Draft Night 2024/25

2024/25 is about to kick off the most exciting year for StatrDraft.com! This season we’re taking you deeper into the game, something we have kept to ourselves for a decade while we perfected our model. We’re ready to show you how we play, how we strategize, and all the behind-the-scenes action that makes our league one of a kind. You can join the waiting list while we get the game ready for public release. Just the other night, our players came together for the event we’ve all been waiting for—our 10th annual Draft Night. It’s the best night of the year, where excitement peaks and the competition is fierce as we select our squads. Spending a Sunday evening rinsing your mates football knowledge while trying to prove why you’re number 1? Yep, that’s Draft Night.

The draft order was set in snakes and ladders style, ensuring a fair and balanced selection process. We picked our teams from the English Premier League, with every choice sparking debate, banter, and the occasional bold move(trust me you’ll see some bold choices when I show you the selections) . With unlimited internal transfers and the option to make one external pick from the free agent list between now and the season’s opening, the stakes were high as each coach aimed to build the near perfect squad.

But the question remains—who do you think perfected the art of the draft? We’re eager to hear your thoughts on who you believe made the smartest moves, who took the biggest risks, and who might have already set themselves up for success this season. The answer as always never the Old Republic…even if they did get the walking Viking cheat code this season.

Draft Rules and Draft Order

Draft Order is simple: we’ve got 10 coaches, 2 in Spain, a few in Dublin and Limerick and 1 off adventuring so once we set the time and place (online and in person) for the draft we used a randomiser to set the order. (we’re not the NFL giving you a leg up for having a stinker over here). Once the order is set then it’s done snakes and ladders style, 1 to 10 and 10 back to 1, so if you’re first up you get 1st pick, 10th, 11th, 20th, 21st and so on. This keeps the teams even and really means picking your team comes down to preparation, strategy, and making the right moves at the right time.

Draft rules are simple: each coach gets 2 minutes to pick their players and each squad is a starting 11 with 7 subs, but more on that later.

Team Rules and Player Breakdown

And by later I mean right now. Team rules are simple: each team needs 2 Goalkeepers, a minimum of 3 defenders, same for midfielders and at least 1 forward. When it comes to maximums you can have a max of 9 midfielders or defenders and max 6 forwards. However when you’re setting your line up you will need a keeper, 3 – 5 defenders, 3 – 5 midfielders and 1-3 forwards with all remaining players on the bench. Playing on our ruleset, our starters get full points and subs get half points so picking wisely is super important as you don’t want to be sitting on an injured player getting no points for months aka Yoro…here’s how the squads looked at the end of the draft, so let’s get stuck into the tale of the tape!

Drafted Order:

Organised Squad Lists:

The Round 1 Picks

We’ve heard the line before, “you can’t win the league in the first month, but you sure can lose it”…well the same can be said for making your first round drafts. As we can see, the Old Republic did possibly the most obvious move of the season by picking the Erling Haaland from the jump despite only being 5th on the auto pick list this year (auto pick is based on last years top points). Next up was the Kinder Mbeumos with a solid start going for last years overall top points earner in Arsenals Starboy Bukayo Saka!

For context our league commissioner is the Aristocrats meaning we will do all in our power to make sure he doesn’t win, but they came in strong with Mo Salah and his fresh chop for a fresh manager in a fresh season (how many times can you put fresh into a sentence before it sounds weird?)

Moving into the middle of the pack for the first round, and let me tell you for a fact, you want to be at the start or the finish of a draft round, but I digress. Kylian Me Softly from all the way in Spain went for last season’s major sleeper and shock top 5 points earner Ollie Watkins. Did she make the right call shooting that one too early or is that just her starting the mind games early?

Craggy Naggins, also last years champions or Pep Garyiola as he likes to be called went kept his cool shooting for Cole “Cold” Palmer while your author and Bilboa Baggins coach (and still our only treble winner) went for the puppeteer perfectionist from Portugal, Bruno Fernandes. Draft Punk (which I will admit is a glorious name) went against his usual picking strategy of “are they Irish? Do they play for Manchester United?” to pick last years PFA Player of the Season, Phil Foden. Jolly Rogers, another one of the usual “ones to watch”, picked Son, much to the annoyance of our next coach and Spurs fan the Moyrosstititues who re-joined the league this year after a hiatus before either striking gold or screwing the pooch early by picking Dominik Solanke in round 1! Last but not least was SpitOnThatHwang who really threw a curveball for round 1 picks in choosing Alexandar Isak. Don’t forget he also got the next pick which was Eberechi Eze, so we aren’t holding out for much for their coaching credentials given literally every other player in the league ( read: De Bruyne, Trent, Silva, Rice and Odegaard) were all available.

Teams

Old Republic

Honestly if you asked us at the start of the season who would be the only person who could shit the bed when it came to being 1st pick the unanimous decision would have been the Old Republic, who have somehow managed to be last in the league more than anyone else in the 10 years we have played. The Republic’s pick method is a tale as old as time:

• Do they play for, did they play for, or have they been linked to Manchester United?

