Talk Fantasy Football

Hello all!

It is that time again, for the community to select a Captain for the 2018 Eurobowl in Wales. Please bear in mind that the dates for the event have been announced (27th & 28th October 2018) so anyone standing should be pretty certain they are free that weekend.

Interested parties have until the 7th of December 2017 to make themselves known over on Reddit (link) should they wish to stand for captain. No need for nominations from a third party.

Please remember the criteria to be eligible to stand. From the selection guidelines:

... to captain the Eurobowl team, an individual must have previously attended/played at a Eurobowl.

Since England has not used non-playing team members, this is currently understood to mean anyone who has played in the Eurobowl event. This includes for the Pirates or as a freebooter for a nation other than England. As the current time playing in the EurOpen does not count.

All the best!
Joe

Joemanji wrote:this is currently understood to mean anyone who has played in the Eurobowl event. This includes for the Pirates or as a freebooter for a nation other than England. Joe

As Zulu has already established you can play for different nations, how about played not as a freebooter for a nation other than England but eligible to play for England by having an English parent?

Interesting - we should probably have put in the Eurobowl rules that once you have qualified as a non-freebooter player for one country you may not represent another as a non-freebooter.

sann0638 wrote:Interesting - we should probably have put in the Eurobowl rules that once you have qualified as a non-freebooter player for one country you may not represent another as a non-freebooter.

Any particular reason why? Has this historically been a problem?

As I understand it, Zulu played for Scotland, then moved to Norway, put a great deal of time and effort into helping build up a community there, and currently plays with (and captains!) Team Norway.
Is that something that the NAF / Eurobowl committee wants to discourage?

I don't have a horse in this race, besides curiosity. Asking as a Dual Citizen (of one country which does not send a team to Eurobowl, and another which has a lot more than 8 coaches who are stronger players than I am).
But it feels to me like a hard and inflexible rule about eligibility not only solves a problem which might not exist (Hypercompetitive national teams recruiting mercenaries and destroying the integrity of Eurobowl), but could also create a real problem in the future for coaches who legitimately move to a different country, or just have roots in more than one place.

I'd suggest a more flexible rule, such as "Each nation's Blood Bowl community decides for themselves who is eligible to play for the national team, the same way they decide on the process of selecting a captain and a team".

(Now if, say, Qatar registers for a Eurobowl with a team consisting of Jimjimany, Kfoged, Clement0, Podfrey, Delevus, AndyDavo, Jeff, and Joemanji, with a Qatari prince as a non-playing captain, that would be a time to talk about changing rules to protect the integrity of the game).
(Those are currently the top 8 ranked players in the NAF, just pulled their names for an example, not to accuse any of them of defecting to Qatar).

Only because I had previously mooted as playing for Wales, and was told it was against the spirit...

I don't care either way, it was just a historical reference. I forgot about Zulu actually playing for Scotland. Guess there is a precedent there then.

Garrick wrote:As Zulu has already established you can play for different nations,

sann0638 wrote:I forgot about Zulu actually playing for Scotland. Guess there is a precedent there then.

Not just played for both nations, he has captained both nations.

I would totally be up for a dodgy pay off from a Qatari prince.

Interesting Topic -i may bring it up to the commitee

sann0638 wrote:Interesting - we should probably have put in the Eurobowl rules that once you have qualified as a non-freebooter player for one country you may not represent another as a non-freebooter.

That also seems as an unnecessary extremely harsh way to do it in a game that is all about community (and that normally more follows where you live than where you was born...)

Team England Captain for Eurobowl 2018 in Wales will be Lycos / Dave Downes. Congratulations Dave!

Congratulations Dave.

If i knew that yesterday grats Dave

KFoged wrote:

sann0638 wrote:Interesting - we should probably have put in the Eurobowl rules that once you have qualified as a non-freebooter player for one country you may not represent another as a non-freebooter.

That also seems as an unnecessary extremely harsh way to do it in a game that is all about community (and that normally more follows where you live than where you was born...)

+1.

Given that we are still an amateur game with no financial incentives to switch countries or codes, why should it matter who we play for as long as the captain of that team has invited you?
If the concern is more towards selecting overpowered teams using the same core group of players every Eurobowl, add a clause that says you cannot switch teams in consecutive tournaments, or maybe you have to play for the same team two tournaments running before switching.

I'm certain that rules lawyers can tweak my grammar...

landrover wrote:Given that we are still an amateur game with no financial incentives to switch countries or codes, why should it matter who we play for as long as the captain of that team has invited you?
If the concern is more towards selecting overpowered teams using the same core group of players every Eurobowl, add a clause that says you cannot switch teams in consecutive tournaments, or maybe you have to play for the same team two tournaments running before switching.

Is that not just a slightly more complex EurOpen then? I agree that it shouldn't be blood tests and genealogy investigations to ascertain if you're eligible for a national team, but I think a European team should be represented by their own coaches as closely as they can, like any other* European tournament.

Otherwise, you just end up with a(nother) more elite EurOpen.

Idiot's perspective, I've never been to the tournament (looking to go next year), but just how I read it.

*actually is that like any other European Championship stylee tournament? Not sure how it works on other platforms, Warhammer 40,000, GuildBall, Age of Sigmar etc.