News Limited’s Super Coach competition looks to have locked in #1 spot in fantasy coaches’ hearts.
One of the big industry questions in Australian fantasy football this off season was whether the Super Coach competition’s victory over the official AFL Dream Team competition in 2008 would continue on into the future. The extenuating circumstance surrounding an unprecedented drop in Dream Team registrations, due to an extremely late opening of the competition, was most definitely not on the case this year, with the AFL pumping up the competition not only through its own Web site in just about every article, but also on radio SEN to an almost nauseating level, and even the odd television commercial as part of their contra agreement with the official broadcasters Seven and Ten. For its part, the Herald-Sun and all the other News Limited newspapers, united under a single Super Coach competition this year after being separated into smaller competitions for each city in previous years, was also producing plenty of fantasy content to support its product, including its new Little Black Book, Kevin Sheedy in a superhero suit, and a comprehensive two-page wrap just before the season started of hot fantasy players. All was in readiness for the start of the season to see which competition fantasy coaches liked more.
The results are in: Dream Team 216,437; Super Coach 281,652. News Limited wins in a landslide.
I have been tracking the registration numbers for the various competitions for a while now, so I can project this graph, based on estimates of how the round 22 registrations will look compared to round 1.
There are a number of points that can be drawn from this. First is that the AFL not having a major media partner – SEN, while strategically important for a large number of reasons, is nowhere near the top of the radio ratings – is hurting their product. SEN’s audience, judging from their advertising, is working men who have the radio on while they work on building sites or cars… not the sort of demographic to which fantasy footy appeals.
The other big point is that is is criminal that Fairfax have not re-entered the fantasy frame with their own product. Their readers have shown from their first foray into the market in the mid-90s that they are willing to play. Fairfax have 3AW, the AM ratings leader and top football calling station in the land, just sitting there ready to be used as part of a concerted marketing campaign. The Age is getting hammered by the Hun on all fronts, yet in this battle they have no soldiers at all.
But what about you guys, the fantasy coaches? I’ve read countless forum threads devoted to debating the merits of the two scoring systems. Is this inexorable rise to ascendancy by Super Coach an endorsement of the Champion Data ranking points as a fantasy staple – late-game swings and normalisation included – or are the external factors like DT’s failure last year more of a reason? Is it just because the readership of News Ltd newspapers is much larger than afl.com.au’s vistors and SEN’s listenership put together? Tell me why you think Super Coach has run down Dream Team in the comments.
XztatiK
March 31, 2009 at 12:23 am
Also, the salary cap is far too high in SC.
Simon
March 31, 2009 at 12:33 am
Maybe its just because SUPERCOACH sounds better when talking to your mates down the pub, rather than discussing your DREAMTEAM, which just doesnt sound as manly, over a few pints…
🙂
TRUCK
March 31, 2009 at 1:25 am
TOM – “i agree with XztatiK noone i no does supercoach coz it is CRAPPPPPPPPP”
Yer no one plays it….
Dream Team 216,437; Super Coach 281,652
Moron
R.A.S
March 31, 2009 at 1:32 am
I rate SC way better for the reason many others have said that it is a truer representation of players who actually play the game well rather than just racking up meaningless possessions.
And for the record, it is the AFL that is stopping SC live scores mainly for the reason of propping up their own competition. It has nothing to do with Champion Data but fact is the AFL are their No.1 client and have rights over the product.
Evan
March 31, 2009 at 1:47 am
I’m not sure if this is common knowledge, but the herald sun website updates every games SC scores at the end of every qtr. To me that’s not a bad substitute, plus i am sure SC will come up with something by next year. Even halfway through the year would be handy.
Then you can always cheer the little dots on that AFL live game thing when your player kicks it to someone that isnt the opposition!
XztatiK
March 31, 2009 at 2:17 am
“I rate SC way better for the reason many others have said that it is a truer representation of players who actually play the game well rather than just racking up meaningless possessions.”
Joel Bowden has averaged 115 Supercoach pts since the comp started. There goes that theory.
Ash
March 31, 2009 at 2:37 am
SC is so much better, takes more skill to pick a good side, i think ur money is fairer in SC, the site is better. There is nothing that i think is better in DT. SC all the way!!
love4thegame
March 31, 2009 at 10:32 am
i made a sc in 5 minutes and im ranked 5000th, sc is so easy. they give out way to much money. the only mates of mine that play sc are the ones that make a team and never check it again. so in reality DT 200,000 DEDICATED fans. SC 20,100 DEDICATED FANS.
