Fantasy Football... What's the appeal?

Somewhat of your stereotypical girly girl I've never really held any interest in the beautiful game... until now.

My on-going love affair with football has been that of a rocky one. Even though I possess absolutely no enthusiasm where 22 sweaty men running up and down a pitch are concerned (okay, maybe a little if one of those men is Joe Hart), I still seem to find myself embroiled into the sometimes, in my opinion anyway, rather extreme passion for kicking a ball around a field.

Reformed: picking this weeks team

With a father and brother who are keen Notts County Football Club supporters and now boyfriend and family that are also fans, there lies little hope in me escaping from Saturdays meaning one thing and one thing only, and the fate of my life forever more hanging in the balance of whether or not Enoch Showunmi scores.

So, when my boyfriend told me he'd set up his own fantasy football team, who may I add enjoys taking the mick out of my minimal football knowledge on a regular basis, I decided to set up my own team... all in the name of research of course...

I signed up on the Premier League website (http://fantasy.premierleague.com) which is completely free to use and allows you to compete against friends and family in your own private leagues. 

Rather daunted at first with the prospect of having to pick my own team of 11 players plus four subs from the Premiership, I decided to tackle the most important (in my eyes) part first... designing my own kit and team name and joining a team full of my boyfriends, also football orientated, friends. 

After enjoying that rather a little too much I set out on the intimidating task of picking out my players. With £100 million to spend on whoever you so wish ( max three players from each team) the only way I could see to best tackle the problem was to pick players by looks... don't have me down for being shallow though, reputation did play a small role, otherwise I'd have never ended up with someone like Nemanja Vidic!

Truth be told I did lose some interest after I'd made the team.... until Saturday came around and I suddenly became strangely excited- an emotion that I never thought I'd be putting in the same sentence as something football related. Gareth Bale was moving to Madrid, and my uneducated self had put him in my team! I had to transfer (a word that wasn't even in my vocabulary up until last week) and quick. 

Ok, so I'm bottom of the league (for now) but starting a week late, and considering my football knowledge can only be described as dreadful I don't think I'm doing too bad. I've learnt which teams are in the Premiership, I know which teams are playing which on a weekly basis, and after revamping my team this week I have high hopes for the rest of the season. Wow... if you close your eyes I sound a little bit like Alex Ferguson giving his comments on the latest Manchester United match... little past it I know but do I look like the sort of person who knows who manages which football clubs!? I'm not quite at that standard yet.