In fantasy football, a type of

fantasy sport A fantasy sport (also known less commonly as rotisserie or roto) is a game, often played using the internet, where participants assemble imaginary or virtual teams composed of proxies of real players of a professional sport. These teams compete ba ...

, players assemble and manage virtual teams of real

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an Australian rules football playing field, oval field, often a modified ...

ers. Teams score points based on their footballers' performance in real-world matches. Players compete against all other participants in a fantasy football competition, but may also form smaller leagues, often with friends or co-workers. Most fantasy football competitions use players from the

Australian Football League The Australian Football League (AFL) is the pre-eminent professional sports, professional competition of Australian rules football. It was originally named the Victorian Football League (VFL) and was founded in 1896 as a breakaway competition ...

(AFL), although several competitions based on the

AFL Women's AFL Women's (AFLW) is Australia's national semi-professional Australian rules football in Australia, Australian rules football competition for women's Australian rules football, female players. The 2017 AFL Women's season, first season of the l ...

(AFLW) have emerged. Fantasy football competitions based on a

salary cap In professional sports, a salary cap (or wage cap) is an agreement or rule that places a limit on the amount of money that a team can spend on players' salaries. It exists as a per-player limit or a total limit for the team's roster, or both. Seve ...

are the most popular. Under this format, the competition's administrators price every footballer based on their estimated scoring potential. Players receive a limited amount of virtual currency to spend on footballers for their squad. During the season, footballers' prices rise, fall or stagnate, depending on their weekly performances. Every round, players may opt to trade a limited number of footballers to improve their teams, subject to the salary cap. In another common format, players instead select footballers for their teams through a virtual

draft Draft, the draft, or draught may refer to: Watercraft dimensions * Draft (hull), the distance from waterline to keel of a vessel * Draft (sail), degree of curvature in a sail * Air draft, distance from waterline to the highest point on a v ...

. Unlike under the salary-cap format, no two players in a league may own the same footballer. Daily fantasy football, an emerging type, sees players assemble teams for a single game or single week rather than an entire season. In this format, players generally pay a fee to participate. For season-long formats, the two major fantasy football competitions are AFL SuperCoach, operated by

News Corp Australia News Corp Australia is an Australian media conglomerate and wholly owned subsidiary of News Corp. The group's interests span newspaper and magazine publishing, Internet, market research, DVD and film distribution, and film and television prod ...

, and AFL Fantasy, operated by the AFL itself. Draftstars and Moneyball are notable competitions in daily fantasy football.

References

{{Australian rules football * Australian Football League