Making the step from limited to rare can be pretty hard for players on a budget. Getting a starting rare goalkeeper is pretty pricey, it’s hard to find one for under £200. The Kick-off competition offers a way to start with 1 rare, but the prize pool is very limited making it a poor competition to prioritise. Cap 220 rare is the better value first step allowing 4 rare cards to be played with one limited – removing the need for a rare GK.

The low cap provides it’s own challenges – with just a single line-up of 4 rares you can easily end up priced out of the competition if your cards have a couple of good weeks. The lower card supply makes moving in and out of rares a lot more challenging than limited. So expecting to buy and sell pieces on a weekly basis is pretty optimistic.

To make a run at Cap 220 Rare on a budget, I’m looking to build a small gallery of around 8-10 rare outfield cards. With the limited number of cards I’m looking to increase the chance of having 4 with a good match-up by playing a partial stack. I’m looking for a team that isn’t the best overall to keep the L15 averages down, but that has potential for spike weeks that can get us in the prizes. As a result there will be a lot of weeks where the line-up has no shot. But, hopefully there’ll be enough spike weeks to win a few cards.

What Scores do we Need?

Before we can decide which team to create a partial stack from, we need to understand what points we need to score to earn rewards. For this, I have looked at the scores required to earn a card and to win Cap 220 Rare on weekend game weeks. I’ve chosen to look at weekends only as I don’t think I’m likely to afford a partial stack from a team playing in European competitions.

On average we need to score 273 points to win a card in Cap 220 Rare and with one exception a score of 280 points would be enough to guarantee a reward. In terms of winning Cap 220, there’s a lot more variation in scores. On average we need 394 points to win Cap 220, but it has required as much as 442.7 points to take home the trophy.

The Partial Stack

Given the majority of Limited goalkeepers in my gallery are from the Scottish Premiership, it made sense to focus my rares there as well. This way I’ll have a few playing keeper options to choose from and hopefully one that fits within the cap nicely.

I’ve gone for a three man St Johnstone stack, mostly because I already had a Steven May card from playing the old threshold format in 2022. Having said that, I do think they fit the bill well for this strategy. They are capable of having some weeks where they win to nil, but also will lose to the top half sides regularly to keep the L15 averages at a usable level.

A 36 year-old centre back in Andy Considine isn’t type of player I would usually target for Capped competitions. However, he’s a bit of a hidden gem on Sorare with the ability to score over 60 points with AA alone on occasion. His current L15 cost is down at 37 thanks to a few negative decisives making him great value in good match-ups.

To go with him is forward Steven May and midfielder Drew Wright. Between the two of them they scored for 16 of St Johnsone’s 41 league goals and assisted 8 times. So, if St Johnstone score multiple there’s a good chance one or both will be involved!

That’s all well and good on paper, but what kinds of scores can we expect in reality?

By putting the three of them into the concept builder on Soraredata.com we can see how they have performed in the past. The graph above shows how the three played together last season. They topped the 200 point mark three times which would put us well on track for a reward. They also topped the 160 mark three times, and the 150 mark a further 6 times. All of which could win a card if our remaining two cards manage 60+ scores.

Having said that, I’m not married to using all three together. It might make sense to leave Considine out in games where we expect goals from both sides. Or just play Steven May if the other rares in the gallery have better match-ups.

Current Prices: Considine (0.0010), Wright (0.0130), May (0.0310) – Total: 0.0450

The Flex Options

To get players within the Cap we’re not going to be able to pick the strong AA scorers we would prefer in other competitions. So the focus is going to be on players that have the potential to score decisive actions in good match-ups. That means full-backs for defenders and attack minded midfielders. I’ll be staying away from forwards mainly because they tend to cost significantly more to buy than midfielders and defenders.

The Goalkeepers

As mentioned above I already have a few options in goal from the Scottish Premiership that I can choose between. At the moment St Johnstone don’t have any goalkeepers with cards on Sorare, but it will make sense to get whoever that is when the new season’s cards are released.

When I think the outfielders have a good chance at a big scores, I will be making this my priority line-up, so I’ll take the best keeper I have that fits under the cap. When the match ups look less good, such as when St Johnstone face one of the Old Firm sides, I’ll prioritise the better goalkeepers in other line-ups.

Expectations for the Season

In total the 8 rare cards in the gallery come to around 0.0810 ETH (~£120), which is about half the cost of the cheapest guaranteed starting keeper from the Scottish Premiership. With the cards I am aiming to win 3 rare cards over the course of the year. The potential is definitely there for a few more, but there are going to be weeks where the St Johnstone players do well and my other two players struggle and kill the line-up. There’s also the potential there for a couple of higher tier cards, which could provide a great return on the cost of the cards.

My plan is to give this strategy at least until the new year to see whether it is effective. Having said that, if there is big profit to be made on a card I will definitely consider taking it. Especially for the flex players, if they perform really well the could become too expensive to fit easily into the cap – so taking the profit in this case would be an easy decision. It’s a bit harder to move the pieces of the stack out as it disrupts the strategy, but if the gains are massive I will consider it.

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