How I didn't win TFF 2015-2016

[sted]

354th

I've always enjoyed reading the forensic reflection of the winner's season, but we don't always see it. Any chance of any of you FISO guys in the top ten (for instance) sharing your journey for the benefit of us lesser mortals?

[brencarr]

Just ahead of you in 273rd .... I got nothing

[murf]

A rare failure for me to make the top 1000.

But I did only have two proper season long teams.... and one of those was the Eggcup where I can blame someone else for the starting XI (which, this year I'll admit thrashed my only self selected side).

Forensic analysis not required.

[Aristotle19]

Finished in 181

Could've been top 100 but for poor decisions to put in Courtois & Azpil when Cech got injured, and then change to Robles & Coleman!

[top banana]

Best of three teams (one was Egg Cup) -167th, or 20th in the (honest ) One League for a min cash.

Not quite top 10 then sorry Sted (no.1 Manxy, Devilsweep 2nd overall tho - maybe he'll post?) but I had time to kill this am.
Dropped team history into a spreadsheet, summarised as follows...

No, Games Points PPG
GK 3 43 165 3.8
DEF 8 129 504 3.9
MID 11 149 637 4.3
STR 10 127 721 5.7
TOTAL 32 448 2027 4.5

'only' 32 players used overall - some duds in there of course, and the standard aguero-ki-ko-ki.
Hadn't realised how many in/outs on Sanchez/Costa/Martial too.

Not quote worthy of a full analysis, but happy with season, and won the works league for 500 bones :p

JC

[Ayns]

Had my best ever season and finished 25th overall, but it was disappointing really as I was 2nd at one point with transfers in hand.

Biggest mistake was probably using 8 transfers on Aguero, but dropping him just before his hat trick away to Chelsea.

[Striker]

Forensic analysis not required.

But surely such an analysis would be really really informative in giving us several clues regarding what not to do.

My own tip is not to be a stubborn idiot (as I was) and refuse to believe that the Jamie Vardy goal scoring run could go on and on. In fact I do have a more general TFF tip. When one season you are ahead of the pack in picking a particular, probably cheap, player, don't avoid him the following season, when many managers are now picking him, on the basis that he's now FAR more expensive, and therefore of dubious value for money, than he was when he was in your team.

[murf]

I was too stubborn re Vardy. There is always someone I swerve.

I also missed out on Belerin. I don't like to tinker defenders and there was never really an opportunity when he stood out - or I went Spurs instead. Them and Dawson and co did well enough but was a mistake to not drop one for Belerin.

[snowy]

575th for me with my one and only team (gave up doing multiple teams a fair few years ago). Really started to do quite well only in about feb. Got liverpool players in at the right time and crucially dropped both barkley and lukaku at exactly the right time. Had vardy when it counted although missed out at the end of the season.

Was up to 250th with a few weeks to go and 4 transfers left but lost out due to still having those liverpool players who kept getting rested, and putting too many united players in..smalling ballsed it big time towards the end.

Still pretty happy with that and won my superleague by about 80 points. Onwards and upwards for next year!!

[abc123]

A disappointing season for my single entry, 11,540th. I never had a Leicester player all season - ridiculous!!!!

[robot]

80th which is possibly my highest season long finish, try with too many teams as usual so can't remember the detail of each without backtracking through the history, but looking at this one only got 14 points from Mahrez may be where it fell short and finished with 3 spurs defenders which didn't help.

Otherwise overall and fiso side games
18 teams in top 10000
Tenner league 6th out of 75
Two foot 6th and 51st out of 86
Super six winner out of 23
2016 league winner out of 13
Tiny league 10th out of 27
Egg premier 5th out of 12
Hot shot = 2nd out of 27
Draft 13th out of 15
Fiso 500 winner
Block league 6th of 20
Weeklys/Monthly's rubbish not had the time to focus
Champions league was doing well till going all out on Bayern.

Reasonably happy overall, but could do better.

[Darbyand]

My own tip is not to be a stubborn idiot (as I was) and refuse to believe that the Jamie Vardy goal scoring run could go on and on. In fact I do have a more general TFF tip. When one season you are ahead of the pack in picking a particular, probably cheap, player, don't avoid him the following season, when many managers are now picking him, on the basis that he's now FAR more expensive, and therefore of dubious value for money, than he was when he was in your team.

Agreed on both counts. I was too slow on to Kane and Vardy....twice in fact on the latter when I didn't get him back after his hiatus which from memory turned out to be one game.

[Maldini]

I fell into the same trap with Vardy.

My best team finished 58th and had I not used my last transfer bringing bloody Smalling in, would have probably got into top 40.

