The Premier League have published a table showing the average performance of participants of the Fantasy Premier League by the clubs that they support. Yes, we're top which is nice but the most interesting part of the table are the bottom 6 places. Is it possible that is coincidence? On the grounds that the universe is rarely that lazy and there's no such thing as coincidence, do the more successful clubs attract the least knowledgeable fans? We all know some of those; individuals who believe that supporting a richer and more successful football clubs magically makes them successful and as knowledgeable as the people who actually created that success. Alternately, does supporting a club that has been successful, make you blind and ignorant to the realities of football? Here's the table 1. Tottenham Hotspur 1,584.5 2. AFC Bournemouth 1,575 3. West Ham United 1,570.2 4. Everton 1,561.7 5. Southampton 1,556 6. Watford 1,555.1 7. Newcastle United 1,549.9 8. Norwich City 1,546.7 9. Aston Villa 1,540.9 10. Stoke City 1,540.8 11. West Brom 1,540.8 12. Crystal Palace 1,540 13. Swansea City 1,538.6 14. Sunderland 1,536.3 15. Arsenal 1,530.3 16. Liverpool 1,528.7 17. Manchester Utd. 1,507.1 18. Chelsea 1,477 19. Leicester City 1,461.2 20. Manchester City 1,454.7 So?
You'd have to see the results across a number of seasons, but I wouldn't be surprised if this was accurate. I wouldn't put it down to any particular level of knowledge, so much as a lack of interest. A lot of people say that they support successful clubs and don't really give a crap about football. There's a way of thinking that gives associating with big brands some sort of reflected glory. A number of those that claim to support some of these clubs probably couldn't name their starting XI. No idea why Leicester are in the mix at the bottom, though. Perhaps they've started picking up glory hunters already!
A more interesting correlation would be the supporter of each club vs the average number of players from their own club in their weekly teams. Based on not606, I assume there a lot of Goon participants who actually pick in advance the team that Wenger will ultimately field that week. <World class> Or perhaps statistical population issues (10 participants will not "average" out any dire team selections of the whole) .
The bottom bit is the only anomaly for me, but if you look at the clubs FB page you can see we have a lot of bandwagon jumpers who can't string two words together!
They're probably Arsenal, Chelsea and West Ham fans. A lot of neutrals want you to win the title, but that lot are also desperate for us not to win it. They're essentially supporting you twice.
I think that they deserted ours after Bentaleb's season went down the toilet. We've been linked with Feghouli though, so they might be back after the break.
