By Kev
The sad rise of the Fantasy Football Manager
So Brendan Rogers is the latest casualty. After failed attempts to destabilise Arsenal and manoeuvre Wenger closer to the exit door, the FFM get their other man. But who is the FFM?
Saturated TV coverage, Dream Team Competitions and computer games consoles have created a community of Fantasy Football Managers . The FFM is an ‘expert’ who can manage the team better than the incumbent manager and can make accurate predictions of what will happen, after the game has finished.
Tactical nous is a given, the FFM is proficient in all tactical disciplines and will quickly be able to implement changes to counter the opposition managers plans. Pressing can be completed for 90 minutes, in every game, irrespective of the number of games played or recovery periods. The FFM is an expert in fitness and recovery programs.
Signing players is easy. The FFM will simply compile a list of 10 players he requires, based on extensive scouting carried out on Youtube and the latest FIFA game released by EA Sports. The FFM will contact the selling club and negotiate wages with the player. There will be no need to consider rival bids because the FFM will guarantee the signing. There will be no bids of £40m plus £1, all bids will be made at a level that guarantees the signing. Money is not a problem, as there is an endless stream of cash which can be used without recourse.
None of these players will fail, they will all be huge successes, gel with their team mates, settle in a foreign climate and ultimately improve the team and guarantee success.
The FFM does not have to worry about injuries, as he is a sports science specialist. Players will be in tip top shape and Red Zone will be a thing of the past. Red Zone will be replaced by green zone. Injuries caused by bad tackles will be eliminated by training the player on how to prevent tackles from making contact. This would ensure injuries will not affect the balance of the team.
Successfully negotiating the difficulty experienced by large winter coats with long zips, is simply addressed by replacing the zips with Velcro.
There are three types of FFM:
The Amateur FFM:
This FFM has special thumbs designed to manage the manipulation of two large buttons. He will have an excellent command of four letter words and will enjoy sharing these linguistic skills with the like-minded community. He will be active in Dream Team Fantasy Football competitions and will spend most of his spare time exercising his thumbs, in between sharing his Management skills on some blog in between abusing somebody who isn’t as knowledgeable as him. He is likely to be called Aaron or Mason.
The Professional FFM:
This FFM will earn a living as a FFM. He will contribute written and online articles which demonstrate his incredible understanding of the game of football, while making fun of any manager working in the game professionally. He is likely to be called Neil, Henry, Adrian, Martin or Peter and may have a smug appearance and will have very nice hair.
He will be willing to share his opinion that ‘Mesut Ozil is nicking a living’ or that ‘Arsene Wenger is a dinosaur who will never win another PL Title’. He will have access to a team of experts who can use a computer programme to make Managers heads appear as vegetables or attach them to the bodies of other people or objects. This will increase their level of smugness.
The professional FFM believes every football manager not called Jose is a clown and that certain football clubs should be singled out for their expert critical analysis. Wayne Rooney should always be given a mark of 8 out of 10 or higher.
Some FFM’s may also appear on TV or Radio. Those called Adrian are likely to have extremely strong wrists, which come in useful whenever they get over excited about a negative article on Arsenal or during a Daily feature on their radio show.
The pundit FFM
This FFM will almost certainly have played for a football club beginning with the letter L or M. They will have far superior tactical knowledge to any football manager and will prove this with their excellent analysis after the game has finished. They will use special computer software to show what they would have done and demonstrate their superiority.
If they had managed that game, the result would have been totally different. They could very easily manage a team and win the Premier League, FA Cup and Champions league treble but they will have decided to sit in a TV studio because they are so good looking.
They will have a fantastic understanding of the rules of football and believe that taking weapons onto the field of play is a legitimate tactic. After all, being nice wins you nothing. There is a very high likelihood that they are intellectually challenged and have views on football that date back to the dark ages.
After news of Brendan Rogers dismissal, all the Fantasy Football Managers will be in extreme state of excitement. However, none will be happier than the Professional FFM, who knows they have got their second choice man.
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- 6 October 2002: Arsenal beat Sunderland 3-1 to make it 7 wins and 2 draws in 9 – and 30 consecutive unbeaten in all – a new Premier League record. It was the last game of the sequence – Arsenal lost the next match.
