Since 2007 more than 2500 people have had a go on YIRMA.

The NIFFTY LEAGUE (Northern Ireland Fantasy Football Through Yirma) started in January 2012 as an invitational Head to Head version of the main game.

Reset and raring to go for the new season NIFFTY is back!

Capped this year at 38 people we have a great mixture of Northern Ireland legends, current Internationals, local radio personalities and the 20th most influencial man in Northern Ireland…

We feel the NIFFTY League has an impressive line up!!  Keith Gillespie, Warren Feeney, Grant McCann and Michael O’Connor have almost 200 International Caps for Northern Ireland and much is expected of their teams!

Alan Simpson Vs Stephen Clements is the NI radio grudge match – battle of the airwaves!! I imagine a forfeit for the loser of this pairing could be quite entertaining….

With several fantasy football enthusiasts and of course the Fantasy Yirma Admin team of @ryano83 @mark_jones86 and @pedro_lamb this league promises to throw up some good matches and produce some questionable banter on twitter.

Gameweek 8

Emile Heskey is a Fantasy Yirma Legend… not sure why, he just is!

At the minute big Emile is tearing it up Down Under.. played 3 scored 2.. best run of form in years 🙂

Here is his goal courtesy of http://www.goal.com – check out their website also.

Many thanks to @shots_on_target for another great article – you can read more at http://www.shotsontarget.co.uk/

check it out!!

@fantasyyirma

Chelsea delivered what you would expect of them in this fixture.  I had them down beforehand for 9 SOT which would lead to 3 goals.  Ivanovic does what Ivanovic does though, with a searing effort and they score 4 .Lots of players impressed in Blue, Mata, Hazard, Oscar and Torres plenty involved, and Lampard to a lesser extent.  Despite Mata’s 2 assists (expect Transfers in this week) the love is still spread out between as many as 4 players in this team.   Norwich put up a good enough fight.  I predicted they’d have 2.4 SoT, they had 2 and managed a goal from that.  Holt put in a good performance and he looks like he’ll be back amongst the goals soon enough.

Swansea should feel hard done by not to have won this one with a massive number of opportunities to score with Ki and Moore most involved, Moore in just 50 minutes mustering 3 SoT.  Ki continues to look like he could actually be the new Steven Gerrard, and not just the Korean one.  Michu only had the one shot on target and looked to be the least involved in actual goal threat of the Swansea front line.  The Royals didn’t really do enough to warrant 2 goals.  Karacan might be worth a gander but overall this lot are fantasy no-no’s.  Pogrebnyak included.

Martinez was quoted after the match saying that Wigan looked like creating something every time they got into the final third – creating shots off target maybe.  That they scored 2 here was fortunate from a pure numbers point of view.  Kone and Di Santo though are clearly the focal point of Wigan’s attack and they seem to know where the net is, with both favouring shots in the penalty box.  I don’t think Kone is worth £1m more than Di Santo though.  Everton had the better chances to win this game with Pienaar the main creator and Jelavic and Mirallas benefactors of those.  Osman and Baines were busy too, but where was Fellaini?  No shots at all, and only one key pass matching Neville’s output.  Oh dear.

Not quite the dominant display that I expected from the Baggies with my Select XI “secret weapon” pick Lukaku on the bench again.  Your eyes are drawn to the midfield trio of Gera, Morrison and Mulumbu for West Brom, with them pretty much equalling each other in attacking performance, indeed, with them all grabbing goals, and Morrison adding 3 key passes and an assist to top the bunch.  In comparison, the “strikers” Long, Odemwingie, Lukaku and Rosenberg all did little.  For Rangers, Granero deserved his goal, will have to keep an eye on him, as well as Taarabt.  The Algerian has so much fantasy promise but can be so frustrating too.

Sunderland did their best to stem the Champion’s attacking talents but Kolorav’s goal so early probably undone them.  Kolorav was pretty brilliant for a defender and with Mancini’s tactical plans allowing such freedom for the fullback it’s a shame for fantasy manager’s that there is so much rotation in that position.  No-one in particular dominated City’s attacking chances though, with Tevez not even getting a shot on target, although Aguero was a real force when he came on..  Conversely, all of the Black Cats play is through Steven Fletcher and he’s already shown he doesn’t need a great amount of opportunity to score. This is why he should be considered a fantasy target when the fixtures line-up.  Not because he “always scores”, but because he’s the focal point of a team’s attack and one of the most proven finishers at this level.

Giroud put up a great display in this game against difficult opponents to boot.  This performance netted the Frenchman the top F.SCORE from Day One of GW7.  Podolski also had his best game in England and Walcott impressed greatly in a 35 min sub appearance.  Cazorla’s goal was from his only shot of the game to hit the target, and he does seem prone to shoot from range – but you have to shoot to score.  This was a good performance from Arsenal and West Ham weren’t given a great deal of chances.   When they did though, they got them in the box, which is an indicator of  Allardyce’s style of play.  Andy Carroll was busy on his full return from injury creating most of the chances.  His relationship with Nolan looks to be a good one.

Pretty even-stevens at St.Mary’s between two of the season’s most attack-minded clubs outside the big boys, with both sides posting very similar number shot totals.  A lack of genuine quality finishing summed up both teams, with Lambert and Rodallega particular guilty of missing the target when given a chance.  Lallana was the most creative player for the hosts, whilst Richardson off the bench to replace Kacaniklic looked lively for Fulham who dearly missed the class of Berbatov.

A dominant attacking display by Tottenham against a Villa side yet to find their rhythm under Lambert.  Spurs did not really make their dominance count though, with a lot of wasted efforts, particular from Defoe on his 30th birthday, whose place you’d imagine is now under real threat from Adebayor.  Aaron Lennon continued to rack up key passes and bagged a goal too, something he doesn’t do often enough.  Gareth Bale continues to provide a real threat from midfield and was unlucky today hitting the post in the final 10 minutes.  Surprisingly, Clint Dempsey playing in the support role behind Defoe did not get a shot off all game, you’d hope he could feed off Adebayor better than Defoe in future.

The Stoke players came out and did exactly what their manager wanted them to do, defend like hell, and go home with a point.  Liverpool fans and owners of Suarez in particular should not feel downhearted; this was never going to be an easy game.   After Arsenal, Stoke have conceded the fewest shots on target in the Premiership this season in a run of fixtures which included games against Chelsea, City and Arsenal.  Liverpool did get plenty of possession and chances of course, with Suarez being the main threat again.   Stoke really didn’t muster enough of an attacking threat to deserve further mention.

This was a really dominant display by United in both attack and defence and they were fully deserving of a three goal victory.  Rooney played a free role in midfield and was a force to be reckoned with, both in a creative sense and with his shooting.  His lack of shots in the box though does reflect his deeper role and the goals may not be so forthcoming this year as in seasons past.  Van Persie had a quite game by his standards and owners of the £13.5m striker should start to worry how the fluidity in United’s attack is going to impact on his goal threat.  For Newcastle, Demba Ba remains the chief threat, with the lion’s share of the Magpies limited chances.