The second season of the official Fantasy Bundesliga game is here and is available in both English and German.
The first season was a lot of fun and we had a few Fantasy Football Scout regulars posters playing but no official league. This season I hope we can step up the community’s involvement and have created a FFS League (Password – FFS).
The concept and rules are very different to the Fantasy Premier League game, so if you are interested in playing I would recommend having a proper look-through. Statistics are a big part of the game so it suits the keen Fantasy player well.
The season will run from 18th August to 12th May over 34 gameweeks. The first deadline is kick off of the opening game on Friday night, August 18th 19:30 UK time.
Rules and Scoring points
-150 million budget to pick 15 players
-No limit on how many players you can have from one team.
-Three transfers between gameweeks. When planning your transfers try to make sure you have as many different kick-off times over a gameweek covered to maximize points potential.
-There are set wildcard weeks (we are not told exactly when) which were last year one of the international breaks in the autumn and the winter break.
-The transfer market is locked when the gameweek starts and opens again after the round is completed with player prices adjusted according to player performance.
-Captaincy has been replaced this year by a star player system. You pick one star forward, midfielder and defender who score 1,5x points.
-Manual substitutions during the gameweek (like in UEFA-games)
-You can replace a player in your starting xi with someone who is yet to play but you lose the points you sub out. You can also change your star player until you are happy with your score or run out of players in that position.
-Multiple ways of scoring points, not just goals, assists and clean sheets.
-If you want to do well in the game you need to understand the importance of duels won. See more here and here.
Selecting your squad
When picking your team you need to decide whether you are putting your budget to your starting xi or utilizing manual subs with more width. All of last year’s bargains have been bumped up in price so we need new ones and they usually introduce themselves when the season gets going, not before. This is why it may be smart to start with 12-13 strong starters and a couple of one million priced bench fodders.
Goalkeepers
Most important thing when picking goalies is that they keep a clean sheet as that gives you five points and every goal conceded loses one point. As every shot saved earns you a point save machines can also be beneficial, however, you want to avoid a scenario where your keeper’s team loses big and you are quickly looking at minus points.
Bayern’s Manuel Neuer (15m) is the most expensive keeper and (depending on his fitness) many will favor him and a fodder for reliable points. Good mid-priced keepers include Oliver Baumann (12m, Hoffenheim) and Rune Jarstein (11m, Hertha). Cheapest rotation pairs set you back 13-15m but for this to work your keepers need to play at different times and this is not the case in GW1 (Hannover/Mainz/HSV/Werder).
Defenders
You want defenders who win a lot of duels consistently every week. That way you have a solid base score even if your defender concedes or doesn’t get any attacking returns. Initially, you might look at someone like David Alaba (13m, Bayern) as one of the best defenders to pick, but even though he got four goals, four assists and a good amount of clean sheets last season, he wasn’t actually as good of a pick as on paper. That is because he didn’t earn many duel points.
Tried and trusted premium defender targets include Willi Orban (14m, RB), Benjamin Hübner (14m, Hoffenheim) and Werder’s very attacking wingback Theodor Gebre Selassie (13m). For a bit cheaper you could be looking at “Augsburg’s Roberto Carlos” Konstantinos Stafylidis (12m), Freiburg’s Caglar Söyüncü (11m) and a cheaper alternative to other Köln defenders Lukas Klünter (9m). Luca Caldirola (Werder, 5m) looks like the best cheap option right now, but when first team players get injured other names will come in to play too.
Midfielders
With midfielders, you are looking at wingers and attacking mids who are able to score and assist goals. In this game, you can also target box-to-box mids who are good going forward and do their defensive duties picking up a handful of duel points in the process.
There are several intriguing premium midfielders. Liverpool target Naby Keita (15m, RB) who bosses the midfield, Bayern duo Thiago (15m) and Arjen Robben (14m), not forgetting BVB’s tricky winger Ousmane Dembele (14m). Going down to 13m you find two set-piece takers in Vincenzo Grifo (M’gladbach) and Werder’s captain Zlatko Junuzovic.
At 11m there is a potential out of position player in Werder’s Fin Bartels, who finished last season strongly playing as a striker. For 10m you can invest in Köln’s Marcel Risse, who did well last season before suffering a knee injury.
Yevhen Konoplyanka (7m, Schalke) has suffered a big price drop because he was out of favor with S04’s previous manager but could emerge as a budget pick with a new man in charge.
Forwards
Goals are expected from your forwards, but also keep in mind that a striker winning regularly 15+ duels in a game will outscore a striker who scores a single goal but doesn’t do much else.
Bayern’s Robert Lewandowski (15m) is the only essential player in the game. BVB’s Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (15m) is close to that, but the lack of duel points last season means he just falls short. He is still, of course, an excellent pick and second name in most team sheets. With that being the case it mainly comes down to the third man in our forward line.
This third slot could be the one where you really play the fixtures. Almost everyone priced at 13m+ is a good pick with a few unknowns in the mix.
At 11m Nils Petersen (Freiburg) and Guido Burgstaller (Schalke) offer two solid cheaper alternatives. 19-year old Kaylen Hinds (5m, Wolfsburg) came from Arsenal this summer and has done well in pre-season, but it remains to be seen if he or any other cheap option can provide a bargain for our forward lines.
Additional Information
The week before the season starts all teams will be playing in the DFB-Pokal, German Cup, which gives a good indication into the starting lineups.
There is a learning curve to this game with a lot of stats based scoring rules so even if it initially might look hard, after a few weeks you’ll start to get the hang of it.
The game also hasn’t done any favors to new players by not including last seasons statistics. I don’t have much saved but will try to help from memory if there are any questions.
Latest news, fantasy tips, lineup predictions and live ticker – Bundesliga.com
Statistics and lineups- Transfermarkt and Whoscored.