Richo
March 31, 2009 at 10:49 am
So there is no better illustration that DT’s scoring system is F$%@ed than this week. Chad Fletcher 34 possesions (114/70) v Judd 23 possesions (101/136).
So in DT you say hmmm 34 possessions is better than 23 so I’ll pick Fletcher. You need no NOTHING about football, just that Fletcher averages more possesions than Judd. Nevermind the fact that he couldn’t hit the side of a barn with a bag of wheat. 34 possesions in a losing side, most DT points for the WCE and couldn’t crack it for a mention in the best!?!? Well maybe the 9 clangers didn’t help. 9, that’s almost 30% in clangers, not to mentions those that were ineffective, but that’s typical Fletcher and reason why he is a useless SC pick.
Why play a fantasy game that rewards mediocrity? I’ve played them both and can’t believe anybody would argue DT is better, but each unto their own.
Forget the website interface, lack of live scores, etc, DT has the inferior scoring system and therefore the inferior product. Period.
Eddie
March 31, 2009 at 11:17 am
Dreamteam simply dopes not reflect the reality of a game & who is valueable & who is not. If you know a bit about footy you like to make judgements based on football ability not about meaningless numbers. Judd is the best example – he is a star player who does not need 30 poss to influence a game. In SC he is a star, in DT he is average.
Hibbo
March 31, 2009 at 11:26 am
@ love4thegame
Yes, sc gives starts with a little too much money on the salary cap- but to say there is only 20,000 dedicated sc players and 200,000dt is a very broad comment, where is the stats/reasoning behind that comment? It is easier to score better in sc with the salary cap, but it is the same for everyone else.
Simon
March 31, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Both are good, but with the amount of resources available to every Tom, Dick and Harriet, I suggest that a draft style fantasy game like Premium DT will be all the rage in 5-10 years. The similarities of most teams seems to take something away from the concept imo.
I think I’ll call this years DT comp “The Year of the Nuff”.
Peter G
March 31, 2009 at 12:09 pm
I think everyone needs to calm down. I posted earlier that SC attempts to place value on better players, which is noble, however, it is also flawed in some ways. Kicking over 40 metres to a contest is effective… hmmmm. Kicking back pocket to full back to back pocket is effective… hmmmm.
I’m not saying it isn’t good, but don’t go rubbishing DT because it places its value on possession. DT is a much harder game to do well in, because you need to know more about coaches and game structure than SC, which you can do very well in focussing on the individuals.
Plus, who determines some of the SC statistics? A lot of the calls are line ball, and without live scoring, they could be estimates FFS.
Just sayin’.
travo420
March 31, 2009 at 1:40 pm
WHO CARES!!!!! , no one gives a flying duck why you play one and not the other,why do people try and justify their choice in DT vs SC?? they both have their pros and cons, and different strategies are needed for both, why cant you play both and enjoy both.
rhett
March 31, 2009 at 3:24 pm
because DT is farrrrrrrrrrr better, its original idea was just copied by SC and they changed a few tiny things to make it different. they even copied the layout and everything
rhett
March 31, 2009 at 3:27 pm
the only reason SC has more people doing it is because it gets all the advertising in the newspapers. where as DT until this year was just an AFL competition on their website without the advertising
Goldmoss
March 31, 2009 at 4:45 pm
The only real scores in football are the ones you get when your side gets the ball through the big sticks. Every other fantasy score is exactly that – fantasy.
I agree SC more accurately assesses a players true impact on a game but I must admit I enjoy the simpler approach to scoring. That is to say, I know what my players are scoring by watching. In SC I have no real idea, and before you say I know nothing about the game I did play at SANFL level.
Its hard enough deciphering what a tackle is let alone hard ball gets, contested marks etc. That leads me to ask about the consistency in SC scores. Who decides effective v ineffective, clangers etc. Surley a lot of the scoring is down to opinion.
Also, with DT my wife knows to cheer her favs (shes got the best looking side) when they get a kick – even if it goes to the opposition.
Knox
March 31, 2009 at 4:47 pm
I like Supercoach better. I’ve got players in SC that i like watching but might not always rack it up i.e Judd, SBurgoyne, Goodes, Pendlebury.
