LeagueHistory of the EFL
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The EFL was created in the early months of 2001, with the first season kicking off in July of that year. It was originally the brain child of Anthony Jones who created the league and rosters and now acts as commissioner. However there was considerable help and support (I lost count of the times where I came close to giving up on the project) from Wilfred Berkhof who now acts as match official and commissioner when Jones is away.
The motivation behind the EFL was simple - Jones and Berkhof had played in a number of esms leagues, and whilst they all had good foundations, none of them had developed as quickly as they had hoped (Jones' desire to manage Liverpool in a PBEM played a major part as well). Therefore the pair decided they wished to control the destiny of their own league and implement some of the many ideas they had. However the EFL required a starting point and so for season 1 and 2, the league borrowed heavily from two other leagues, the FPL and the WWIFL.
The EFL is based upon a fantasy European League featuring 20 of the best sides the continent has to offer (maybe one day real-life will follow fantasy...?!). The rosters were set up to be as realistic as possible, with player stats modelled in an attempt to mirror real-life players.
The EFL started of with 2 divisions of 10 teams, but was expanded in season 10. An additional 8 teams have been added with the league now structured in as a pyramid system with two sub-divisions of 10 teams feeding into the Elite division of 8.
There are two cup competitions "The Lucky Break Cup" and "The Endurance Cup". Where the Lucky Break Cup is a standard knock out competition, the Endurance Cup is based more on the champions league with two group stages to be played. And to give all teams equal changes of winning there's a skill cap on the players in the Endurance Cup as no player with a skill higher than 9 can play. In addition to this we're always looking to run small friendly tournaments based on whatever formats and rules our managers can come up with.
Over the years the EFL has made quite a few ground breaking changes to the way an esms league is run. The addition of an elaborate contract system, Bosman transfers, coaches and not in the least the modified game engine make the EFL a league where in all teams can challenge for the top spots and where all managers are constantly challenged to improve themselves and their team.
