FTL 2014-15 Proposal

Now that the final prize money from 2013-14's FTL season has been distributed, (congratulations Skeeve), it's time to look forward to next season, and there appears to me more than enough interest in a second FTL season for 2014-15, so here are some thoughts.

The bad news is that I am thinking of raising the entry fee to, a still very reasonable, £52.50 and capping the entries at a maximum of 32. For a bit of fun that keeps you interested for nine months of the year, I think that price is fair enough. In order to justify the hours spent on this to the boss, (and it does take several hours each week), I'm going to use £2.50 as an 'administration fee' with the pot receiving £50. I hope no one objects to this small token fee.

The good news is that this will mean bigger rewards, and on the topic of maintaining interest, I have a couple of ideas. Of the 22 entries last season, 18 made it through to the end with entries in either April or May, and the earliest 'retirements' were in January

With this in mind, I had the rather brilliant idea of allocating a percentage of the pot to a single-elimination competition, i.e. a Cup. Assuming we get more than 16 entries, there will (if necessary) be a Preliminary Round to reduce the number to 16, and then knock-out rounds on specified dates. I'm thinking of using the weekends after the FA Cup rounds take place to guarantee that there is a full schedule of matches for people to choose from. Cup games themselves are not eligible for the FTL due to their absence from Football Data's results.

The Cup results would simply be the profit or loss for that weekend's matches and would also count in the FTL - this would just be a side event on maybe five weekends of the season. You could lose 3 points, but advance if your 'opponent' loses 4 points, or you could be up 10 points and be eliminated if your 'opponent' makes 11 points.

Otherwise the basic structure will remain the same as last year. I'm also thinking of adding a small prize for each monthly winner, i.e. most profitable entry for the eight months of the season counting August and September as one, and combining April and May also.

In summary then, my proposal is that 75% of the pot money will go to the League competition, 15% to the Cup and 10% to the monthly prizes.

If we fill up with 32 entries, there will be £1,200 prize money for the league, £240 for the 'Cup' and £160 for the eight monthly prizes.

Unless there are objections, the Cup winnings will be 50% for the winner, 25% for the runner-up and 12.5% each for the losing semi-finalists, while the League prize money will be divided among the profitable entries in the ratio of the profits. Thus if four entries are in profit, e.g 6 points, 4 points, 3 points and 2 points, the pot will be split 6/15ths to the winner, 4/15ths to second etc.

Thoughts? Comments? Suggestions?

Slots will be awarded (and are filling up fast) on a first come, first served basis as fees are received - PayPal to calciocassini @ aol.com and if anyone wants to top up the kitty with a sponsorship, and a mention each week, please feel free. Graeme, aka The Football Analyst, has already offered to match his offer of £25 to anyone beating him next season up to a £400 (I think) total liability. Last season cost him £125 but I'm sure the publicity on here made that a worthy investment.

Bottom line - it's good fun and an opportunity to show your skill and win some decent prize money.