- 6 October 2012: Olivier Giroud scored first goal in 3-1 away win against WHU. His goal equalised an opening goal from West Ham. He also set up the second goal for Walcott. Santi Cazorla got the third.
- 6 October 2013: The Arsenal History Society presented a 10 year analysis of the first six games of the season.
LOL Kev
One of the best Pundit FFM all times must be Alan Shearer.
When he decided to leave MOTD for a while to show what he can do on the real playing field the FFM was sad to see him leave. Finally one of them would show how it should be done…. did he ??? 😉 🙂 🙂
Mind you he didn’t play for a team starting with an L or an M. 😉
Love it!!! Great article. Exactly how I feel, if all these FFM think they know better than the managers of the clubs, then they should get their badges and start managing a club. Analysing a match and provide opinions is fine but once you start disrespecting the manager and make personal insults then that’s unacceptable.
FFM punditry I love the most is when they use there computer graphics to prove that three midfield players “hold their shape”. They then have three lines joining the three players up and show that wherever they move around the pitch, they are playing in triangles……………………f’in priceless!!
Cheers.
The blogs and twitter are alive with the FFM’s.
Did you see the recent articles by Steven Howard?
He is a well know Wenger critic who has been writing articles about Wengers ‘hopelessness’ for years.
Last week, after Olympiacos he wrote a terrible piece that said he had given up on Wenger 6 years ago because in his eyes Wenger was a dinosaur. The large picture for the feature was Gunnersaurus with Wenger head super imposed. Nice.
On Monday, after we took Manchester United apart, you can probably guess what he composed. Yes, an article that heaped the blame on Manchester United and gave no criedt whatsoever to Arsenal.
This tells you everything. FFM’s like Steven Howard cannot reconcile that a dinosaur who has become a bad manager could ever possibly send a team out to win well. Therefore it must be the other teams fault. The other team in this case being a side that has spent nearly £400m on players, was sitting at the top of the league and was being discussed as possible title winners.
These people are actually really stupid.
FFM… Funny how it doesn’t incorporate in it’s running program the influence of the tilting of the pitch by PGMOB!!
If it did there would be many recalls by EA Sports and the like!!
The ones on the other hand who would be breaking their play station and game PC’s would be the same ‘expert’ FFA type analyzers of the real football we experience.
Very odd minds!
I understand Talkshite has Morgan on at 4pm on Thursday.He is talking to Durham.It was obviously planned to coincide with our loss on Sunday! Shame.
Whats the betting he will be on after ourur away match in Munich or our last match in the group.
Can someone tell me why Durham hates AW and Arsenal so much.I think his lad supports us and his second Wife does.A total low life.
Another thing to note is that the amateur FFMs favoured phrase on any forum includes ‘then you must be deluded’ which is odd coming from someone who clearly has no understanding of tactics (they believe the pundits) or team/squad dynamics (they believe the hacks), let alone economics.
Everyone who follows football, has played it at a certain level and whose favourite team has NOT won the CL every year since the Norman Conquest, fancies his chance as a FFM.
For me, at the Emirates, I would lower ticket prices,and improve and reduce the cost of catering as my first move.
With my professional advisors gathered around me, decisions would be made on which new signings would add strength to the first team.
Negotiations in secret would begin between each Transfer Window in order that new players could join immediately the Window opened.
Within reason, the inflated cost in order to buy would be accepted, provided my war chest had the money.
I would stop loaning out players and train them at Colney with the first team to learn and maintain the Arsenal Way at first hand.
If I failed and Arsenal folded,
I would persuade the Board to close down the Club, demolish the Ems and build flats. 😉
If you go on other blogs or sometimes on twitter, you see players names being banded about as players we ‘must’ sign. Not neceesarry the traditional names like Benzema or Lewandowski.
The latest one is the Belgium player Michu Batshuayi, who plays for Marseille. Apparently we should sign him for £25 million. Now Walter will know about him then anyone but I found it surprising he was suddenly on the ‘must have’ list, as he has kind of past me by. When I looked into it further it appears that he has outperformed his price and rating on the EA computer game FIFA15 and opinion was seemingly being based on that!…!! Here is the link.
http://www.futhead.com/15/players/25785/michy-batshuayi/
It remonded me of the start of this season when a lad phoned into Talksport to discuss Arsenal. He was very angry with Arsene Wenger for not signing a striker or DM, claiming there were loads available at great prices and that we must have a rubbish scouting team. He then ran off a load of names and their clubs in Europe, displaying an incredible knowledge of European football. Not to mention a memory an African Elephant would have been proud of. The caller was quoting stats on successful tackles made, pass completion, goals to shots etc, it was impressive stuff. Micky Quinn asked the lad how much time he spends watching european football around the world. The lads answer just summed it all up really. He didnt watch football he learned it all from the computer game he played!
