The world of fantasy football has landed in New Zealand and Australia, with the launch of the A-Leagues’ first ever fantasy and tipping competitions to commence this season.
The unveiling of the twin men’s and women’s competitions marks a significant escalation of the A-Leagues engagement with its fans, and will be based on a uniquely comprehensive scoring system drilling down into players’ real-life performances.
Armed with a budget and with prizes at stake, fans entering the Official A-Leagues Fantasy Competition can use their skills to assemble their own dream teams for both the Isuzu UTE A-League Men and the Liberty A-League Women – making the A-Leagues the only Australian sporting code to have a league-licensed standalone fantasy competition for women’s sport.
Under the sophisticated model developed for the new fantasy competition, players’ performances in the actual A-Leagues will be measured over a broad range of categories – allowing fans to compete against other managers in their league to score points based on real football in the A-Leagues. Fans will be able to participate for prizes and bragging rights amongst mates, colleagues and everyone in between.
New Australian midfielder Steven Ugarkovic is the most expensive Wellington Phoenix player in the men’s fantasy competition at $312,500, almost a quarter of a million dollars cheaper than the game’s priciest player, Adelaide winger Craig Goodwin.
The Phoenix men are bargain buys, with Ugarkovic the only Nix player priced in the top 50 players. Bulgarian international Bozhidar Kraev is listed at $234,500, the same as Polish striker Oskar Zawada, while exciting new Brazilian midfielder Yan Sasse is just $209,000.
The women’s price list will be released once Liberty A-League squads are finalised.
The A-Leagues Tipping Competition, meanwhile, will test fans’ result-predicting abilities in both the men’s and women’s competitions, earning points to secure a position on the global leaderboard that will determine the winner of prizes.
“We want to create opportunities for fans to connect with the A-Leagues in any way they choose, and the demand for fantasy and tipping competitions is huge,” Australian Professional Leagues chief commercial officer Ant Hearne said.
“This product helps fans to get more deeply invested in players and their performances, and helps fans to connect with one another to build social connections around the A-Leagues too.
“Having a standalone competition for Liberty A-League Women is an important part of our investment to grow engagement with the women’s competition, particularly as we look forward to the FIFA Women’s World Cup™.”
Both competitions are free to enter and will be available via the KEEPUP app and website, and will officially launch on September 21st for the Isuzu UTE A-League Men and October 12th for the Liberty A-League Women.
Sign up now and challenge your friends at play.keepup.com.au.
