How a Wet Grass pool works
A group picks a real tournament, divides it up between them, and then the real results decide who wins. No money, no spreadsheet, no commissioner staying up late with a calculator.
Everybody starts from the same tournament
A pool is built on a competition — a World Cup, or a Premier League season. That choice fixes what there is to own: the clubs in it, the players in it, and the fixtures that will eventually decide everything. Nobody is drafting an abstract player pool; you are dividing up an actual tournament that is about to be played.
Then you divide it up — two ways
Both formats happen live, with everybody in the room at once. That is the point of the evening.
Simple and familiar. Everyone takes turns picking, and the order reverses each round — if you pick first in round one, you pick last in round two. That is the “snake”: it stops the first pick from being worth too much.
Fast, low-stakes, and the right choice if half your group has never done this before.
Everyone gets an identical imaginary wallet. Assets come up one at a time as lots, and the room bids against a countdown until one is sold. Then the next one opens.
The difference from a draft is that anybody can own anything — nothing is out of reach because of where you sat. You just have to be willing to pay, and every dollar you spend is a dollar you cannot spend later.
This is the reason the site exists.
One wallet, one board
Most fantasy games keep clubs and players in separate competitions. A Wet Grass auction puts them on the same board, bought with the same money. Arsenal and a striker are two things you cannot both afford, so every bid is a genuine decision rather than a slot to fill.
It also means there are no minimums telling you what to build. Spend nearly everything on two strong clubs, or skip clubs entirely and buy six players. Both are legal, and both have lost leagues before.
You have $800. Arsenal sells for $147, so you have $653 left and the rest of the board still to come. The manager who let Arsenal go now has more money than you for every lot after it — which is exactly the bet they made.
Then it scores itself
Nobody enters results. Finished matches are read automatically from the official box scores, and your total updates. Here is the entire scoring system for a season pool:
| What happens | Points | Who it counts for |
|---|---|---|
| Your club wins a match | +3 | The club's owner |
| Your club draws | +1 | The club's owner |
| Your player scores a goal | +1 | The player's owner |
| Your player makes an assist | +0.5 | The player's owner |
| Your keeper keeps a clean sheet | +1 | The keeper's owner |
| Your keeper concedes three or more | −1 | The keeper's owner |
A keeper is the only asset that can lose you points, and he is scored on his own matches rather than his club's — a shutout he watched from the bench is worth nothing. Clubs score the league points from the result, which is simply the real table.
Tap any club or player in your league to see the match-by-match breakdown: what they did, and exactly how many points it was worth.
Glossary
- Lot
- One club or player being auctioned right now.
- Nomination
- Choosing which asset comes up for auction next. It rotates around the room.
- Unified board
- Clubs and players auctioned together, from one budget.
- Snake draft
- Turn-based picking where the order reverses every round.
- Clean sheet
- A match in which a goalkeeper concedes no goals.
- Commissioner
- Whoever set the league up. They can start the draft and fix mistakes.
- Matchweek
- One full round of fixtures — every club plays once.
- Mock
- A practice draft or auction against the computer. Nothing is saved.
Questions people actually ask
Is this gambling?
No. There is no buy-in, no prize, no payout and no way to deposit anything. The auction budget is imaginary points, the same way Monopoly money is. Nothing on this site can cost or win you money.
Is it free?
Yes, entirely, and there has never been a paying customer. It is a hobby project run by one person because his own league needed it.
Do I need an account to try it?
No. You can play a full mock draft or auction against AI managers from the home page without signing up or giving an email address. An account is only needed to join a league with real people, because we have to know which seat is yours.
How many people do I need?
Anywhere from four to twelve works well. Somewhere around eight to ten is the sweet spot for an auction — enough competition that good assets get expensive, few enough that nobody is waiting long between turns.
What if someone can't make the draft?
They get autodrafted. The computer takes the best available asset when their clock runs out, so an absent manager still ends up with a squad and the room keeps moving. It is not as good as turning up, which is rather the point.
How long does a draft take?
An auction for a season pool runs about an hour with nine managers. A snake draft is quicker — usually half that. Both are designed to be done in one sitting, with everybody on a call or in the same room.
Who can see my email address?
Nobody else in your league — they see the team name you choose. The privacy policy spells out exactly what is stored and how to have it deleted.
Try it before you organise anybody
A mock auction against the computer takes a few minutes and needs no account.