Two years on the trot that I've got a team in top 100 and 58th represents my second best ever performance.

Think I'm getting a bit better (and less trigger happy).

[jobmeister]

I had 12 season long entries.4 finished in the top 1000,the best team finished 42nd the final transfer Alli to Smalling proving costly.Though this team finished 6th in the one league for £50 and won three £250 elite leagues ,so very rewarding.
Another team finishing 485th also won a £500 elite league.
My second best team finished 287th but not entered in any elite leagues.
Also won a 5 token league £50 and a 10 token league £100.
Won weekly winner game week 12 for £200.
So a very rewarding season financially,still learning all the time and still need to hold back making transfers too hastily.
Got a few form players at the right times such as Bellerin on 17th October and Mahrez on 16th August- very early.

[devilsweep]

I'll pop something up in a little while. Good transfers 95% of the time, not surprisingly. BUT this team genuinely did have Scott Sinclair for a while I'm sure.

[morts]

My best team finished 99th but should have done better. Very few of my transfers from January onwards worked out well. Everton really let me down, mainly Barkley and Lukaku, but I also went for Robles when Cech got injured, which was a bit of a punt that didn't work out. Should have gone for De Gea which I did in most of my other teams. My worst mistake was probably dropping Aguero for Lukaku on 3rd April. Too much time looking at the fixture grid and thinking Aguero would be rested against West Brom and wouldn't score well against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge...oh dear. Martial was rubbish whenever he was in my team and scored well whenever I dropped him. Similarly Ozil.

Shouldn't grumble too much because it was my second year finishing in the top 100 having been 59th in 2014-15. 22 of my 27 teams finished in the top 10,000, I won my work mini league of 58 teams for a cash prize and won a cash prize in 5 of the 7 elite leagues I entered.

The main things I've learnt are:

1) Not to have so many teams. I want a maximum of 10 next season.
2) Not to spend so much time looking at the fixture grid.
3) You can't predict when a player will perform well...it is a guess and relies on luck.

[Striker]

I'll pop something up in a little while.

Why bother, we're not interested in how some bloke couldn't carry a potentially winning team across the line.***

BTW - Well done and genuine commiserations as it did seem that you might do it. Your posts on fanfo*ty, (is that still a forbidden word in our highly modded world) certainly suggested that you were hopeful that you'd nailed it at one point.

*** Mind you I'm hardly one to criticise you about not winning, despite my ninth place this season being my seventh top 20 TFF finish, I've still to reach the top three in this game. At least you got silver. (where's the clapping smiley?)

[jobmeister]

Like most I feel chasing the extra games cost me most over the season .The main culprits being Lukaku and Barkley,even though it seemed a sensible move at the time.

[Yorkshire Exile]

I'll pop something up in a little while.

Why bother, we're not interested in how some bloke couldn't carry a potentially winning team across the line.***

BTW - Well done and genuine commiserations as it did seem that you might do it. Your posts on fanfo*ty, (is that still a forbidden word in our highly modded world) certainly suggested that you were hopeful that you'd nailed it at one point.

*** Mind you I'm hardly one to criticise you about not winning, despite my ninth place this season being my seventh top 20 TFF finish, I've still to reach the top three in this game. At least you got silver. (where's the clapping smiley?)

choked

and well played striker - mr consistent - even if it is only for a measly £100 or whatever....

[devilsweep]

I'll pop something up in a little while.

Why bother, we're not interested in how some bloke couldn't carry a potentially winning team across the line.***

BTW - Well done and genuine commiserations as it did seem that you might do it. Your posts on fanfo*ty, (is that still a forbidden word in our highly modded world) certainly suggested that you were hopeful that you'd nailed it at one point.

*** Mind you I'm hardly one to criticise you about not winning, despite my ninth place this season being my seventh top 20 TFF finish, I've still to reach the top three in this game. At least you got silver. (where's the clapping smiley?)

choked

and well played striker - mr consistent - even if it is only for a measly £100 or whatever....

Crazy end of season results saw me and Wino off. Frosty played it very very well and a combination of Rooney going in late with Mata, Rashcock and me having Smalling did for me. Best man won, end of. 3rd and 2nd in the last 4 years aint too shabby but I suspect that was my chance for the biggun.

