The Community Tournament Strikers Keepers, Losers Weepers – Your Questions Answered

Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening! The Community Tournament team is back to give you an update on captaincy recruitment and some basics of this year’s competition.

To help us answer the large mailbag of questions we have received, we have elicited the help of FPL Agony Aunt Maureen Bodega (for legal reasons we should state she is no relation to Boris).

PICKING THE RIGHT PARTNERS

Our first letter comes from Willy Vonka from Finland. He asks, “How do I go about recruiting a team if I put myself forward as a captain?”

Lovely to hear from you Willy, this is a perfectly natural concern but one that can be easily solved. From the 11th August we will be opening applications for anyone who wants to join a team and based on the last couple of years there will be plenty of choice.

From the start of September, you can put an ask out for team members via the Scout article comments, Twitter or you may know fellow FPL managers who you want to sign up. Please note that they will need to be registered.

Then of course there are the drafts which will kick off in mid-September, including the chance to sign up some of the more prominent managers.

One piece of advice: don’t be premature Willy and make some space for the drafts as there will be plenty of hidden gem managers and you may discover the next Fabio!

CAPTAIN DUTIES

Chaz from just outside the 100k Acre Wood writes in to say, “Is it complicated being a captain – how much effort is actually involved?”

Oh, dear Mr. Chaz you have got yourself in a tizz haven’t you dear! Whilst you need to be able to fill in a spreadsheet and probably set up a WhatsApp group the rest is a breeze but don’t take my word for it let’s hear from one of last year’s managers, a polite young man known as Toblerone…

Hi Chaz, fresh from leading the glorious hamsters in the Pundits Playoff of 2018/19 I have a few tips on being the head of your very own FFS squad.

The main duty as captain is to submit the lineup for the team each week. Depending on how keen you want to be as a squad this will define how much effort you put into this.

I have seen some incredible spreadsheets based on the FFS RMT function whereas the more chilled out managers I’ve heard from partake in last-minute scrolling through team screenshots to pick out the perfect squad.

Either way, this should not be too laborious a task you just need to confirm your team’s lineup around the same time as the FPL deadline each week.

Another thing I liked to do as captain was add all my team to a WhatsApp chat (other instant messaging services are available), this is what the tournament is all about, having a nice environment to chat about FPL, make new friends and decide on your tournament strategy!

I would highly recommend doing this so all the squad can keep in touch and you can check out each other’s lineup each week.

Equally importantly you must decide on your squad’s composition. Some teams have been competing in these tournaments for a number of years and will probably make use of the ‘predraft signings’ to keep the core of a squad together. Other signings will be made on draft night, so you need to get your scouting done ahead of time to fill your team with the top talent.

The final primary duty as manager is to update your team’s score at the end of each week on Boris’ Master spreadsheet. Also, a good idea to do a sense check of the opposition’s score to check that there is no Tomfoolery!

All in all, being a manager will take up a bit of time each week, but I never had any issue working it around my usual FPL gameweek experience. It’s great fun leading a team in these competitions and if anyone is still unsure at this stage then I would urge you all to go for it. Carpe Diem! It can’t be as bad as triple captaining Shane Duffy anyway….

Thanks, Toblerone, lovely young man but spends way too much time playing with his hamsters.

HOT DATES

Joan Matthews from Glamorgan has sent us an electronic mail asking, “When are the key dates as I want to book my annual caravan trip to Barry?”

What’s occurring Joan, these are some of the dates for your diary as we will build towards kick off:

Plenty to look forward to but don’t worry we will be writing regular updates so everyone knows what’s going and your friendly neighbourhood Agony Aunt (and the rest of the organizing committee) will be available if you have any questions. Tidy.

HOW DO WE SCORE?

Early Riser from Delhi tweeted us a question “How does the scoring system work over the season? And can I make it mandatory for all of my team to own Luke Shaw?”

Oh, Early Riser you are clearly infatuated with dear Luke but are you Shaw he’s the one for you?

In terms of scoring, every match week, the team captain must choose a starting team of 14 from his 16 players’ squad. Within those 14 starters, one player should be selected to be the Striker, and a second to be the Goalkeeper.

These two players will play Head-to-Head against the opposition’s nominated players, Striker vs Goalkeeper. The name of the game here is to score goals. Should the Striker’s FPL score outscore his opposition’s Goalkeeper’s FPL score, he gets goals depending on the amount he outscores him by.

The rest of the starting squad combine their 12 FPL scores, and should they outdo their opposition’s 12 players FPL scores, they too will score one goal or more, depending on the amount they outscore them by.

All the goals get added up to reach a final match week score. The winners get 3 league points, draws will see each team get a single league point, and loss gets nil points.

To answer your second question, no dear, you shouldn’t ask everyone to own Luke Shaw, especially not when Tierney is available for 5 million.

SIZE MATTERS

Gianluca from Rome has sent us a copy of his book and scribbled inside is the following remark, “How many people do we need for a team and can I ask my mate Tony to join?”.

Lovely to hear from you Gianluca. The teams are made up of 16 in total with 14 players, 1 Team Captain and 1 MVP to be picked via the first draft.

The MVP list will include the prominent players we mentioned last time, see link to article here and the highest ranked managers still available. More on the draft to come but please no attempts to sign up any of the prominent names mentioned beforehand.

Finally, Gianluca, yes, you can ask Tony to join but he will need to register when player applications open on 11th August. Remember though it’s nice to mix with other boys and girls as well.

THE WINNER TAKES IT ALL

Romeo Bakar has sent me a tweet wanting to know about the format of the competition, well more detail to follow my dancing diva but essentially teams will battle it out in a H2H league format over the course of the season.

The tournament will be split into 22 match weeks, so in each league of 12 teams, every team will play each other twice over the whole season.

Depending on where the teams place there will then be a knockout series of matches over the last few weeks to determine who wins the big trophy!

CAPTAINS JUST WANNA HAVE FUN

Mark has written in from his shed to ask, “Is it good fun being a captain?”. Your handwriting does look familiar but anyway, who better to ask that question than a former participant Darth Krid. Darth, are you there love?

Darth Krid writes

You get as much fun from being a captain as you’re willing to put into it. If you assemble a good bunch and there’s strong participation and camaraderie in the group chat, then it’s a great laugh and you can all experience the brilliant highs, lows, and banter together. At least being a captain means you can take all the glory if you win and blame it on your team if you lose, so there is that.

Thanks dear and I do hope that embarrassing rash clears up, just apply that ointment once a day.

CLOSING THOUGHTS

That’s all from Auntie Maureen for now, to sign up to be a captain please use this form and complete by 13th August. We will open for player applications on the 11th August with another article to explain how to register your interest.

You can read the previous article here which kicked off proceedings, provided an overview of some of the prominent names involved and highlighted the impressive trophy you can win.

To apply to be one of the Team Captains in this season’s Community Tournament, fill in this online form with your real name, email address, FPL team ID#, Fantasy Football Scout online name and the reason why you would make the ultimate team manager.

Your FPL Community needs YOU!