UCL Fantasy Captaincy Thresholds: Should you change captain to Haaland?

Almost every matchday UCL Fantasy managers face a dilemma: Should I change my captain? 

In this short article, we will look at some basic “rules” (captaincy thresholds system), when you should change your captain to help you with your dilemma.

Let’s go. 

Matchday 8 dilemma after Day 1

So, if you have Mbappe or Kane captain after the Day 1 of Matchday 8 (R16 2nd leg), we think, you should keep the captaincy on them and not change it to Haaland. Haaland would have to do a lot to match them, and potential gains are not worth the risk of switching captaincy. 

Imagine you have both Haaland and Kane, currently Kane captain (13×2=26 points). If Haaland scores a hattrick (17 points if he gets a MOTM as well), that is 34 captaincy points. Here is the breakdown:

• Kane (C) + Haaland = 26 + 17 = 33 points
• Kane + Haaland (C) = 13 + 34 = 37 points

So even if Haaland scores a hattrick (and gets MOTM), you would gain only 4 points on switching the captaincy. Is that really worth the risk?

Captaincy thresholds

Here are our captaincy thresholds for each round of UCL Fantasy. If our captain reaches the desired amount of points, we keep the armband on him.

Group stage

• Matchday 1 – 6: 6 points (8 points, if you have a great captaincy option for Wednesday)

Round of 16

• Matchday 7 (first Tuesday): 8 points
• Matchday 7 (first Wednesday): 7 points
• Matchday 7 (second Tuesday): 6 points
• Matchday 8 (first Tuesday): 8 points
• Matchday 8 (first Wednesday): 7 points
• Matchday 8 (second Tuesday): 6 points

The rest of the elimination rounds

• Matchday 9 – 12: 5 points

*Notes:

• Each round of R16 is big, divided in 4 matchdays, which means we can change our captain 3 times! That’s why we have a higher threshold for captaincy – as there is a bigger chance we catch a haul with so many captaincy changes available.
• the more captaincy option we have, the higher our captaincy threshold is. Once we get to the quarterfinals, there are just a few matches, so there is a smaller range of great captaincy options, so our captaincy threshold is lower than in the group stage.

Substitution threshold

Similarly, we have a substitution threshold that determines whether we should sub off a certain player if he did not score satisfying amount of points.

Our subs threshold is 4 points. Meaning that if your players scores 4 points or more, you will not sub him off after the first day.

If he scores 3 points or less, you replace him on Wednesday with a player who is yet to play and is confirmed in a starting lineup.

With balls recovered and a clean sheet point(s) is quite common for players to score 3 points, so we always subbing of players with 3 or less points scored on Tuesday.

Changing the captain for pro active managers

We usually use 6 points as our threshold for keeping the armband on a selected player.

So if you do not really have a lot of time to manage your UCL fantasy team, keep it simple, and if your captain scores 6 points, you keep him as your captain.

However, if you are a pro-active manager and want to make decisions on multiple factors, this is what you should consider:

• Do I have a reliable player in my UCL fantasy team that could easily outscore my original captain?
• Does this player have a fixture where he could score 10+ points?
• Is this player likely to get MOTM award if he scores?
• What are other UCL Fantasy managers and my rivals more likely to do? Stick or twist?

Basically, it all comes to one thing: whether or not you have a player that could outscore your original captain with ease.

So, these are our new thresholds for pro-active fantasy managers:

• <= 5 points: Changing the captain
• 6 – 8 points: Changing the captaincy only if your new captain has a very easy fixture and could easily score more points
• >=9 points: keeping the armband on the original player no matter what

9 points is a lot of points. It still could be rewarding if your new captain would score more points, but double digits holes are rare… It might happen, but the risk of losing your points is very high here.

The important thing here is to have a system in place. And if your potential new captain scores more points but you did not change the captaincy, keep your emotion in check. This system will reward you in the long run.

You need to have a system in place

If you want to succeed in UCL Fantasy (in a long term) you need to have a system in place: a system that will help you make the right decisions overall – in a long run.

A system that will help you catch captain hauls, but also a system that will help you avoid captain blanks.

Our captaincy thresholds are designed to do this. They are not perfect and you will miss out on some hauls. But you will also avoid many captain blanks. And in a long run, you will do well. That is all that matters.

Risk management is hugely important when it comes to succeeding in areas of life (fantasy football, investing, forex trading and I could continue) where the output is uncertain and depends on the Law of Large Numbers and the Chaos Theory.