game every week though. Rodallega due some goals, brunt a good pointgetter, not sure bout odemwingie again but we'll see.

Yeah West Brom should do alright - first 3 have included Chelsea and Utd to be fair. And Stoke.

I have well and truly pounced. RIP QPR contingent, your relegation battle with a hoy hoy's Arsenal contingent woulda been lots of fun.

I picked up Barry and Anelka, dropped Arteta and Welbeck.

The remaining players who have scored the most points so far are on Wolves and Wigan mostly.

Yes, Barry has had a good start to the season, and I'm glad to see that Anelka has found a good home.

a h h at least has 2 players who play for a usually successful club that will probably feature every week in santos and mertesacker. Maybe the Arsenal revival is just around the corner?

Merdy has done well there strengthening an already stacked squad.

dropping arteta's a strange move?

lol i wanted mata too but had to spread my money about, making it seem like i was just... me. still, i dont care that i look like a wenger stan, it has to be an upgrade on lita, gohouri and naughton

i whimsically bid for lukaku but now i'm not sure i really want him instead of gyan. tough one.

lukaku will play as much as sturridge, wherever he went.

I don't think he went anywhere, did he?

Surprised he stayed at City, what with all the competition for a place.

Decided to leave my team as is, gonna wait til Jan and see how the season is panning out then. Pretty sure that playing alongside Prince Bendtner will mean my man Sessegnon is soon racking up the points.

p sure bendtner is going to prove stiff competition for gyan if steve bruce is ever able to get that scarf off him.

I don't think he went anywhere, did he?

― Ismael Klata, Friday, 9 September 2011 14:09 (12 minutes ago)

^^^^doesnt get a meme

's funny, I thought I did?

i'll sb LBI if ruiz turns out to be rubbish. i have very little confidence in my forwards but i'm happy enough if they're not on the bench for the rest of the season.

I think Ruiz has a better shot playing for Jol, who saw him at his best firsthand in the Eredivisie, thanhe would for a British manager who'd inevitably drop him for Andy Johnson.

Arteta I don't expect to get a lot of games, really. Was more valuable at Everton as a guaranteed penalty taker also.

yeah tbf ramsey and wilshere are already much bet no fuckit i can't even finish

boxall - my bench this week

Dyer
Alex
McCarthy
Marshall

Cheers

Great - everyone should check the subs, C and VC listed under 'Week 4' and tell me if what I have there is wrong or out-of-date. Some teams have no VC at all and you need to have a permanent one in the next 12 hours.

Here's the link again.

adebayor c terry vc ta

Captain: Downing
Vice Captain: Klasnic

Subs this week: Cech, Hughes, Coloccini, Zamora

Actually, subs:

GK: Cech
1: Coloccini
2: Zamora
3: Hughes

sticking with torres as captain (god help me) with charlie adam as vc.

same starting 11 as week 3.

subs: sorensen, ivanovic, vidic, marveaux
captain: hernandez
vice captain: al-habsi

Subs: GK. Bogdan, 1. Sturridge, 2. Kalou, 3. Steinsson

C: Mata
VC: Hoolahan

Subs: Schwarzer, Rafael, Kranjcar, The Drog

Captain Young, vice captain Kompany

Tevez! I didn't pay nearly £10m for scuffed penalties you clown!

you're welcome! in related news agbonlahor actually scored today :)

i whimsically bid for lukaku but now i'm not sure i really want him instead of gyan. tough one.

― Upt0eleven

Gyan's left and nobody found out until this morning - I assume there are no objections if I let N1ck have Lukaku after all?

Fine with me

i object

Fu

rooney gonna keep me in dis ting single handed by the looks of things.

Even if you count Lukaku I now have three strikers of which I can expect, at most, one to play each week. I am basically fucked.