NFL offseason? Run your office pool on soccer

The Premier League season starts in mid-August — right as NFL preseason wraps up — and finishes in May, three months before your football pool kicks off again. Run both and your group gets about eleven months of weekly picks with barely a gap.

It's the exact game your office already knows: pick one team a week, win and you advance, and you can't use the same team twice. The only thing that changes is the league — 20 clubs, most matches on Saturday and Sunday mornings US time, which slots neatly in before the NFL Sunday slate.

• One pick a week, no repeats. Same rule, same strategy headache — burning a powerhouse early still haunts you later.
• Survive and advance. The win-only rule most soccer pools use is the same sudden-death format as an NFL survivor pool.
• The trash talk. A survivor pool is really a group chat with a leaderboard. That carries over unchanged.
• Entry fee optional. Play for a prize like your NFL pool, or keep it free for bragging rights — the format works either way.

• Draws exist. About a quarter of soccer matches end level, and a draw is not a win. Most pools play win-only — pick a team that draws and you're out. Agree this rule before week one; it's the number-one source of arguments.
• 20 teams, not 32. The no-repeat rule bites sooner, so saving big clubs (Arsenal, Manchester City, Liverpool) for tough weeks matters more.
• A 38-week season. Roughly double the NFL slate. Most office pools crown a winner long before May — and if everyone flames out, the last survivors split the pot.
• Occasional midweek rounds. Cup competitions shuffle some fixtures to Tuesday or Wednesday. Deadlines adjust automatically, but it keeps the chat lively.

You don't need anyone who "knows soccer." The whole point of survivor is that you're picking winners, not players — anyone can look at a fixture list and pick a favorite.

Set up takes about five minutes: create the league, pick the win-only rule, share the invite link. Fixtures, deadlines, eliminations and the leaderboard are all handled for you, and there's a host kit with copy-and-paste invite messages written for exactly this pitch.

• Home favorites are your bread and butter. Home advantage is strong in the Premier League — the classic survivor pick is a strong side at home to a struggling visitor.
• Don't burn the giants early. Manchester City at home to a promoted club in week one is wasted ammo.
• Watch for European weeks. Big clubs rotate their squads around midweek Champions League games. Check who's actually playing before locking in.

Every week we publish the safest picks ranked by win chance — the fastest way for a soccer beginner to make a smart pick. More detail in the soccer survivor pool guide.