Excitement for the new season is rising and with preseason friendlies unable to fill the void, we turn to fantasy football to try and feed our insatiable addiction.
Though fantasy teams are intended to be season-long commitments, there are enough Jose Mourinho quotes and halftime shirt swapping scandals to fully occupy our time once the season gets going again. So here’s a guide to building a fantasy team and then forgetting about it in about two months.
Convince yourself that this is the year you’ll stick with it
It’s difficult to fully invest in building a great fantasy team when you know you’ll completely stop caring about it in the near future. So it’s imperative that you go into this with the mindset that you’re in it for the long haul. That this year is different and you have the discipline to set your line-up every week. That your parents were wrong when they said you wouldn’t take care of a dog when you were 12. That you’re going to show your friends and the world that you are the Ed Woodward of fantasy football and all the prizes will be yours. THIS WILL BE THE SEASON YOU FLEX YOUR FANTASY MUSCLES AND KEEP THEM FLEXED UNTIL YOUR FANTASY FANTASY IS A FANTASY REALITY AND YOU PASS OUT FROM STAYING FLEXED TOO LONG!
Carefully select your players
Instead of going to be beach or making up for all that time you ignore your loved ones during the fall, winter, and spring, hunker down and pore over your player selections. You really can’t overthink this, so tinker with it for hours each day, making sure you’ve got the perfect balance of proven points kings and sleepers that no one else can see but you. Everyone is going to be so impressed with your selections that Arsene Wenger will probably invite you to his house and ask you to slap him in the face just so he can feel the sting of your genius.
Compare and gloat
Once you have your team set, it’s time to compare your picks to everyone else’s and tell them why they’re idiots. This is the best part of the process, so enjoy it.
Panic and make wholesale changes in the first few weeks of the season
OK, so the players on your team decided to be losers and not immediately fulfill all your expectations in their first few games. Instead of being patient like a dope, you have to dump them all for players who are doing well right now. After all, if you get hit by a train tomorrow, it will be that week three position in the fantasy league table that gets included in your obituary.
Completely lose interest
Fantasy team? What fantasy team? FIFA 16 is out now and thirty seasons of Football Manager need to be played and there’s that backlog of podcast episodes to listen to. Plus your significant other said something about leaving you if you didn’t do something or other. But that was weeks ago, they’re probably over it by now.
Remember that you have a team in March
After months of complete neglect, finally take the time to reset your password and see how your team is doing. Then immediately get angry because all your players are injured and you’re in the bottom half of the table with everyone else who lost interest in October.
Wash your hands of this failure doomed team and start over again in July
New summer, new boredom, new chance to go for half-assed glory!
If this sounds like a plan you can carry out, join our league at PremierLeague.com (code: 761504-188328) so we can find out who the least committed fantasy mastermind really is.