h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Well? What does everyone fancy doing once the Premier League season is over?

I've got a short competition around the playoffs - A999561 - to which you are all welcome to sign up for. But after that it is looking a bit bleak, what with no World Cup this year

The likes of the Spanish, Italians and Dutch keep on playing as far as the end of June. And then there are our Scandinavian cousins who will be playing all summer long. So we could have a competition going through the summer until English football starts again in August.

Your opinions please

well...we could do a summer league with matches being a mizture of foreign matches and friendlies, with a mixture of teams from different leagues.

i also think that next year, each week, a match should be taken from:

Premiership
First Division
Second Division
Third Division
Other (perhaps conferance, foreign, cup, or another match from one of the other leagues)

I think I prefer the themed weeks and current system to something a bit more prescriptive. Novelty is good!

We could always play fantasy cricket over the summer, or have a more general sports prediction game.

themed weeks are cool, i just think it's bette not too have premiership matches most of the time, and my suggestion sort of gave the other leagues a bit more of a look at.

thinking abut it we should have one fantasy snooker for th crucible!

Snooker would have been good

Just in case you haven't seen it flagged up in another thread...

The next competition has already started!

The playoffs for promotion out of the Conference League and into the Football League proper start this week. On Thursday evening to be precise...


Pop over to - A999561 - and get your name down on the signup sheet, and your selections in for the 1st and 2nd legs

I like the idea of a summer tournament based on European fixtures. The statistics are easily found on the 'Net, and if you can't be bothered to look them up then you don't have to enter!

OK, it seems that the concensus is heading towards a summer tournament. I'm sure I can oblige

I'm not sure quite when I'll start it. You see I wouldn't mind a week or so off after the current season ends, so maybe the end of May for the kick off, and I'll run the new 'play offs' competition as just a small side event.

If I repeat my whinge about the points for first scorer in good time for next season, will you take any notice of it?

B

I don't know. What was your whinge again?

To re-issue the whinge:

I don't really appreciate the skill element in guessing first-scorer when people generally just shove down the star striker (Beattie, Owen etc. etc.). My proposal was to extend the points so you received more points for correctly guessing a midfielder to score (first), and more still for correctly predicting a defender. This then, would allow people of sufficient nerdiness to factor in a team's potential for scoring from corners, set-pieces etc.

The counter-argument at the time was of blurring between positions (Giggs, for example, is a midfielder who is currently playing up front, so in what capacity does he qualify?). However, many match reports (says he with both the Times and Telegraph sports pages in front of him) separate defenders from midfielders from strikers with little dashes. If this doesn't resolve it, then the threads themselves should be able to settle by concensus what position a player is before the results come out.

B

Ah yes, that's the one. Thanks for reminding me. And you're right, I will be ignoring it

B

In seriousness, whilst your idea does have some merits, I do have a number of objections to it.

1) It pushes the balance of the scoring out towards picking goalscorers rather than the results of the match.
2) Whilst there is data around on player positions for UK football teams (ie soccerbase.com) there isn't necessarily that data easily available for foreign and non-league teams. Therefore that would knock any future international, or 'journeyman' selections on the head.
3) It makes the whole game rather nerdy, and by definition exclusive. One of the things I want to do with the season in August is to advertise it a bit to get new players in. Hopefully attracting the casual player who just wants a bit of fun - and fun *is* what it's all about after all.
4) It already takes me 40 minutes to mark the scores, type them out and update the table. How much more work do you want me to have to do?!

*Agrees with all of GDs comments above*

And points out that you could get silly situations whereby if a defender takes the penalties or goes up for corners and scores regularly, people pick him on the off chance that they could get a shed load of points.

Players change positions in the duration of matches. Would we have to take account of that as well, or would it just be starting positions?

Basically it's just too complex.

If you get bored with seeing Henry or Van Nistelroy every week, the trick is to change the teams we're picking from regularly.

Sprout

Varying the teams is on the list of things to do.

So that will mean a lot less mentions of Leeds next season!

How about a Friendlies League?

Nice to see you back V

Friendlies I am sure will feature in the Summer competition, as the various European leagues come to an end. Come to think of it I suppose I had better do something about coding up a page for it

GD- could I request the US league featuring over the summer.

Ah, yes, i remember B's whinge about scorers.

Problem: GD picks a Paraguayan league match, for reasons best known to himself. Jose Luis Chilavert is playing in goal. But he takes the free kicks, penalties, and scores more goals in a season than most of Everton's strikers. And yet you would give lots of points to someone predicting Chilavert?

And I know that if I was still running the show, and I'm pleased I'm not, I can tell you, the whole positions business would p*ss me off something rotten.

What, and give me the chance to listen to another insane webcast in the middle of the night from our old and dear friends at Charleston Battery?

Absolutely