Saturday, July 11, 2015

2015-16 SEASON CONCEPTS

So, we have finished our first season and its time for review and preparing plans for the next year.

First, a look back at 2014-15.
The season was scheduled for 20 players, with each player matched up against the other 19 players home and away for a 38 game season.
Scoring was by tipping H, A or D, with points awarded for correct outcomes only.
Players also tipped from a selection of 7 games in the league and 10 in the Cup.
All players also participated in the knockout cup, with 20 players competing head to head over the season reducing down to a final 2. As before, 10 games needed tipping.
Also, the Asian Cup made for another variant in tipping...4 games but predicting margins. Which was an interesting competition and format.


An additional point about the comp... it is loosely based on something I played via email at the turn of the millennium. While I cant remember all the rules and detail, I have a recollection that the actual Leagues were closer then than now. Italian and Spanish football in particular looks quite uneven and therefore restricts good selections for tips.
So while starting this comp seemed like a good idea, in practice it became a hard thing to run.


Proposal - Number / Style Of Tips

Each week, and occasionally mid week, I had to find 7 League games and 10 Cup games from 6 European leagues, the A-League and on rare occasions the J-League and MLS.
Some weeks it was straight forward, but also there were others when some obvious mismatches were needed to round out the tip selections.

So a few proposals to increase the quality of games to tip and and also make for interesting tipping are:
IDEA A - reduce the league games from 7 to 5 tips
IDEA B - reduce the cup from 10 to 6
IDEA C - amend the cup format to be based on margins not HDA


Proposal - Finals

Last season finished with a top 8 finals series.
As it was running I thought it was redundant (to a point) as after 38 games we knew the best tipper. And Finals is an AFL thing, not really a soccer/football thing
IDEA D - Bin the finals for 2015-16, and make it 'more like soccer' with a 'Premier only' system.


Proposal - Expansion

Expansion would bring promotion and relegation into the frame and make the back end of the season a it more interesting. That said, managing 40 players (to replicate the current 20 player division we have now) would make the task difficult.
IDEA E - Go the full Magilla and try to get 40 players for 2015-16 - First and Second Divisions.

Or... Another idea is to expand slightly... as part of the next proposal:


Proposal - Split Season

20 players playing 38 games works well, but for some at the back half of the season might have lost interest.
So another idea is to
IDEA F - split the 20 into two levels of 10 (based on last seasons table).
- bring in another 10 for a third div.
- run the first 18 games up to Christmas - each player plays 9 others home and away for 18 games.
- take a short break over Christmas (when the UK is busy, but Europe is quiet)
- promote and relegate mid season (maybe 2 up 2 down).
- run a second season in the post Christmas period.

This leaves either:
- the ultimate FMICL champ to be the one that wins the second half of the year, or
- to play off the first and second section winners.




Discuss... let me know... its your comp as well. And it needs to be interesting.

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