Ladder Leagues

PREAMBLE

This is not really a sports replay simulation, more a method of re-creating a full season (any season) of football showing how fortunes (as measured by league position) ebb and flow over the course of the season. Because this only makes sense if we compare like with like we treat the league fixture list in an abstract way, using blocks of four matches at a time in which each team plays two home and two away matches, so that, unlike in    real-life, all teams have played the same number of matches at any given time when league positions are determined and recorded. This has both advantages and disadvantages. We ‘miss out on’ the situation where, for example, the league leaders are 4 points clear of the chasing pack but have played two more games than the team in  second place and three more than the team in third who are just 5 points behind. And because we randomise each 4-match block of matches (using the actual fixture list even it was readily available would produce varying number of games played for each team) there is no certainty that, for example, Liverpool will play Arsenal home and away just once (or even at all) over the course of the season, so that is another abstraction but one that in the context of this game engine is unimportant.

Initially, when the season starts, the teams are graded based on last season’s finishing positions, but those Grades are only used for the first block of 4 matches, thereafter the Grades are based on the number of points scored in the previous 4 matches

DESIGNER’S NOTES

I said in the Preamble  that this is not really a replay simulation. For  the main play-test I staged a re-run of the 2024/5 season. all four of the English leagues at the same time. The opening match was Liverpool. versus Southampton, a 5-0 win for Liverpool. How decisive that was to prove, as 36 matches later Crystal Palace, then 2 points ahead of Liverpool. were held to a 1-1 draw at already relegated Ipswich, missing a second half penalty, while Liverpool scored a late winner at home to Bournemouth to win 3-2 and equal the Palace’s points total and win the title with a 3-goal better goal difference !

So this product is more fun than fact but we all need a little light relief sometimes.

One little tip here, if you are playing more than one league at the same  time use separate sets of Team Cards as originally I forgot that the Championship has four more teams that the Premier League and my first Fixture Block for the Championship was two matches short of a full set !

 LIST OF CONTENTS

2 @ Points Progression Sheets 

2 @ League Positions Sheets

2 @ Goals Scored Cards, one Home, one Away

2 @ 1 - 24 Team Cards

4 six-sided dice, 2 @ Red. 2 @ Green

Rule Book