SuperCoach 2020 Changes Announced + Emergency Pod

At 11 am today the News Ltd team announced a raft of changes to the 2020 SuperCoach game forced due to the COVID-19 two-month hiatus and reduced season.

Here’s a summary of the changes for those who have not seen them yet:

• 5 trades for round 3 – reduced back down to 2 from round 4
• 37 trades maintained
• No restart of the season or points
• Bye rounds removed
• Finals series runs from rounds 17-20
• Player prices updated at the end of round 3 (no change)

The 5 trades will be available from the 12th of May, so there’s plenty of time for us to plan for how we are going to use these.

Initial thoughts

I personally like the changes that they’ve made to the game as it’s maintaining the integrity of the competition and keeping it simple. The only additional change that could have been introduced would be a reduced number of total trades based on the same per game ratio as the 37 over the normal H&A games. We now have closer to two trades per game and the full max of trades per game for those that are yet to make a trade over the first two rounds.

By maintaining the same number of trades and the reduction of byes sees those that have started the season well with a competitive advantage as it will be more challenging to make up the points over the season. And good for them, well deserved. However, there will be some shrewd players out there that will still make it happen either by prioritising cash grabs early on or making the right POD calls.

The initial feedback is that there will be a lot of similar teams now, but there were last year also due to the number of good cash cow options that we had on offer. This season was shaping as a far more challenging season and there will continue to be some complexities, including the strict COVID-19 protocols (i.e. you could have players missing games due to cold/flu symptoms) and the travel restrictions that may yet prove to be a challenge depending on how quickly the rest of the country opens back up.

One thing is clear though, you cannot hold onto players, particularly expensive players in positions such as fullback that miss even one week through injury or suspension. These will need to be traded as otherwise you will fall too far behind and you can trade them back in later on with the increased number of trades pro-rata.

There’s plenty to think about pre the May 28 kick-off. What are your thoughts?