I’ve seen quite a few people coming on to the site with questions about the rules of, mainly, the McDonalds format, particularly around transfers. Also around the usability of the McDonalds format. Here’s some thoughts of mine on these points. Unfortunately, firstly I can’t wave a magic wand and give you all the answers as the rules look like they have been drafted by either someone who doesn’t have a clue or care about clarity. Secondly and to be kind the McDonalds site it, shall we say, has a few functionality issues with points disapeering etc . I imagine these are problems which will come and go as the site tries to fix them. I won’t try and tackle these. Hopefully this article can also be a bit of a forum for those wanting to discuss the issues they have. I gather it’s similar to UFPL and also the World Cup version in 2014 so those people who have played these formats will be helpful
Euro 2016 fantasy football rules – Some thoughts mainly on transfers
The McDonalds format
I’m not going to say much about the substitutions. Hopefully they have been working for you. Certainly I’ve had no issues subbing players who have played for those who haven’t. As long as you do it before the first game of the day. I haven’t done any captain changes. I’ve stuck with Giroud so I can’t comment how those are working but it doesn’t seem to be an issue that I can see.
The transfers:
Firstly lets copy what there is in the rules and the how to play section:
Making Transfers
After selecting your squad, you can buy and sell players in the transfer market. Unlimited transfers can be made at no cost until your first deadline and between group and knockout stages.
Only one transfer can be carried forward to the next matchday. No free transfers can be carried forward once the knockout phase begins.
Number of free transfers
Group stage: one per matchday
Round of 16: unlimited
Quarter-finals: 4
Semi-finals: 6
Final: 6
You are deducted four points for every transfer you make above the available free transfers for a matchday.
3. Manage team
Your team will be locked only when the first match of the day starts, so you can make any changes you need to your team until the scheduled start of the match – you can transfer/substitute players depending whether it’s a transfer or substitution period.
You can make unlimited transfers before the first game of the tournament and knockout stage. However, during the tournament you will have limited number of transfers.
The substitution period will be available between gamedays where you can replace a starting XI player with a bench player.
By the way if you haven’t worked it out a matchday isn’t a day at all. In the Group stage it’s a round of matches.
So that is about as useless as you can possibly get.
My interpretation is that after the first round of matches there will magically become a short transfer period after the first round of Group matches and before the 2nd round starts. That’s basically after the Portugal game tonight and before the Romania Switzerland game at 17.00 UK time tomorrow. Obviously there’s nothing that says this (why would there be?), but in absence of any transfer button now that’s how I have to see it working.
I hope that helps in some ways on transfers even if it’s very brief. You can try fantasy@support.uefa.com
A few other things:
Remember there’s a wildcard to use which I’ll probably use after the 2nd round of Group matches when there’s the possibility of players being rested for already qualified teams. With so little attacking returns to date how you would radically change the team anyway is beyond me.
We also have the interesting possibility of price changes coming up after the Group stages.
Here’s my previous notes on the different advantages of wildcarding after the first round of Group games vs the 2nd
After round 1 gives you the following advantages
The best chance to pick up price rises as you’re picking the best players for that round only
A chance to pick up those players who are unexpectedly selected for their teams and to dump those who weren’t selected
After round 2 gives you the following advantages
A chance to make mass changes before players are rested before the knockout round in teams that have qualified or won their Group.
At this stage despite the advantages being firmly on wildcarding after round 1 my feeling is to leave it to avoid key players being rested in teams that have qualified or won their Group. I’ve got a fairly round 1 weighted team anyway.
Sun Dream Team
In comparison to the McDonalds site this seems an oasis of certainty.
Here’s the transfer part of the rules:
For each of the phases one, two and three, you may make up to three transfers to your team(s) per phase. Transfers can be made between the beginning of the current phase and the beginning of the following phase.
During phase four you may make up to eleven transfers to your team(s).
For details of phase dates, please see the Euro Dream Team Game Phases section.
Transfers will take effect from the first Eligible Game starting after you have made the transfer.
Eligible game I think just means the next game in the Euro 2016 context.
In essence during the 3 rounds of the Group stages you can make 3 transfers in each round. It doesn’t explicitly state that you can do it after the first game of the day has started but that is my interpretation although I may do my transfers on that basis to be safe.
The Telegraph fantasy football format
The telegraph format shows how it should be done. Here is the extract:
You will then have 26 transfers to use during the group stage of the tournament opportunity with which to replace injured, suspended and under-performing players with fresh faces to keep your points tally ticking over. Any transfers not used during this period will not be carried over.
There will be another amnesty following the conclusion of the group stage, so you can change your entire team at that point if you like. This will run until the first kick-off on Saturday, June 25, 2016.
Another 20 transfers will then be made available for you to use during the knockout stage of the tournament.
Transfers can be made between matches, so any players transferred in will start scoring from the next kick-off.
So that’s crystal clear and maybe next time they can write the other format’s rules
That’s it. Hope that helps in some way and provides the basis for people to discuss things
Remember my daily team changes will only be on twitter @fantasyfoot20