Then I’ve got the likes of Kane Cornes, Daniel Cross, Matthew Priddis etc in Dreamteam and they don’t inspire me with their play.
adam
March 31, 2009 at 4:49 pm
supercoach is a way better scoring system.montys a raahd
nick howell
March 31, 2009 at 4:52 pm
oakley nichols is a far better player then judd….people just rate oakley a lot harder and stuff.andrew mcqualters the best midfielder in the comp n lewis roberts thompson will be all australian centre half back
nick howell
March 31, 2009 at 4:54 pm
the alpine eagles would be able to beat geelong, there just so good
nick howellxx
bryce mummery
March 31, 2009 at 4:55 pm
i should be an elite afl player.id be able to beat ablett one on one easily
Rourke
March 31, 2009 at 6:06 pm
Monty, which competitions did you consider in the “Other” category? FWIW, I vote SuperCoach but play both and tend to do better in DT. E.g. about 2,050 in each this week. Meh.
benny
March 31, 2009 at 6:15 pm
No surprise there’s 281,000 in SC considering News Ltd has merged all the comps in each state into one main comp.
But DT only gets 216,000, the AFL will be upset with that especially with all the in-game advertising at qtr breaks and tv ads, & you can include every AFL-related interview on SEN over the last few weeks has been DT related.
Mark
March 31, 2009 at 7:43 pm
I read here that SC live scoring is something the Hun can’t do because of AFL licencing with Telstra, and presumably that extends to ChampionData, who are part-owned by AFL http://superfootyforum.com.au/viewtopic.php?p=71817#p71817
Finn
March 31, 2009 at 8:04 pm
Hey guys, I work at the Herald Sun and just wanted to comment on the live scoring: We’d love to have it, but the AFL won’t allow us to run live SC scores on our site at the moment.
We manually publish them after every quarter, but that’s as good as we can do at the moment and is never going to be as fast an RSS feed.
You can get them on all our gameday pages the moment the match finishes.
And thanks to everyone who has chosen to play SuperCoach.
give live SC scores
March 31, 2009 at 8:12 pm
Not good enuf Finn…there are your scores on your website so why should the AFL have a say in what is done with these?
love4thegame
March 31, 2009 at 8:44 pm
we may as well stop this argument alltogether.
but ill show what each site has which is good.
Dreamteam:
Live Scoring
Premium Dreamteam
Eliminator.
Simple System
Long History
Televised Scores.
Less money(more challenging)
Supercoach:
Faster Website
Scores based on player skill.
Herald Sun advertising/stats
More money (for the ones that need it)
so all in all dt wins with the stats
Chris
March 31, 2009 at 9:02 pm
Let me just say this is an awesome thread, love the debate.
I do both but most mates only do DT so I care more about that, and enjoy it more.
However SC definitely is a much more accurate representation of the game, yet I have to agree with XztatiK in that both last year and this year (admittedly only 1 round) I put very little effort into my SC team and still topped my leagues, it seems easier.
Hence DT for me
Brad
March 31, 2009 at 11:17 pm
@ Chris,
I am doing d/t for the first time this year.
I put my side together in 5 minutes and scored 2119 to leave me ranked 304th in d/t after round 1. I have never ranked that high in s/c ever, not even close.
It took me 5 minutes to do my d/t because i didnt have to think at all about how well a player uses the pill just how many times they get it, i know off the top of my head who the players are that get 35 useless touches a week that make them good d/t players.
At this early stage, and it could have been lucky or a fluke, d/t just appears to me to be incredibly easy to pick a side that scores well as opposed to s/c that takes a lot more research and far greater thought process.
cdrobert
March 31, 2009 at 11:46 pm
What will be interesting is how both competitions will function once the Gold Coast Team comes in and forces a bye round.
haryscary
April 1, 2009 at 1:00 am
Of course Supercoach is going to have more – it has been promoted hard in the Herald Sun daily for 2 months now.
If AFL was promoted as hard as Supercoach i am sure the results would be different.
On a side issue – the amount of information given on Supercoach in the Sun this year is a disgrace and allowed the hacks to enter having done no research and put in OK sides.
Defeats the whole flowering purpose
dave
April 1, 2009 at 1:48 am
SC is a pile of balls. You freaks from the breakaway murdoch pile of sheite. Oh my god (you fags would know it as OMG) when are the SC scores up? SC scores? what is he in SC? What a load of poofs. DT is the original and the best. to be perfectly honest can’t believe anyone has gone for it. Just to show that more is always less. I don’t care how many people play SC and monty if you could do the stats on the ratio of SC players and tickets to Sydney for the big pink bash on your blog that would be greatly appreciated.
