We are a couple of weeks into the 2023/24 season, but I still want to put my goals and strategies to achieve them down on paper. The hope is this helps me to focus my plans and use my gallery as efficiently as possible. But that doesn’t mean the strategies are set in stone – I will review how things are going every couple of months and adjust as needed. I’ll post some reviews periodically to keep me accountable to these goals.

Goals for the Season

SO5 Goals

• 2/3 hit rate for Limited thresholds – I got off to a slow start at Cap 240, but at the end of last season but won 6 of 9 to end the season. I’m looking to keep up that form over the season.
• Record a 450 point score in a non-Amateur competition – My highest non-common score to date is 394 in MLS Pro. With the new fitness boost coming, I’m going to aim for a big jump in peak score.
• Win a Star Limited card – This one might be a bit optimistic, there aren’t many Star Limited cards on offer each game week and there is a lot of competition. My best reward to date is a Tier 3 (or old Tier 2) – so even getting Tier 1’s would be a great result.
• Win 3 rare cards – any tier will do here, I’d like to start building towards playing Cap 240 Rare. Winning three might be asking a bit much!

Other Goals

• Outside of elite cards, do a better job of taking profit when it’s there – this is something I’ve struggled with since joining Sorare I hold cards too long and miss out on decent profit margins.
• Add midweek and international utility to the gallery – in particular I’m shy of a goalkeeper for international game weeks.
• Add some cards with summer utility – at least one elite stack, possibly some further cards to compete for thresholds.
• Trim down some of the low-end cards in the gallery – there’s a fair few cards in my gallery that are mostly useless, I’d like to clear them out and bring in some card(s) that are usable.

SO5 Strategy

All Star and Champion Europe

I’ve grouped these two competitions together because both feature extended ETH pay-outs beyond the podium. Because of that these two will be my priority line-ups in most weekend gameweeks. As a result my elite cards and those with the best potential for big scores will be used in these line-ups. If my gallery is looking particularly week in a given gameweek, I’ll focus on a single strong line-up in All-Star rather than spreading the quality across both competitions.

For All-Star this will generally be based around a core of Celtic players, at times it will be a full stack but it may also have other strong players mixed in depending on the gameweek.

In Champion Europe it’s a similar approach, based on a Newcastle United stack with a more limited number of replacements available in my gallery.

Cap 240 Limited

My focus in this competition will purely be on achieving threshold payouts, any card rewards will just be a bonus on top. As a result I will be looking to use players with reliable splits in scoring home/away and positive match-ups. The focus will be on predictability of positive returns on L15 cost and not on the potential for the peak scores that would be needed for high rewards. My gallery is heavily focussed on the Scottish Premiership and my line-ups will mostly be based around those .

Cap 220 Limited

Cap 220 Limited is going to be held separate from the rest of my gallery. As I discussed previously the strategy is to play the competition on a budget as a DFS alternative. I am starting with a £30 budget and will trade in and out of cards on a weekly basis to attempt to win card rewards. It should be a fun scouting challenge and I’m aiming for a 100% ROI between prizes won and profit/loss from buying and selling cards. With the limited budget for trading this will be focussed on weekend game weeks. This is one I will be reviewing on a monthly basis, especially with the changes in scoring coming in September.

Cap 220 Rare

I have talked about my strategy for this competition in more detail than I’ll go into here. The core concept is to focus on a partial stack from a weaker side that has the potential for peak scores together. Then, I’ll squeeze the line-up inside the cap by adding one further rare outfielder and a limited goalkeeper. If I like the match-ups for the four rare cards, this team will take priority on selecting the limited goalkeeper. I’m hoping to win rare rewards from. However, there will be a big focus on taking profit from these rare cards. I’m looking for low scoring players to get under the cap, so if they have a good run I’ll be looking to take some profit and find new lower scoring players that give more flexibility in selecting a goalkeeper.

The Leftovers

The remaining competitions won’t be prioritised for me, but may be filled out from the remaining players in my gallery. Mostly, that will be entering into Cap 270 and Challenger Europe limited over the winter. If I have some success over the next couple of months, I may be able to add enough strong performers to compete in these competitions a bit more effectively.

Under 23 currently isn’t possible with my gallery as I lack a goalkeeper. At this point I think I’ll get better returns from my cash to invest in older cards than to force a U23 line-up. My stronger performers are mostly too old for U23, so any U23 line-up would be very much a compromise without a lot of investment across all 5 positions.

If you haven’t signed up to Sorare and fancy giving it a go, sign up via this referral link and earn a free limited card when you collect five cards via New Card Auctions.