Fantasy Football Ends with an Exciting Super Sunday

Yesterday marked the last day of the English Premiership Season so its time to hang up the boots and reflect on my Fantasy Football experience..

To tell the truth I have never really been into football.  As a youngster the nearest big club was Brighton and Hove Albion and my friends and I never made the trip to the terraces and as a result I never felt the club spirit that so many people talk about. I wasn’t sporty as a kid, never played myself and my lack of interest meant that when the big national events came around I wasn’t that bothered as to who won or lost. 
I do remember the FA Cup being a big thing though. It would nominate the live kids TV on a Saturday morning the in early summer and always seemed to be a red team playing against a blue team. 

As a student in Leeds, before the premiership, I did go once to Elland Road in the 91/92 season. This was when they won the first division ahead of Man Utd. These were in the days of Gary Speed, Gary McAllister, Lee Chapman, Gordon Strachan and Eric Cantona (na na - as I perhaps mistaken my believe the chant used to go). 
Up until recently if people asked me which team I support I would say Leeds, but to be honest I had no idea how they were doing...but it would usually shut down the conversation!

Knowing about football does provide a social advantage, of that I am sure, whenever there is nothing to talk about football can usually bring some flair to a foundering conversation. Until this year I managed to bluff my way through a football conversation by listening to Radio 4 sport news on the way to work. This usually provided me with something intelligent to say that provided me with an ounce of football credibility. 

However, this season a few things have happened that added together have increased my knowledge greatly. First my stepson has me interested in football. He decided that as a family we would support Spurs. This is a controversial decision living where we do in North London as on the whole Arsenal (or The Arsenal - as I have come to understand) are the preferred choice and to say the rivalry is strong is as understatement for sure. However my interest in the team has developed a wider knowledge of the premiership. 

Secondly my Arsenal supporting best man took me to The Emirates to see The Gunners play my old team Leeds in the 3rd round of the FA Cup. The excitement of the game opened my eyes to what I was missing. 

Most importantly this year was the invite I received to join my workplaces’ Fantasy Football league. Through this game I have followed the ups and downs of the football season. I have learnt who the best players are, the injuries, the importance of penalty takers and the goal scoring midfielders. Importantly I can now speak with some authority about certain players. For instance I know that De Bruyne of Man City now holds the all time record (with Thierry Henry) for the most premier league assists in one season (20) getting his 20th assist alongside two goals in the 5-0 final game against Norwich. I also know that Tottenham’s strong finish to the season and their inclusion in the Europa League next year was down to the number of goals scored by Harry Kane since returning from injury and lockdown. He scored to help secure the draw against Crystal Palace that with the loss against Chelsea by Wolves secured European football for Spurs next year. Also Leeds secured their place back in premiership football next season. 

See. I know about football. 

So how about the Fantasy Football league?

This is my team in the final week. Not a good result of truth be told.  It all rested on a poor decision made a couple of days ago. My most prolific player this year has been De Bruyne, I mentioned him earlier. 

He has been my captain for most weeks but recently he has not always started on the pitch. He did play in the week before. There was a big risk that he would not be in the starting lineup for the last game. As his fellow midfielder teammate was benched last Wednesday I made the decision to swap him out and replace him with Mahrez instead and in turn making Sterling my captain. That decision cost me 21 points. Gutted. 

Even so I maintained third place in the league and happily joint third with my close rival. Third is not first I hear you cry but it’s not bad for a football novice. 

Bring on the 12th September I say!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sparkly bathroom prevented by natural chemical equilibria

Image
I have had the pleasure of cleaning the bathroom today. I have used a number of different products over the years to find a chemical that will remove the annoying marks from the tiles, taps and shower screen. The hard water means that no matter how clean and sparkly I get the taps, they are only two showers away from being once again covered in the annoying white powder.   Crystals of limescale (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kesselstein_k.jpg) There is a lot of interesting chemistry involved in limescale. It is essentially deposits of insoluble calcium carbonate left behind from the hot water. But how does it get into the water in the first place and why doesn't it stay in it? Limescale initially starts as limestone, chalk and other similar sedimentary rocks that formed from the bodies of tiny calcium containing sea creatures that lived in warm shallow tropical seas millions of years ago. See the BBC clip at this learning zone site. Since their formation these rocks have been
Read more

Polka dot, 7 inches, 15 minutes, luke warm

Image
January 2010 and a new craze hit Facebook. Across the social network women started to post colours as their status. Some posted beige, some ivory, some hot pink, some polka dot. For a while people across the world were confused, intrigued, indeed fascinated by what these colours could mean. In fact the colours referred to the colour of the bra the woman was wearing that particular day. This 'craze' was in aid of a breast cancer awareness campaign a fantastic cause and in my opinion a clever and innovative use of Facebook. Over the last couple of days some of the ladies have begun to post a length measured in inches followed by a time in minutes. This has resulted in a status that might read '6 inches 25 minutes'. Oh how amusing...I like a bit of smut but I found these updates strangely annoying. Obviously it doesn't mean what it says and is code for something fairly inane and boring. So slightly intrigued and determined to crack the code I did what I always
Read more

What's Your Station?

Image
One of my most vivid memories is completing my Silver Duke of Edinburgh Expedition in the New Forest one October half term. It must have been 1987 as Mike Smith was the Radio 1 breakfast host and I remember cooking bacon on the Trangia stove, in a field behind a scout hut in Fordingbridge, whilst listening to T'Pau's new single China in Your Hand, it was a gorgeous Autumn morning.  http://asymptotia.com/wp-images/2007/08/Radio_dynamo.jpg I had a red plastic battery operated radio that we listened to as we walked. That radio once got us into trouble on a snowy February in Dartmoor as the magnet in the speaker affected our compass, a rookie error that put us out a couple of miles searching for a postbox on Rough Tor.   Radio 1 was the station to listen to, the new music was heard first on this station, and alongside Mike Smith the line-up included Simon Bates, Mike Read, Simon Mayo and of course Steve Wright. Whilst at Uni I still enjoyed listening to Simon Mayo's breakfast
Read more