The Pre-Match Preamble – Gameweek 4

In case you missed it (and, doubtless, the intention is that you do), the Fantasy Premier League (FPL) have appeared to have tweaked the algorithm that governs their player prices and, as a result, slowed the increases of player values. Where last season a strong bandwagon would soar, sometimes adding 0.3 to a player’s price in a week, now we’re seeing far steadier rises. While most of the three million who play FPL will be oblivious to this, many amongst the Fantasy Football Scout community are very aware of the change; some are not particularly enamoured by it.

I have to admit, I’m slightly biased on the matter. I was badly stung by player values last season. I missed several key bandwagons and watched those players – Aaron Ramsey and Yaya Toure – accelerate away from my budget, making it even more difficult for me to admit my error and bring them in after big points hauls.

Even before last season, though, I’ve always felt that the FPL market was too volatile, that players soared and dropped in price too quickly. I hear the arguments that this new landscape makes things easier for the “mainstream” and “casual” player but I’m struggling to see how this would persuade the FPL to shift back to a more changeable market. It may even have been the intention.

The Premier League want to attract and, more importantly, retain players. They’ve developed a game that has captured our imagination as seasoned Fantasy managers but they may have identified rising player prices as a factor that perturbs the more casual player. The Premier League don’t want to explain and make the price changes transparent – keeping them under wraps allows them to tinker during the season. Instead, they appear to have opted to curb their influence.

The calming of the price rises does remove some of the “advantage” (Tom Fenley won last season’s FPL title without monitoring them) gained by those who studied third-party tools and plotted the transfer strategies accordingly. However, equally, it also reduces the frustration we face when a bandwagon faces a term of absence.

Daniel Sturridge provides a timely example: he could be out for three weeks or more and yet his owners will have little qualms about selling him on because his price has not increased markedly, as a result there’s little or no concern on funds lost or the inability to fetch him back once he’s fit. In previous seasons, I’ve always felt we can be punished for getting in early on key players, watching them rise and then face the conundrum of losing funds when they pick up injuries or bans. That issue is exacerbated by the rapid rise in price in form players; based on the current trends, that should now be reduced.

This undoubtedly tweaks the mechanics of the game. If I miss out on a major bandwagon, I can jump on board a week later, leaving it until the following Friday and pay just 0.1 more or even the same price as those who beat me to the punch. Last season, in that scenario, I might have felt pushed into spending points or making my transfer early in the following week or risk paying 0.2 or 0.3 more.

The rewards for getting the right player at the right time aren’t reduced – those who make the right call, still get the points. However, the penalties for missing out have diminished. It’s not that the hardcore, hands-on manager is being punished, more that the casual manager can now relax, dip into the game every Friday and not get the impression that they are at a disadvantage.

The “hardcore” manager can object to this change but, realistically, we can’t expect the move to be reversed if it’s seen to broaden the appeal of the game. We just have to accept it and play what’s in front of us, relying on our ability swoop for big hauls and leave others chasing points. We also have to remember that the FPL have kept the system behind the player prices to themselves for this very reason – they reserved the right to change the way it worked and tweak the balance – it’s not in the rules so we have no guarantees.

On another note, I find it interesting that there’s a section of Fantasy managers that are missing this aspect of the FPL and the task of tracking market forces. Fantasy games often baulk at the idea of using stat-driven scoring matrix for fear of adding too much complexity. And yet, from the reaction to this recent change, a good deal of us enjoy the process of monitoring and playing a mechanic that is unexplained and revealed only by the use of third-party tools. We can’t deny that the art of player the FPL market was and still is a dark art – a hardcore pursuit. Seemingly, however, it’s something we’ll be left hankering for.