Brad
April 1, 2009 at 10:52 am
@ Finn,
Disgraceful effort & planning on behalf of the HUN.
This surely should have been rectified before round 1 because the lack of live scoring has taken most of the fun out of it for me and is really pushing me back to dreamteam.
If this isnt sorted quickly you are going lose patrionage to d/t in big numbers come next year.
Peter G
April 1, 2009 at 12:07 pm
@Brad
2 things, mate. First of all, the early leading teams in both DT and SC are usually not particularly good teams, but the teams that got lucky, i.e. leigh harding.
Secondly, SC requires far less research because most of us are already footy tragics who know the good players, established and up-and-coming. Knowing who laps up the cheapies during red time and who will ne played loose by a new coach requires far more knowledge than SC.
Prospector
April 1, 2009 at 12:40 pm
Interesting comparison of scores of guns on p346 of this year’s AFL Prospectus.
Averages across the season show player rankings…
Judd SC 8, DT 73
Goodes SC 14, DT 105
Gilbee SC 47, DT 122 (it’s the haircut!)
Toddler
April 1, 2009 at 6:48 pm
SC kills DT!
So much easier to read, understand and appreciate how well a player is truly going! Look at the beginning salary caps, SC- 10mil (simple)vs DT-7mil and something.
Also, the team guernseys, SC has real jumpers, that football teams actually wear, DT has a shield, which has no relevance to footy.
Having said that I play both, but I spend loads more time on SC because it is better! SC’s big let down is the no live scores though.
Chris
April 1, 2009 at 8:10 pm
@Brad
Agreed, I think that was what I was kinda getting at and you hit the nail on the head, if you have a fair knowledge of footy anyway you can whip up a SC team in no time
splash
April 1, 2009 at 8:17 pm
second year involved.love it all.live scores are needed for sc.
Prospector
April 1, 2009 at 8:18 pm
Another fact of interest…
posts on this site by registered users:
266 topics, 1365 posts – DTriumph
45 yopics, 201 osts – SCraq
Wheeler
April 1, 2009 at 9:37 pm
All you blokes saying SC is better because it’s a true reflection of a players performance are kidding urselves. I don’t deny that it allows a player who doesnt get as many possies to score higher if they play well, but joel bowden isnt the second best backman in the league. And whenever a player gets injured theres always a few tossers who start cheering and say ‘yes, he’s injured… sucked in’, so clearly not many of you actually care about the real players anyway, it’s just a computer game to you.
DT is a lot simpler and a lot easier to understand, i dont understand why SC complicates things so much and unless ive got eyesight problems both the layouts are pretty much the same.
XztatiK
April 1, 2009 at 10:24 pm
“SC kills DT!
So much easier to read, understand and appreciate how well a player is truly going! Look at the beginning salary caps, SC- 10mil (simple)vs DT-7mil and something.” -Toddler
Seven Hundred and what million gazillion??? Oh my god! It’s so hard to read!!! What are those numbers after the seven? What does it all mean???
Oh well, off to SC where they give me a nice clean number with plenty of zeros so I can buy 30 Abletts.
Mark
April 1, 2009 at 11:12 pm
My theory is that 70-80% of people that have a dreamteamers have a supercoach side as well. where as the people that do supercoach dont bother having a dream team. therfore i think the true fans are 50/50 for each
Brad
April 2, 2009 at 12:01 am
Israel and Palestine are more likely to sort out there differences before this thread sorts out which is the superior format!!
Prospector
April 2, 2009 at 12:48 am
Mark,
right thought. wrong conclusion.
Wayne Carey
April 2, 2009 at 1:21 am
supercoach is hairy like stevo’s wife
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Brady
April 2, 2009 at 8:04 pm
Hi,
Just wondering in SC,
When does players prices start to rise? I thought when they performed well, there prices went up?
asanque
April 3, 2009 at 5:08 pm
Interesting numbers.
I just added the teams by state on the Herald Sun website and only got approximately 250k?
wick
April 13, 2009 at 4:00 pm
SC has 100,000 more players than DT in victoria……so the only reason sc has more is because of the coverage it has had. No real coverage of either in other states…..or just stupid victorians attracted to the bright lights…