[Frosty Casino]

Winning team 2015/16 Season

City Aguero was formed before the first Monday night game (10th August) West Brom v Man City.
It included Aguero who was on the bench and M Ritchie who looked good for Bournemouth. So this was a city block team
Hart, Kompany, Sagna, Kolarov, Mangala, Silva, Toure, Navas, Ritchie, Sterling & Augero.
Man city’s 5 clean sheets to start the season gave this team a great start.
Early on it became obvious that Vardy and Mahrez were players that were performing and so cheap so these were the first two transfers on 26th September after Tot v Man City 12:45 and Leicester v Arsenal where the gunners won 5, 2 but Vardy scoring a brace. The players taken out were Mangala & Navas.
4th October bought in Ozil for Sterling as Man U game wass a bonus and some good match ups for Arsenal. This was a key move as Ozil made loads of points and remained in till the end.
Week 11 Next transfer was Augero injury so took him out for Sanchez on 16th October (so I didn’t forget the next day).
17th October bought in C Dawson & Costa for Kolarov and Silver (more man city injury).
Costa got 13 points and swapped for Lukaka on 1st November followed by Ritchie for Barkley a week later as Everton had a great run of games, this turned out to be great timing as they both scored great points.
21st November and Augero is fit again so swapped Sanchez for him.

29th November was a ‘big move’ swapping Man City defenders for Arsenal (Man city struggling and Arsenal had a great match ups) so. Dropped Kompany, Hart and Sanga for Bellerin (kept till end), Monreal (also until end) and Cech.

Augero injery again so swapped for Kane on 13 December.

28th December Arsenal playing 5:30 so swapped Barkley for Mertesacker (this turned out to be a bad move as he got injury and I kept him in for several weeks without playing)
29th December, Augero playing again so my strategy was to always have him playing so Lukaka dropped.

Now I lost it, googled African cup of nations and read an article from previous year! Lets not go there, so I removed Toure for Sterling on 9th January.
WK 25 Sterling gets injury so swapped for D Ali on 24th January. And also took out Vardy for Giroud at the same time, he stays for three weeks getting a grand total of 6 points! At this point the team was in 21st place but 78 points off lead. Then after the FA cup games 30th and 31st January it dropped to 46th and 99 pints off lead.
3rd February Mahrez and Giroud out Barkley and Lukaka back in (for rest of season).
After 14th February games team in 50th Place 92 points behind. On the 20th Feb after FA cup games it was 108 points behind.
Augero yet again injury, dropped for Costa on 21st February, at the same time I finally gave up on Mertesacker ever playing again and swapped for Payet (great move and he stayed until the end)

27th February I finally jumped on the Dier bandwagon dropping Dawson (another great move)
On 2nd March, Augero playing again so Costa dropped.
Now Cech gets his injury and after a great deal of looking at the match ups, Schmeichel is the replacement (5th March), great move as he has a string of clean sheets. Before the move the team was in 25th place 95 off the lead and after it was in 15th, 74 behind.
On 14th March removed D Ali for Mahrez (silly move but moved into 9th place 58 off the lead), but even more stupid was the fact I tool Mahrez back out on 20th March and, wait for it, bought in Wijnaldum!!!
International break and lots of time to think, with still having 9 transfers and Everton having 10 or 11 games left to Tottenham’s and Leicester’s 7 that became 6 before Everton played, made some bold moves on 3rd April
Kane out Vardy (Villa game) in then the move that almost lost it Schmeichel,Wijnaldum & Dier all dropped for Robles, Lennon & Coleman.
Everton had good match ups but were so bad and of course the players I took out scored loads of points. Still can’t believe that this mistake didn’t destroy the teams chances but it just goes to show, never give up.
10th April decided that Leicester were getting tense and Man Utd were in the cup so Vardy out for Mata, at first this looked to be am error but not in the end.
Coleman got injered and that helped as he was replaced by Koscielny on 17th April.
After Thursday night arsenal v West Brom it was in 10th place 51 off the lead,
On 23rd April took out Augero for Rushford with the intention of bringing ion Cech for Robles the following day but at the last minute changed that to bringing in Sanchez as they played Sunderland and Norwich so Sanchez must score – not! If it had been Cech, it was a walk in the park as Robles did not score a single point in the last 4 games.
With one transfer left the decision was witch Man Utd player in for who. In the end on 1st May went for Rooney in place of Sanchez as was so far off the lead (31 off the lead), needed to make the team very different from the top of the table teams and I couldn’t see anyone bringing in Rooney. Somehow this all worked, still not sure how but an amazing last weekend followed by Man Utd last week and having the top three fantasy scorers in the team rocketed City Augero to number one!
As you can see there were some very bad transfers as well as some good ones but it just goes to show you can make lots of errors and still be OK.

[jobmeister]

Congratulations and great write up Frosty Casino.Fantastic achievement ,I think your major turning points were changing city to Arsenal block on 29th November and your Rooney differential right at the end and like you said a few bad transfers which we all make but can still progress and learn from.Well done.