Fantasy Premier League: Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of ’17/’18.

Written by @NiallHawthorne

Captain Salah.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, captaining Salah would be it.
The long term benefits of captaining Salah have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience…
I will dispense this advice now.

Enjoy the power and beauty of Raheem Sterling; oh never mind; you will not understand the power and beauty of Raheem Sterling until it has faded.
But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at the FPL statistics of Raheem Sterling and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous he really looked…
Shaqiri’s not as fat as you imagine.

Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to fit Kane, Salah and DeBruyne into your team by chewing bubblegum.
The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind.
The kind that blindside you at 11.30am on some idle Saturday morning as the Gameweek Deadline looms.

Do one thing every day that scares you.

Buy Charlie Adam.

Don’t be reckless with other people’s transfers, don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Buy Pascal Gross.

Don’t waste your time on jealousy;
Sometimes you’re ahead,
Sometimes you’re behind.
The race is long, and in the end, it’s only with yourself. And 5,910,134 others.

Remember the Bonus Points you receive, forget the ones you don’t;
If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your Bench Boost Chip, throw away your Wildcard in August.

Stretch…to buying Eriksen.

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your team next week.
The most interesting people I know didn’t know at 11.30am what they wanted to do with their team, some of the most interesting people I know still don’t at 11.35am.

Get plenty of Valencia.

Be kind to Firmino, you’ll miss him when he’s gone.

Maybe you’ll marry, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll have children, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll divorce at 40 because of your FPL obsession, maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary while checking your FPL score online.
Whatever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself either.
Your choices are half chance, so are everybody else’s.
Enjoy your team, Use it every way you can… Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it,
It’s the greatest team you’ll ever own…

Dance… even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room when your captain scores four.

Read the FantasyYIRMA Previews, even if you don’t follow them.

Do NOT read non FantasyYIRMA content, they will only make you feel ugly.

Get to know your mini-league rivals, you never know when they’ll be gone for good.

Be nice to your workmates;
They are the best link to your past FPL success and the people most likely to rub your face in it in the future.

Understand that seasons come and go, but for the precious few you should hold on.
Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle because the older you get, the more you need the people who know how good those new foreign players are.

Be in the top thousand places, but leave before it makes you hard;
Be outside the top million places, but leave before it makes you soft.

Travel (when the season is over)

Accept certain inalienable truths, player prices will rise, bonus points will screw you over, you too will get old, and when you do you’ll fantasize that when you were young player prices were reasonable, bonus points decisions were noble and children let their elders win.

Screw your elders.

Don’t expect anyone else to support you.
Maybe you had Coutinho, maybe you had Suarez; but you never know when either one might run out.

Don’t mess too much with your team, or by the time you’re 40, you will look 85. (Ed: You are 41 now… right?)

Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with FantasyYIRMA who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth.

But trust me on Captaining Salah…

Written by Niall Hawthorne.

Drop him a follow on twitter. Good thing about Twitter – you can always unfollow again later!

Niall Hawthorne has a strange view on most things.

Check out his blog for proof rantsofarebel.wordpress.com.

You can read more from him also on twitter at @NiallHawthorne

His views are his own, because quite simply nobody else would have them!