VirtualSports haven’t been sitting on their hands while the AFL dilly-dallies, and today they launched the Yahoo!7 AFL Football Fantasy competition on behalf of Yahoo!7, the joint venture between Yahoo! and the Seven Network.
The first thing to note is that there seem to be zero prizes. None. Nada. Zippo. Lethal League‘s prize pool of $4,960 is looking better all the time! (hint hint) 😉
The rules are very similar to all the other VirtualSports competitions: a squad of 30, 22 playing and three emergencies. The only difference is the salary cap, which is set at $8,000,000, and the scoring system:
| Statistic |
Points |
| Kick |
4 Points |
| Handball |
2 Points |
| Mark |
4 Points |
| Tackle |
6 Points |
| Free Kick For |
1 Point |
| Free Kick Against |
-3 Points |
| Hitout |
1 Point |
| Goal |
12 Points |
| Behind |
1 Point |
As any fan of Dream Team can tell you, this system favours goals twice as much, while also giving a nice boost to kicks, marks and tackles. This means backmen who venture forward now and again are going to be valuable, and makes Andrew McLeod a lead pipe lock. Justin Koschitzke becomes much more tasty in the rucks for the same reason, as does a number of those Crow midfielders who are supposedly spending more time forward this year, like Simon Goodwin. It is important to select the right forwards because they are going to make up a higher percentage of your overall score, which leads me to think that selecting as many premium forwards from the start is probably the way to go.
It was inevitable that Yahoo would get into fantasy AFL at some point, given their strong association with the industry in the States. Personally, I’m a little disappointed by this offering, particularly the complete lack of prizes. Maybe next year they’ll delves into the as-yet-untapped world of private draft leagues, at which they have many years of experience. Until then, I can’t see this comp getting huge support from the Australian fantasy community – even if the official Dream Team comp is delayed!
Note: FanFooty will provide live scoring for the Yahoo!7 competition this year.