• What does the auto pick say?

• Is Martin Dubravka available?

The Old Republic on their 2nd round picked up both Morgan Gibbs White and Diogo Dalot but its interesting that it took almost 15 rounds of picks before anyone decided to take Lisandro Martinez off the table. Other notable picks here would be the last 3 choices with the injured Yoro and rotation players Mudryk and Ferguson filling the line up. If you ask me, without serious surgery the Old Republic are still probably going to fare better than usual with a mid-table finish foreseeable.

Draft Rating: 5/10

Kinder Mbeumo

Kinder Mbeumo are what we would call the silent sleeper in the league. The Kinder Coach isn’t the thinking man so his move is very much what does the auto pick say? Which – if we’re being honest – is far better then the Old Republic. After taking Saka early doors he followed it up with league stalwarts and solid picks in Guimaraes, Bowen and Kudus. The major downside of going auto is probably obvious, you miss the annual keeper rush which started in round 6 and you’re more than likely going to be left with the next best defenders after everyone has already taken their pound of flesh. This team we reckon is like that meme of the Ferrari and the Nissan Micra, Midfield is stocked to the high heavens, front line looks mediocre at best while the defence and keeper situation is the one to keep the eye on when the transfers start coming.

Draft Rating: 5.5/10

Aristocrats

The Commissioner….here’s the thing about our Commissioner: he didn’t watch football until we started this league, and purely knows the sport by the numbers. Some might call him Statman J, others Data Jesus, some just call him Jimi and the ever present second best had a very solid draft once again with his first few rounds of picks rounding out his team nicely early doors. However, with questions on his first keeper choice he somehow managed to get one of the leagues top points scorers later down the pecking order in Leno, which came as surprise to all. The Aristocrats are not fans of Pep Roulette squad rotation of modern football and prefers to pick players who are guaranteed to play and should be important components for their teams. Remember we don’t care how their teams fare, just how the player does. Purely loses points on the draft rating for Hermansen, Barkley and the Jamie Vardy party as while he thinks each of these players is a guaranteed starter, actual sports fans know this ain’t gonna be the case.

Draft Rating: 6.6/10

Kylian Me Softly

One of our Spanish contingent, as if it wasn’t obvious from her draft strategy. Like the Aristocrats, KMS took the route of rounding our their team early doors with some very strong early picks across Watkins, Rice, Diaz and Gvardiol, and that’s where it all started to go wrong. Punting on new signings and banking on youth, the KMS team banked their teams on the emerging Conor Bradley, which could be an amazing pick or a dud depending on how Slot-Ball comes to fruition for Liverpool. Also, does Zinchenko start now that Arsenal have Califiori and Timber as left sided options? is the guy who signed from Brighton having never played for Newcastle in Minteh any good? Will Tosin be first or nineteenth choice for Chelsea? We reckon there is work to do across defence and in the midfield here before the season starts.

Draft Rating: 5.8/10

Craggy Naggins

Our current champion and second highest title winner in the history of the league is hoping to defend his league title this season with the Craggy Naggins once again set to be there or thereabouts come the end of the season. Only 3 Liverpool players this season which is a record low for Pep Garyiola. With Palmer, Rodri, McAllister, Robertson and Silva as the first 5 rounds, Craggys have seemingly made a mockery of the middle of the draft order being the deadzone, stacking the midfield early doors. The forward line is just a whole pile of punts, hoping Timo Werner and Ivan Toney hit their stride, Savio actually plays, and Neto and Hojlund progress from decent seasons in the year just gone. The weakness is obvious (look at that backline!), count the injuries and it must surely hurt a Pool fan to be leaning so heavily on the West Ham bound Wan-Bissaka, which could be the signing of the season.

Draft Rating: 7/10

Bilboa Baggins

PSA: this is my team, so totally not going to be biased here (ha!), but ….it’s class. Once again as the leagues only historical treble winner (and, sadly, the name sake for the leagues end of season wooden spoon game after The Great Match Fixing Scandal of 22) we’re in it to win it this year. Taking Trent just before Craggy Naggins attempted to grab their crown jewel is not only a masterstroke of a move with a defender who plays as a mid, but the mind games have well and truly begun. After a stellar Euros and a new Dutch manager we expect Gakpo to go from strength to strength. They say forwards win games and defences win titles, so here’s hoping the Bilboa Baggins backline holds firm, because while the midfield is solid and all bar Diallo are going to start, that forward line does look light and is heavily reliant on Gakpo as Rashford, Delap and the leagues new big man Fullkrug are all potential hits and misses.

Draft Rating: 6.8/10

Editor’s note: At time of publication, the draft rating awarded above to Jon by Jon for a team that by his own admission has no bankable strikers is under extreme review – Jimi

Draft Punk

Can we all take a collective moment to appreciate the quality naming here? This year the Punks decided what their draft strategy was to have no strategy and unlike Kinder Mbeumo who questioned the auto pick, the Draft Punks are probably looking at being the league Punks this year with the team basically Foden and Friends F.C. Sadly for this coach, his front line is light, the engine room is looking mediocre at best, and poor Tarkowski (as if he didn’t have it hard enough at Everton) – the rest of his supporting cast is not the strongest. Weakest draft by a distance but luckily he can rely on The Old Republic to finish easily below them this year.

