One of my other passions in life other than this crazy intense game we all love, is international travel- and I have currently visited 33 countries. Now you might be thinking why am I writing about this in a fantasy football blog, and the simple answer is the ‘challenges’ and ‘funny stories’ my travelling while ‘trying’ to play fantasy has led to.
In my 4th blog I talked about how I have been lucky enough to win profits of approx 11k from ‘fantasy’ this in turn has led me to be able to experience some great holiday destinations, New York probably being my favourite, Rome probably my favourite European destination. I also think one of the main reasons I enjoyed my best ever fantasy season was very likely to do with travel limitations and restrictions over the past year, meaning more time to spend on ‘fantasy’ whilst stuck at home.
Now what are the main ‘challenges’ of playing the game whilst on holiday. Of course time difference is a big one I think Bali was the most extreme I experienced being 7 hours ahead. Another is wi-fi access, now this has improved dramatically over the years, with European access now just coming out of your allowance in most cases. The Wi-Fi password is now expected by travellers in restaurants, as soon as you sit down. My lowest point in my fantasy career was having to leave the wife in a restaurant (their WiFi didn’t work) in Greece whilst I ran back to the hotel for wi-fi to check Hazard was playing (and transfer him in to multiple teams) vs wales in ‘euro 16’ after an injury scare only to see them then loose 3-1 a couple of hours later.
Now the other challenge is explaining to your partner whilst despite being in these amazing locations, your still spending hours checking ‘football stuff’ as she calls it. In some cases being away makes watching games in bars or round the pool easier, as long as the wife has a cocktail in hand. The times we are away usually mean I’m away for the international games. Our anniversary is in June, as is the wife’s birthday which is 1 DAY!! before the euro’s start, she has already planned 3 celebration events, and I have already made my excuses for the first one with her work friends to ensure I can check line ups/ watch the Italy- Turkey game.
Being away also can also work in my favour and give me more time with no work constraints. Going back to the Wi-Fi issue my 2nd worst fantasy memory was in Croatia, where we visited a nearby island for the day, only to see me scrambling around once I saw timo Werner was starting vs South Korea in the 2018 WC, I brought him in to about 20 teams across all formats, only to arrive back via boat to the mainland to watch the 2nd half and see them dumped out 2-0 to the underdogs. This ‘Werner’ experience ultimately led to me largely avoiding him in fantasy this year so something positive did come out of it in the end.
The other thing to note is watching the premiership abroad is so much easier than watching it at home (without spending a fortune on subscriptions) every hotel room has the games on, as do all the bars, including games not even shown back home. You can certainly see why so many international players play FPL.
I also have some great football memories whilst being abroad, and this years international tournament will be my first one since 2004 where I haven’t been abroad in some capacity during it. I was in Spain in 2008 and 2010 whilst they won the euro’s and World Cup. I even ended up staying in the same hotel in Sweden, as the Peru football team in their final warm up game for the World Cup in 2018. Even earlier memories saw me visit the ‘camp nou’ during euro 2000, and buying a ‘figo’ kit only to see him score past England a couple of days later (and then move to Madrid that summer) I also have great memories of watching the famous 5-1 vs Germany (2001) in a British bar in Spain with my family. Things don’t always go quite to plan though, in Euro 16 I was ridiculed by my friends, while away in Greece, after making plans to be at the ‘quarter final vs France’ in a pub with them, only to then see us humiliated by iceland.
As for watching live games abroad in stadiums, that’s probably one step too far for my wife. I did however get her to a baseball game in Canada, and we both got very into bastketball there too as we watched 3 games in fan zones seeing Toronto win the nba title for the first time in their history. My best football live game abroad remains watching Hamburg on my ‘stag do’ where they beat the drop on the final day of the season vs Schalke (57,000 great atmosphere)
So there we have it, I hopefully will get back to some holidays when it’s safe to do so, but at the moment it’s certainly easier for me to manage my multiple teams whilst being in the U.K. Although I’m no doubt going to be stressing around the wife’s birthday, not over what present to get her, or what restaurant to take her to, but instead thinking of who Ukraine’s starting goalkeeper will be.
Good luck all in any euro games your playing, feel free to share any ‘fantasy’ stories or challenges you have faced whilst being on holiday in the U.K. or abroad.
Keysersoze fantasy football 