A lot of change at the top, which is typical of this time of year, as Team Evil has dropped from 1st to 3rd and FC Matmyeon has had an amazing leap from 6th to the top of the table!

Here is the current league listing:

Lets take a look at FC Matmyeon‘s most recent week.

Lots of good choices here. Di Maria has lit up the Premier League since joining Manchester United for a British record fee. Sigurdsson has been unstoppable at Swansea, accumulating the most points of any midfield player this year. Raphael is a bit of a wildcard considering how likely he is to get himself sent off every week but otherwise this is a really solid team.

The Prize Box is getting fuller. I’ve added some (in reasonable condition) Kevin Smith inaction figures, an album of Ken Plume crapoke songs, and a shard of a broken guitar which was smashed by Adam Savage at Dragon Con 2013 signed by him and a host of celebs such as Paul & Storm, Phil La Marr, Molly Lewis and a tonne more that I can’t read. I think Paul & Storm? Who knows.

We’ll do another catch up next month when things will really start to get interesting as we gear up for the busy Christmas period.

So lets get our bearings, shall we? As it stands, here is our league table (yes, my team is highlighted, I haven’t figured out how to get rid of that yet).

As we speak, there are only two teams undefeated, and two teams without a win. Lets look at the positive and check out the top two.

Choc Chip Cookies is managed by Fiona Hook (who hasn’t designed her team jersey yet, tut tut). Here is how her team looks as of the most recent week.

Some good choices there. Ramsey was a beast last season, Fabregas seems to be one of the buys of the season at Chelsea, and Henderson is a reliable performer at Liverpool at a good price.

Now lets look at Team Evil (using an appropriate all black kit) with an amazing points tally of 181 so far, managed by Andrew Donaldson.

Great choice of captain (that can make or break your team’s performance), a surprisingly good investment in a Newcastle defender (who knew?), and some familiar high performing faces.

Interestingly, neither team has used their transfer wildcard yet (which allows you to make as many transfers as you want in one game week without points deductions). I, however, used mine after the second week. I did not choose wisely at the start of the season. I took some chances that didn’t pay off. But I feel better about my team now and think it was worth blowing my wad early so to speak. I would suggest you do the same if you think you’re under-performing so far. There is no point in waiting as you’re just losing points in the mean time and you get another wildcard in January too so get your wheeler-dealer hat on and sort that team out!

Every month I’m adding to The Prize Box. This month I’m throwing in (amongst some other weird crap) a postcard for the film The Zero Theorem, signed by its director Terry Gilliam! Here is a picture of me holding it to prove that it’s real.

There is plenty of time to go before the end of the season so don’t worry if you’re doing poorly so far. Just keep an eye out for a bargain buy and be clever with your captain choices! We’ll see you again back here for next month’s report.

It’s a head-to-head league which means each week you’ll be pitted against another team in our league and the winner will have points added to their tally.
I’ll be giving monthly reports on the league including commentary on how your teams are doing and players to watch out for!

The English Premier League starts on the 16th of August so to register your team in time you must have joined our league before midnight GMT on the 15th of August as that is when I will close our league to new entries.

A random example of the type of squad you can set up

To join simply go to http://fantasy.premierleague.com, create your team and then go to the “Leagues” button in your top menu bar. You’ll see an option to join a league and just enter our code to join up!

The code is:

786900-283963

My team Phoenix Park Tuesday are waiting for you there. I look forward to beating you!