Draft Rating: 4/10

Jolly Rogers

The second of our Spanish contingent and one of the favourites for the league this season and the other half of the Kavbowl (Aristocrats Versus Jolly Rogers family feud) did a solid draft, taking Son in the first round right from under the nose of the Moyrosstitutes. De Bruyne is still De Bruyne and looks back to his best and when we look across the squad the starting formation smells of 3-4-3 with Virgil, Udogie and Gabriel supporting Martinelli, De Bruyne, Szobozlai and Sarr behind Wood, Son and Jesus. We reckon there is a new keeper and defender needed to make the Jolly Rogers a genuine title contender for the coming season.

Draft Rating: 7.2/10

Moyrosstitutes

After a 5 year hiatus the Moyrosstitutes returned to the fold for this season and could you tell they have been out of the frame for a while judging by their draft? After Son was stolen right from under their noses they turned to the next available Spurs frontman in Solanke, which could be a sleeper hit under Ange with their mad style of ball. Per their name, the Moyrosstitutes love a subsititute with Trossard, Jones, Partey, Akanji, Richarlison and Zirkzee all likely bench-to-rotation options for their clubs this season. Having said that, their keepers are probably the pick of the bunch, and a front line consisting of last seasons second half hero Muniz could be looking at a play off placement with the right trades and transfers in the coming weeks.

Draft Rating: 5.8/10

SpitOnThatHwang

Poor SpitOnThatHwang, picking up Isak and Eze that early in the draft you could smell the newbie from a mile away which got even worse half way down the draft when a player they wanted got selected and they plumped for the perennially injured Shaw and Jacob Ramsey. Thankfully for them Old Republic and Draft Punk had weaker drafts, and some TLC in that midfield could change them from bottom of the league fodder to a playoff contender.

Draft Rating: 5.5/10

Notabale Picks and Curveballs

Category : Random Shouts

Fabio Carvalho, Yoro, Caoimhin Kelleher, Jack Grealish, Sessengon, Miguel, Solanke, Paqueta, Lief Davis and Oscar Bobb

Some super random picks across the board here, and can you guess the Fulham fan in the group picking Fulham Academy and Brentford bound Fabio Carvalho, Sessegnon and Emile Smith Rowe in their team? To be fair Carvalho could be a great shout if he’s given the game time under Thomas Frank. Yoro, picking Yoro was a terrible call, he’s injured for 3 months so that was just a waste of a draft pick, their fault, their problem.

Grealish and Bobb are random shouts as neither are nailed on starters for City, but then again in the era of Pep Roulette who is? Could be gold, could go cold, let’s wait and see. We all know Paqueta has been a bold pup so let’s look at Leif Davis. The young Ipswich fullback had an amazing 2023/24 seasonin the Championship, loves going forward and will be playing every week for the Town…could he be this seasons Doughty?

Category: How the hell did it take so long?

Mainoo Round 9, Martinez Round 15, Ben White Round 4 and Walker Round 11

Plenty of Manchester United hate this season after a very question 23/24 but the shining light of their season and one of the few guaranteed starters had to wait for 85 players to be picked ahead of him. The same could be said for Lisandro Martinez, now that he is fit and coming off the back of a Copa America win with Argentina he is sure to be starting every week so why did it take so long to pick him? The perception that he is a yellow card machine which is yet to be proven right or wrong after an injury hit season in the Premiership. Ben White was the 8th picked defender behind Dalot, Tarkowski and, potentially Saudi bound Trippier, shame on all of us for waiting so long to pick one of the highest scoring defenders last year. Last but not least the best right back in Premiership history, I hated even writing that but it’s true and he’s set to have another stellar season so here we go again.

Califiori Round 18!, after having a great season and even better Euros, how did nobody take Arsenal’s big money signing until the final round of selection? especially considering other players chose Liverpool’s soon-to-be-sold Kelleher, Man City youth prospect Oscar Bobb, the aging Jamie Vardy and Ireland’s Evan Ferguson.

It’s Game Time!

That’s it: that’s Draft Night in the tank for another year. Jon, Jimi and Damien now go back into their caves to keep adding new features for our coaches to test throughout the season like their line-up setter, transfer engine and more. As we gear up for the biggest season of our self built fantasy football experience, we’ll be taking you through the fixtures, starting with Week 1, which is just around the corner. Every week, we’ll analyse the internal and external transfers our coaches make, offering insights into their strategies and how they’re adapting to the competition.

Now that you’ve seen the draft, we want to hear from you—who do you think nailed it? Who’s set to dominate the head-to-head, and whose teams need a little more work? What transfers would you make if you were in charge?

Don’t forget to hit us up with your predictions and thoughts on who’s going the distance this season. And if you’re not in the game yet, make sure to join the waiting list and become part of the growing group of players ready to join the fantasy football revolution.

_{Jon Harrison}