The Auction

Ten titans of fantasy league power gathered together in the luxury of the Jug and Jester's beer yard garden to do battle and carve up the cream of the Premiership between them. A full complement of managers meant there was no need for the auction to be sullied by having girls bid for players - any female presence was purely decorative.

The early pace was furious, with managers spunking money like there was no tomorrow. Seemingly especially eager to get back to his cement was Tall Mark, who presumably thought that two players would be plenty enough for the long, gruelling season ahead. Once most managers realised they'd have to buy 11 players with 9 million quid, things calmed down a bit, allowing me to get Ruud van Nistlerooy for the absolute-bargain-of-the-year-until-Man-Utd-buy Michael-Owen-tomorrow price of £9.5m.

Other moments of note were Tim's over-enthusiastic bid of £10m for Freddie 'pants model' Lyungbirg Liyoonburg Ljungberg and Dave getting lumbered with Everton refusenik Tim Cahill for £6m after a plan to stitch up Lozza went very wrong indeed after Loz showed little interest in buying the Australian (given that he turned down a new contract and may be out the door).

At the time of writing, Tall Mark still needs to trawl through the free agents for a few more players, so I shall defer criticising analysing everyone's team until later in the week.

Comments etc are encouraged.