It is said that the best ideas are ones that are thought about meticulously; planned out from every angle and every major flaw in that original idea worked out long before implementation. The Predicta League drops it’s trousers and gleefully pisses all over that notion.

On the night of August 9th 2007, just 13 hours before the 2007/08 Premiership season was due to begin, Lucas Pollard, Martin Capewell and Rob Hodgetts were discussing the oncoming season with a sense of child-like excitement. As the conversation grew and each club’s fate was spoken of, Martin voiced the idea of predicting what the scores would be in tomorrow’s games and then seeing who got the closest. While this seemed like a brilliant idea Rob and Martin decided that a scoring system would be needed to see who was the closest in there predictions. As if by magic, Martin came up with one on the spot that was the right mixture of simple/genius, that led the two of them to not only think of predicting tomorrow’s games, but possibly predicting the entire season. Lucas, who hadn’t been paying attention as he was thinking of how his life would be different if he were an octopus (he came to the conclusion that it would be, but not by much), realised that Martin and Bob were looking at him. After blindly agreeing to whatever it was they had said he refocused, listened to the discussion and joined in animatedly from then on. The League had it’s first 3 members, but it was felt that a 4th member was needed to add a balance, so it was decided that Gary “Vinny” Capewell (who wasn’t present at the time) would complete the group, and while he was given no choice in the matter, it was later discovered that he was happy to be involved. The only thing that remained was for this group to have a name, one that implied dignity but was also welcoming, a name that said “Yes we’re great, but you can still be our friend”. That was when Lucas uttered the five words that changed the course of history and took the human race from it’s small insignificant existence and thrust it forward so that it could stand on a par with Zeus himself - “How About The Predicta League?”.

While it was originally feared that interest would be lost after a few weeks, the exact opposite happened and interest among the “Core Four” (as they had come to be known) only got more intense. In fact it seemed as though their very lives revolved around the League; time spent not predicting was spent talking about predicting. It was because of this new found obsession that on September 18th 2007, local computer whizz and all around nice guy Lucas debuted The Predicta League website. Whist the website was crude and basically just for displaying information that was already available to the members, it opened The Predicta League up to the world and gave it a global presence. Averaging over 5 hits a month since its inception, The Predicta League Website has become the focal point of the League and to a much smaller extent the internet itself.

The League had begun to take shape with Lucas creating what would prove to be an uncatchable lead, and Vinny so far behind in last place that he was in danger of being lapped. The real battle was taking place between Bob and Martin for who would secure 2nd place. Both had their victories and both suffered losses. A major turning point came in the introduction of the ill fated bonus week, where each Predictor chose a selected Championship fixture to predict that would be worth double points. Martin scored a respectable 4 points but Bob nailed it and collected the first ‘10 pointer’ in Predicta League history. This proved to be a fatal blow to Martin’s hopes of finishing 2nd and despite a streak which saw him win the final five weeks of the season, Bob was able to hold off Martin and claim the silver medal.

With the first season drawn to a close all four members were unanimous in feeling that The Predicta League had been a huge success. Whilst their memories kept the members warm for a while, the off season began to prove difficult, with withdrawal symptoms have varying effects on each Predictor. One poor soul even had to travel to a monastery in Tibet to calm his Predicta cravings. After what felt like years, the new League was about to begin. What would this new season hold? Even our team of hardened Predictors couldn’t tell, but one thing was for sure - the future of The Predicta League was brighter than the brightest of stars.