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Each of the World Football (Soccer) Book fantasy games is based on the 2009-10 English Premier League, Spanish La Liga, Italian Serie A, German Bundesliga and French Ligue 1 Orange seasons — or in the case of the European Super League, a combination of those leagues. Players will score points based on league games played over the season.

The game will start from matches played 15th August 2009 and will run through to the final matches played at the end May 2010.

The biggest difference between this year's competition and those of past years is that you will able to cash in your points earned for portions of exclusive merchandise offered by World Football Book.

How to Play

All of the World Football (Soccer) Book games are free to play. You may only enter 1 team per league and you must be a member of the service to play. To enter a team you must use your budget of €140 million to select a squad of 11 starting players, plus 4 bench players and a manager.

Your bench players can be an extra Goalkeeper, Midfielder, Defender or Striker. You can swap these around within your team without using up your allocated transfers, as long as you stick to your original chosen formation, and each of the 15 players on your final squad will earn you the corresponding fantasy points along with the manager you have selected.

You have Monday through Friday in any league to make transfers and only the 11 players and manager named in your team that weekend will earn you fantasy points for those games involved. Important note: Up until 16th August 2009, there is a transfer window — which means you can make changes to your team without using any of the four monthly allocated transfers. All transfers made after the window closes will be taken from your allocation for the month specified.

All teams which are complete when the transfer window closes — yet have not been submitted — will not be automatically submitted by this service. Any team incomplete at this deadline must manually submit their teams, and will not score points until they do so. Teams will not score points until the next matches after they are submitted.

You may register teams at any time before or during the season. Any teams registered once the season has started will only score points from the date the team is submitted.

How to pick your team

You can select your fantasy football team(s) from the top players in the English Premier League, Spanish La Liga, Italian Serie A, German Bundesliga and French Ligue 1 Orange leagues. You will receive a budget of €140 million with which to build your team.

The formation you pick will decide the shape of your squad, your tactics and how your budget is spent. Choose your formation carefully as you cannot change it once you have submitted your team. You will need to buy a manager and 15 players. Some of the key strategies to consider are: players who are in the starting line-up with consistency, overall team depth, players who are set-piece specialists and players who do not lose the plot by getting high numbers of yellow and red cards.

How points are accumulated

In the case of managers, their points reflect the quality of their teams and they are usually top-five defensively. For each win they earn your squad 5 points, a draw is 2 points and a loss is -2 points. With players the calculations are more individual-focused, so buy with an eye towards goal scorers and clean sheets.

	Goal Scored	Goal Conceded	Clean Sheet
Keeper	+7 pts	-1,-2 pts *	+2 pts
Defence	+5 pts	-1 pt	+1 pt
Midfield	+4 pts	n/a	n/a
Striker	+3 pts	n/a	n/a

* Goalkeepers are subtracted one point for every goal allowed up to two goals. For instance, if a keeper surrenders three or more goals he is assessed a two point penalty for each instance. There are no exceptions for own-goals or goals surrendered due to penalty kick or indirect free-kicks.

Additional Point Considerations

Yellow Card: -3 points
Red Card: -10 points (two yellow cards meet the standard 10 point deduction)
Played Full Game: +2 points (90 minutes and not substituted)
Played AET Game: +3 points (120 minutes and not substituted)
Substituted: 0 points
Win: +2 points
Draw: +1 point
Loss: 0 points

The only results used for the game are those reported by key news agencies. If any decision is reversed from what was initially reported World Football (Soccer) Book will not amend the points already applied. Goals scored either by means of open play or by manner of a penalty shot are equally considered - meaning - there is no deduction in point value for penalty kicks.

Transfers and Deadlines

All teams will receive 4 transfers every calendar month. Transfers will be allocated at the start of each month and must be used during that month — any unused transfers will not be carried over to the following month and you will lose them. An open transfer window remains in place through 16th August 2009. Transfers may be made until this date without affecting your allocation of 4 monthly player exchanges.

Players will only score points during the time and date that they have been "locked" into your team. Transfers are only allowed Monday through Friday to compensate for different league start days and times. World Football (Soccer) Book will not automatically "lock" completed rosters of 16 players and manager, nor will it entertain discussion about times of transfer, or backdate points for any reason.

Always make sure that your changes are complete, you have 15 players and 1 manager and that your squad is "locked" to avoid mistakes in point calculation.