How to play Football Index and a guide to the match day and media dividends

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Fantasy Football Scout are joining forces with Football Index in the upcoming season.

If you’re new to Football Index, think of it as a revolutionary betting platform that works a bit like a virtual stock market.

Similar to player prices in Fantasy Premier League, the aim is to bet on the future value of the players when the price is low and then sell on when the value is high.

Now imagine you could do that sort of thing and have the opportunity to profit from FPL skills.

Well you can. It’s what happens at Football Index (FI) and Fantasy Football Scout will be dipping its toe into FI’s waters for the season.

Or, more accurately, I will. With a very modest £20 budget to work with, I’ll attempt to play the market, turn a profit and, most importantly of all, have some fun while I’m doing it.

Along the way, Scout will provide some tips on who to buy and sell while I no doubt ignore all that expertise and go for an ill-advised punt that lasts about as long as Martin Kelly’s England career.

GET STARTED WITH FOOTBALL INDEX HERE

So how do you play the game?

Put simply, you place your bet and buy shares in individual players and make/lose money based on the changing value of those shares.

Values change due to a number of factors, but like ‘real’ stock exchange shares, the key reason is popularity. The more people buy into a player, the greater his price, and vice versa. The trick, as ever, is to buy before values go up, and sell before they go down.

There are, however, many other ways to win on FI – dividends.

Many of these dividends give FI more of a Fantasy Football feel because they are based on the players’ on-pitch performance.

FI has just overhauled its dividend pay-outs and it’s not controversial to say that they are extremely generous, with a number of 100% increases in certain areas.

Dividends are awarded to owners of players who excel for their side, with bigger pay-outs for stand-out performances on major match days (10+ fixtures across Europe’s top five leagues/the Champions/Europa League and the European Championships). There are also awards for players who make it into FI’s team of the month.

All those dividends rely on the sort of match day data that drives any decent fantasy game these days, as well as the bonus point system in FPL. So a goal will earn a player 45 points as part of their dividend ranking, a red card -30 and so on. Defenders earn clean sheet points, while keepers also enjoy a raft of exclusive ways to make their mark.

One other dividend is different. And daily.

The media dividend is paid out to the player with the most mentions across a range of major media sources every single day.

Seen through the prism of the last few days, it demonstrates how Football Index works on a fundamental level.

Take the example of Lionel Messi. Talk of the pint-sized legend leaving Barca once and for all and this news has dominated the media recently, resulting in a massive jump in his price.

These things change, obviously, but the last time I checked it would cost you seven quid for a single Messi share – two pounds more than before he hit the fax machine, which is a huge rise in relation to his overall value.

And for those of you who can only think in these terms when talking about Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo is currently at just over three pounds.

Compare that to Harry Maguire. Despite being all over the media, FI‘s dividend doesn’t take bad publicity into account. It’s not a measure of infamy.

But the fallout of his recent press coverage – the Paddington Hard Stare from Southgate, being dropped from the England squad etc – has clearly spooked some owners into selling their shares in him.

The bottom line – not all news is good news with FI‘s media dividend, but it’s a daily way for a chance to win.

There’s even a set of in-play dividends to win from, with FI paying out on individual actions (goals, assists, clean sheets etc) by players for the first 30 days that you own them.

Like all the best games, the rules are fairly straightforward, but the nuances start to pile up as you become more familiar with how things can play out.

I, no doubt, will pick up on some of these nuances, and get burned by others, as I wend my merry way through a season of Football Index trading.

I hope you’ll join me for the ride.

And in the meantime, all the rules and regs can be found on FI’s excellent Academy Page here.

GET STARTED WITH FOOTBALL INDEX HERE

But don’t forget, this is gambling with real money, so always gamble responsibly: https://www.begambleaware.org/. 18+.

BEST PLAYERS BY POSITION:

• Goalkeepers: Budget
• Goalkeepers: Premium
• Defenders: Budget
• Defenders: Mid-Price and Premium
• Midfielders: Budget
• Midfielders: Mid-Price
• Midfielders: Premium
• Forwards: Budget
• Forwards: Mid-Price
• Forwards: Premium