One would expect, after ticking off nine months of mortal existence across 38 Gameweeks, to be overtaken by some sort of emotion on the final day of the season.
The top-two bosses had their Instagram moments a week early: black jumpers in front of cameras, the one in grey trousers more animated than his Catalan counterpart, the celebration police mostly perfunctory in their disapprobation.
Mind how you celebrate Fantasy success, as well. ’42 from six, any good?’ might see one tarred and feathered but a hard-won green arrow, all the better if through luck than skill, you’re one of our own.
In my jumble-sale jumper world, something was missing this season. Colour me old-fashioned but the appeal of the Fantasy game to begin with is not merely the social aspect but the thrill of feeling a connection to the action on the grass; my virtual Kevin De Bruyne knocking in another improbable goal during his salad days in Manchester — six years ago if memory serves — was the same as your Kevin, and it was absolutely thrilling. Might not have Sky on the box but FPL brought you every goal, and hands up if you miss the endless Agueroooooo comments now more than they annoyed you at the time?
A rose-coloured paean to the old days this isn’t, though. It’s a rumination on what we’ve had, what has changed, and why so many of us have double-digit numbers next to our names. It is a Discord comment on the ratio of trolls to RMTs and some proper hubris about the value of the FFS community. It’s me not blaming DefCons for my Fantasy ennui this season, though I dearly miss the thrill of a Cresswell or a Baines or an Alexander-Arnold in the backline, real high-ceilinged stuff, the lower floors of yore favouring unicorns over ubiquity.
What I’m trying to tease out here, from beneath my own perplexity of a campaign, is that despite this Fantasy game having been repeatedly ‘ruined’ — by a surfeit of chips, apocalyptically named defensive points, change — we are here, week in, week out, red arrows or green. Simon and Lateriser have put it far more eloquently than I but the game and this community are a welcome constant, and I reckon it would take more than another All Out Attack chip to shutter our clubhouse for good.
A Preamble without Mark’s byline was never going to be the same but it’s been my love of the game motivating these musings just as it was Mr Sutherns’s — who, I’m pleased to note, is comfortably ahead of me in the points. A heartfelt thank you for indulging me.
Special thanks to Sheffield Wednesday and TM for posting price changes, and to everyone who commented below the line. 1-0 to the DZ.
See you in August.
