And the 2009-10 winners are...

As the dust finally settles after another whirlwind Premier League season, it's time to hand out the virutal trophies for our Fantasy Premier League and I Know The Score competitions.

Beginning with the former, we're delighted to announce that Chris Gordon has done it again. Having won the 2008-09 SPAOTP Fantasy Premier League, he's retained the title by winning the 2009-10 version as well (see table right - click for larger version)!

His team this year, The Glengarry Leeds, romped home with a score of 2,403 - a full 269 points more than last season - and that's 74 points more than our 2009-10 runner-up Matthew Nerney and his team Red Lions FC. Dan Arvid Bjørsvik finished third, a further 27 points behind, with his team Dango FC. Last season's runner-up, Graham Matthews, finished fifth this time around.

Once again, we're delighted to say that your collective interest in our league has made it one of the most popular on the official Fantasy Premier League website. Out of 193,262 registered mini-leagues, ours was ranked 1,674th and for that we thank all of you for taking part, regardless of how your team fared!

Over on our I Know The Score mini-league (see table left), we have a new champion in the shape of JimmyJazzzz, a Blackburn fan from Ireland. He finished top of our league of 22 teams with a score of 2,875 points - nearly 400 points more than last season's champion TokyoToffeeman who this time could only finish fourth. Our runner-up for 2009-10 was EvanQuigley, an Arsenal supporter, again from Ireland, with 2,850 points - just 25 short of JimmyJazzzz!

Third place in our I Know The Score mini-league goes to RobAdelaide with 2,740 points, and as ever we need no excuse to give a special mention to our old friend ChrissMari who this season finished a very commendable fifth on 2,415 points.

And that's about it for another season. Once again it's been a lot of fun pitting my football knowledge and tactical astuteness against you all, so thanks for taking part and the best of luck for next season too!

'I Know The Score' is back!

Everyone loves trying to predict the outcome of a football match, but we know what you're thinking - 'if only I could outscore other decent people like myself who regularly visit Some People Are On The Pitch'? Well now you can with our FA Premier League I Know The Score game for 2009/10!

Many of you will know that last year SPAOTP set up it's own mini-league as part of I Know The Score and this season we're doing the same again. It's very easy to play, so if you haven't taken part before, here's how it all works.

Players score points for their astuteness in guessing the outcomes of each set of games, and the closer they get to the actual results, the more points they score.

But if you're thinking that's a synch, think again. There's a tactical element involved that brings bonus points if you play your chips right. (Don't worry - we're not talking about a new gameshow fronted by Bruce Forsyth…)

Each week you're given two casino-style chips, one called the 'Banker' chip, the other, your 'Insurance' chip. If you feel one of your predictions is a dead cert to come in, you can play your Banker chip against it. If the score matches your prediction, 'happy days' - you'll get double or even triple points.

Conversely, if you think that one of your predictions is looking somewhat shaky, you can play your Insurance chip against it. Why? Because incorrect predictions mean points are deducted from your total and the Insurance chip is a way of making sure that doesn't happen for the match concerned.

Returning to the subject of the Banker chip, you can score even more points by building up your Banker Bonus. If you place the chip correctly, your Banker Bonus will increase to five points. Place it correctly the following week and it'll increase to ten points, then fifteen and so on up to a maximum of twenty which you can maintain week in week out - as long as you correctly place your Banker chip.

So there it is - the SPAOTP I Know The Score mini-league. All you need to do is go along to the FA Premier League's I Know the Score website, register your details and join our Private Mini-League in the Mini-Leagues section. You'll be asked to type in a code number, so enter FC974-QSG to gain you entry to the SPAOTP.com League.

Once that's done, you're ready to take part when the season starts. Last season's winner was Tokyo Toffeeman who racked up 2,485 points, just 15 ahead of another old friend of ours, ChrissMari. Can they be beaten? Will you be our new champion for 2009/10?

There's only one way to find out. We look forward to seeing your name on the list on August 15th 2009...

And the winners are...

Now that the dust has finally settled on another fine football season, it's time to announce the winners of SPAOTP's two online competitions.

Back in July 2008, we invited you all to take part in our Fantasy Premier League and 'I Know The Score' League, both run in conjunction with the official Premier League website. Once again, we had a terrific response from all of you resulting in a record 121 players taking part in the former, and after 38 weeks of ardent battling we are delighted to announce that the winning team was Leeds from the Front, managed by Chris Gordon.

Chris amassed a total of 2,134 points (averaging over 56 per week) and finished 10 clear of Graham Matthews' Nowt Since '68 in second. In third place was Riverdale FC, managed by James Dutra, with 2,083 points.

Congratulations to all of them and indeed all of you who took part. Thanks to your efforts, the SPAOTP.com mini-league was finally ranked 389th out of 140,784 which, we think you'll agree, is something to be very proud of.

Over in the 'I Know The Score' mini-league, we're delighted to announce that two old friends of SPAOTP ended up at the top of the pile. The outright champion was Tokyo Toffeeman who ended the season on 2,485 points - just fifteen clear of ChrissMari who put in a last ditch challenge with 200 points on the final gameweek. Had she not predicted Hull would get a draw against Man United on the last Sunday, she might have just snatched victory but that's just us being pedantic... ;-) Third place went to minty83 who ended up with a creditable 2,390 points.

Once again, congratulations to the winner, Tokyo Toffeeman, and our thanks to everyone that took part. We hope we can call on your participation again next season!

Play 'I Know The Score' with SPAOTP!

Never say we don't spoil you here at Some People Are On The Pitch.

As if our generous invitation to take part in our Fantasy Premier League competition wasn't decent enough, we can today bring you news of yet another idle pursuit we'd like you to take part in.

It's called I Know The Score and it's the FA Premier League's very own competition where the winner is the person that correctly predicts the most scores and results throughout the course of the season.

Players score points for their astuteness in guessing the outcomes of each batch of games, and the closer they get to the actual results, the more points they score.

But if you're thinking that's a synch, think again. There's a tactical element involved that brings bonus points if you play your chips right. (Don't worry - we're not talking about a new gameshow fronted by Bruce Forsyth…)

Each week you're given two casino-style chips, one called the 'Banker' chip, the other, your 'Insurance' chip. If you feel one of your predictions is a dead cert to come in, you can play your Banker chip against it. If the score matches your prediction, 'happy days' - you'll get double or even triple points.

Conversely, if you think that one of your predictions is looking somewhat shaky, you can play your Insurance chip against it. Why? Because incorrect predictions mean points are deducted from your total and the Insurance chip is a way of making sure that doesn't happen for the match concerned.

Returning to the subject of the Banker chip, you can score even more points by building up your Banker Bonus. If you place the chip correctly, your Banker Bonus will increase to five points. Place it correctly the following week and it'll increase to ten points, then fifteen and so on up to a maximum of twenty which you can maintain week in week out - as long as you correctly place your Banker chip.

So there it is - a great new competition which is fun to play and proves how good you are at predicting Premier League results. All you need to do is go along to the FA Premier League's I Know the Score website, register your details and join our Private Mini-League in the Mini-Leagues section. You'll be asked to type in a code number, so enter FCDA9-CUV to gain you entry to the SPAOTP.com League.

Once that's done, you can start thinking about those opening day fixtures and perhaps guess the results to a few of them. There's no time to lose - adulation and glory awaits, so why not take part now and see how you get on!