McDonald’s have once again teamed up with FIFA for the Official 2018 World Cup Fantasy Football game, so don’t miss out on the opportunity to participate. There are some great prizes up for grabs with the overall winner picking up a KIA Sportage, a signed Captain’s Armband from the winning World Cup team and a copy of EA SPORTS FIFA 18 for PS4.

It promises to be fantastic tournament so here’s an overview of all the tips you will need to start playing Fantasy FIFA.

How to play McDonald’s FIFA World Cup Fantasy

To get started you simply head over to the Official FIFA website and click on the Create Team tab, choose your squad then register your account.

However, before doing this it is well worth getting to know the rules so let’s walk you through some of the essentials.

Selecting a squad

Each player has his own valuation and you must ensure that you do not exceed the overall budget which is set at $100m for the group stage before increasing by a further $5m for the knockout stages of the competition.

You are not obliged to spend the maximum amount but players are usually valued highly for a reason so it makes sense to use as much of the budget as possible to increase your chances of being successsful.

All squads must contain 2 goalkeepers, 5 defenders, 5 midfielders and 3 forwards.

Players may be revalued after the Group stage (Round 3 but more on that later) based on their performances in the tournament.

In the initial group stage (Rounds 1 to 3) you can select up to 3 players from a single team. This is increased to 4 players for the Round of 16, followed by 5 for the quarter-finals, 6 for the semi-finals and 8 for the finals of the World Cup (3rd place play-off and World Cup Final).

Your 15 man squad must be made up of players from the list that contains all of the players from the Official 23-man World Cup squads. However, you may wish to make use of some of the available sorting options when browsing through the list of potential selections. Filters include – player position, team, price, selected by % and you may also want to make use of the ’round’ and ‘goals scored’ options as the tournament progresses. To navigate through the list click on ‘view more’ then use the sidebar to scroll up and down.

Once you are happy with a slection, simply click on the player (+) to add him to your squad.

You will need to repeat the process until you have selected all 15 players but once you are happy with your initial squad you can then enter this team by registering an account using a personal email address and make further changes at your leisure.

Selecting a team

For each game round you are required to select a starting XI that must comply with the allowed playing formations. These are:

5-3-2    5-2-3    5-4-1    4-4-2    4-3-3    4-5-1    3-5-2    3-4-3

The playing formation box is located on the ‘pitch view’ to the left of your starting goalkeeper. Simply click on the default formation icon shown to choose an alternative set-up.

You will also need to nominate a Captain for each game round. This is a vital decision since your captain has his points score doubled for each game round. To select your captain, simply click on the player of your choice and hit the Make Captain tab.

Managers who may be familiar with the Official Fantasy Premier League game should note that there is no ‘Vice captain’ option in this format. Therefore, if your captain takes no part in a particular game round, no other player’s score will be doubled.

Now it’s time to look at some of the trickier bits.

Substitutions and managing you team

You must select 11 players from your 15 man squad before the deadline for each game round.

You will then accumulate points for the round based on the scoring actions of these 11 players. If one or more of your players do not play then they may be automatically substituted with the players from your bench. However, you are also entitled to make changes within a game round so how does this work?

After all of the matches on a single day have have been completed and before the next day’s matches start, you can make changes to your starting 11 by substituting in any of the players from your bench that haven’t yet played.

This gives you the potential to maximise the number of points your squad picks up but it’s important to remember that you will lose the points that have already been accumulated for any player that you decide to replace. The incoming player’s score will then count towards your game round total instead.

The same rule applies for your Captain unless he was sent off in a previous game within the round, in which case he cannot be replaced. However, if you do opt to change your capatin, you lose the initial double points that he earned and replace it with double the number of points that your substitute captain accrues.

Substitutions cannot be cancelled once they are confirmed and you simply click on a player to see the remove player/substitute options.

You are entitled to use all of the substitutes on your bench, not just the standard 3, like in a normal soccer match but bear in mind that no automatic substitutions will be made if you opt to make substitutions or change your captain.

If no manager substitutions or captain changes have made, automatic substitutions will kick in at the end of the game round, once all of the fixtures for that round have finished. So, for example, if your starting goalkeeper played no part in the round, he would be replaced by the goalkeeper from your bench.

Outfield substitues can be prioritised and they will be used according to any preferences you set so long as ‘valid formations’ rules remian adhered to.

Substitution priorities can be changed on the ‘My Team‘ page.

Pro Tip – Select substitutes that play in fixtures that are scheduled to take place on the latter dates of a game round whenever possible

Game round deadlines and transfers

Now before making transfers it’s important to know exactly when the deadline (cut-off point) is for each round of FIFA fantasy. Deadlines are set at the time of kick-off of the first match of in a round.

Unlimited transfers are allowed until the first deadline and between the end of the group stage and the start of the ’round of 16′. Once the group stage begins only one free transfer can be made per round. Unused transfers will be forfeited in the next round. Additional transfers can be made but 4 points will be deducted from your score for every additional transfer made.

So to summarise:

Now it’s time for some tips on a few of the other features you need to know about.

The Wildcard

When you activate your Wildcard, you are allowed to make unlimited transfers for a game round. It can be used only once during the tournament amd must be played prior to the start of the game round by selecting the ‘Play Wildcard’ option but this button will only become visible when you make at least one additional transfer on top of the free one.

You must still make sure that you remain within the specified budget and the wildcard can not be cancelled once activated so think carefully about which round you really want to use it in.

The Maximum Captain Booster

 The ‘booster’ chip must be played prior to the start of the respective Round and can be used only once during the tournament.

It effectively makes the highest scoring player from your final playing 11 in the game round captain for that particular round only. It can offer some surprise returns if a makeweight was to score heavily for example.

The Bench Boost

When you play this chip. the points of all 15 players are counted for the round in which it is played. Again this chip must be played prior to the start of the respective round and can only be used once during the tournament.

McDonald’s FIFA World Cup Fantasy Scoring

During the tournament, your selected players will be earn points based on their match performances. The criteria for scoring is shown below:

Kindly note that Extra-time events do count but penalty shoot-outs do not, while a clean sheet is only awarded for not conceding a goal whilst on the pitch and playing a minimum of 60 minutes.

Also, if a player receives a red card, they will continue to be penalised for goals conceded by their team and red card deductions include points deducted for any yellow cards issued to the same player.

There is plenty more as well – you can create or join leagues and there are also ‘Achievement’ badges waiting to be unlocked!

McDonald’s FIFA World Cup Fantasy gets under way on the 14th June – if you need additional tips make sure that you reference our World Cup Cheatsheet and familiarise yourself with the likely penalty takers for each of the 32 nations taking part.

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