The history of fantasy sports dates back to an era without the internet. Wilfred Wilken Bach devised fantasy golf in the late 1950s with players selected from a team of pro golf players and the winner was selected with the lowest number of strokes. Wilken Bach was also credited for creating fantasy football in 1962.
The advent of the Internet in the 1990s ushered in offerings on American online platforms. CDM Fantasy Sports, SportsLine and Prime Sports together formed the first industry body called the Fantasy Sports and Gaming Association in 1998. The transition from fantasy season leagues to daily fantasy sports led to the next boom across the world. While fantasy sports was existent in Europe in the 2000s, the boom came in post-2016. India jumped on the fantasy sports bandwagon in 2001 when Star Sports and ESPN launched Super Selector.
The contemporary fantasy sports version was created by Daniel Okrent in the 1980s with baseball. He was the founder of Rotisserie League Baseball. The members of Rotisserie League Baseball would draft virtual teams from a list of active players, following the players’ performance to score themselves at the end of the season.
The first fantasy sports platform, Dream11, was launched in 2008. The fantasy sports platforms saw different models spanning from ad-driven models to freemium over the last decade. The verdicts of Punjab and Haryana high courts and subsequently, the Supreme Court presented the online skill gaming with legitimacy to grow, attract investors and users.
Federation of Indian Fantasy Sports (FIFS) was established in 2017 to represent the industry and creating a self-regulatory framework. Technological developments contributed to the boom of fantasy sports with the boom of smartphones as well as 4G network. As per industry estimates, India is the biggest fantasy sports market with approximately 13 crore users which is higher in comparison to USA where the format originated from.
If you're a Gabriel owner then now could be a good time to move him on, but there is a chance he could start Arsenal's home game against Fulham in gameweek 3 with Oleksandr Zinchenko potentially fit to resume his role on the left and Takehiro Tomiyasu suspended after his red card against Crystal Palace.
Personally I would sell Gabriel because I want someone in my team who is a guaranteed starter every week and I don't think you can say that about him at the moment.
Gabriel for Saliba is an easy swap but it will now cost you £0.2m with Saliba up to £5.1m and Gabriel dropping to £4.9m.
I also still own John Stones but he's out for the foreseeable future so that's my priority transfer this week and there are plenty of options to replace him.
Ruben Dias (£5.5m) is probably the safest bet if you want to bring in a Man City defender, although Kyle Walker and Manuel Akanji have started both Premier League games this season, as well as the Uefa Super Cup game against Sevilla
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