Our team of Hall of Famers and guest writers are offering regular contributions throughout the 2023/24 Fantasy Premier League (FPL) campaign. Here, former champion Simon March follows up his article on composure by analysing another trait needed to win FPL.
There’s been an ever-present debate throughout the history of FPL concerning how much of the game is skill and how much is luck. Some say it’s 80% luck, some say it’s 80% skill. Others put it closer to 50-50. Ask a dozen FPL managers and you’ll likely get a different answer each time.
Simply put, winning in FPL does require luck. Whether you’re competing for an elite rank, mini-league glory, a head-to-head encounter and certainly when it comes to winning the overall prize.
But what exactly does it look like in this game? Is it something that either comes our way or otherwise eludes us? Or is it something we can help influence for our benefit? These questions, and others, will be the focus of this week’s article.
WHAT IS LUCK IN FPL?
When we think of luck in FPL, we’re usually not talking about tripping over, hitting your head on the keyboard and accidentally triple-captaining Dan Burn (£4.4m) for an unlikely 42-point haul in Gameweek 17.
Usually, we’re referring to the margins between a decision paying off or it backfiring. But no matter the factor luck might play in determining the outcome of these actions, they are still decisions with a percentage risk and percentage payoff associated with them. They are not mere random events.
In other words, it doesn’t take a lot of luck for a well-reasoned decision to pay off. And it only requires a little bit more to succeed disproportionately. Yet it takes plenty of luck for a high-risk decision to pay off and an even greater amount to do so excessively.
Flip this around and you can argue that it takes quite a lot of misfortune for a logical decision to backfire and a huge amount for it to backfire disproportionately. In contrast, it takes very little misfortune – relatively speaking – for a high-risk decision to backfire. And only a bit more for it to backfire excessively.
GETTING LUCK ON YOUR SIDE