That about sums it up, hence my obsession with the FFM’s.
Hey Kev!
Very funny, entertaining article. As with all great comedy it is rooted in truth. I really enjoyed your writing and hope you do more.
Paul, Dullham doesn’t hate Arsenal he is just a lazy journalists who has found that Arsenal fans react to his lazy questions. We have one of the largest profiles on social media and that is what he relies on, cause outrage get fans to tweet and post on Facebook. People will then click on the mail or call talk sport and so he does his job for his employer.
He just belongs with the rest of the lazy journalists in sports media today
‘A smug appearance’. How true! One of their most irritating features. I thought your comment about the zip was below the belt though!
Great article I love it when I plundit points out that a striker should have ran into this or that position as that’s where the ball would go, never occurred to them that we know this as it has already happened and a watching a replay, when the striker made the decision it was happening at that moment… Surprise they don’t look amazed on MOTD that it’s light during the match but dark outside as they’re talking…
And as for Crooks team of the week, the bloke is clueless, love his De Bruyne as DM this week…
This FFM will almost certainly have played for a football club beginning with the letter L or M. They will have far superior tactical knowledge to any football manager and will prove this with their excellent analysis after the game has finished.what is with carragher anyway!!he criticise everything.. After our game on Sunday, the only thing he says is that arsenal cant win a champions league
nicky “Everyone who follows football, has played it at a certain level”.
Unfortunately very few of them have ever played any organised football and if have or they’ve tried to organise a team then they’ll have spent all their time trying to get more than 9 players (so their idea of tactics is ‘you go left and you go right and you hang back a bit’).
@Andy Mack,
Any male in our land, with the slightest interest in football would have played the game at school, youth club or amateur club.
I played at all three levels between 1933 and 1950 and never received a single minute of coaching. How times have changed. 😉
Whatever happened, happened for good.
Whatever is happening, is happening for good.
Whatever will happen, that will be for good as well.
What have you lost? why are you crying?
What did you bring with you, which you have lost?
What did you produce, which was destroyed?
Whatever was received, was received from here.
Whatever was given, was given here
You brought nothing when you were born
You are taking nothing with you when you die
Whatever is yours today was somebody else’s yesterday and will be somebody else’s tomorrow.
Change is the law of the universe.
– The Gita
Nice piece Kev , funny as hell and truthful in every way . These smarty pants are all over the place and all spheres of life . They think that they alone have ‘broken the code ‘ to the secrets and mysteries of the universe , and have all the answers , but oddly never put their money where their mouth is.
With probably no formal education , and only with the aid of the internet and like minded persons , they now ‘know’ everything . But kudos to them , not only they are willing to share this knowledge for free , they often stuff in down others throats will glee . They know best you see !
One day , the the fact that they really know nada will hit them like a ton of bricks . Let’s see how they dig themselves out .
On a t-shirt – ” My wife gives me sound advice . 99% sound , 1% advice !”
Sound familiar ?
Brilliant read Kev, some readily identifiable people out their to fit into your categories of FFM.
A dog thinks: Hey, these people I live with feed me, love me, provide me with a nice warm, dry house, pet me, and take good care of me they must be Gods!
A cat thinks: Hey, these people I live with feed me, love me, provide me with a nice warm, dry house, pet me, and take good care of me – I must be a God!
nicky, different times mate. As a kid we’d spend the school holiday playing footy on any piece of scrap ground (inc old bomb sites/disused factories) in the 60s & 70s but that doesn’t happen now. All the scrap ground is built on and kids aren’t allowed out or not allowed to the park as that’s where the thugs/gangs supposedly hang out etc. so they play computer games, which includes FFM but also includes so many other options.
Great piece Kev, I look forward to more.
“I wonder, I wonder, what you would do if you had the power to dream at night any dream you wanted to dream.” – Alan Watts
http://educateinspirechange.org/spirituality/alan-watts-inception/