A team of artificial intelligence (AI) experts from Electronics and Computer Science at the University of Southampton is challenging fantasy football managers across the world to take on their fiercely competitive machine learning algorithm.

Associate Professor Dr Sarvapali (Gopal) Ramchurn claims that his system, known as Squadguru, consistently outperforms millions of players in the popular the Fantasy Premier League game by tapping into the latest AI techniques

Last year, more than four million players around the world competed in the English Fantasy Premier League, tinkering with their squads to generate maximum points from their teams. In the game, shrewd dealings in the transfer market can make or break teams’ seasons and entrants scramble week on week to strengthen their sides as Premier Leagues stars go on and off the boil.

Squadguru has been tested on player data from previous seasons and produced teams which would have consistently ranked in the top one per cent of the Fantasy Premier League. Last season, a Squadguru generated team placed in the global top 60,000 of the game for most of the 38 gameweeks out of the millions of players.

“From Elon Musk to Stephen Hawking, everyone’s talking about AI taking over the world - is that now also true for Fantasy Football?â€? Gopal asks. “Come and take on the best AI engine for fantasy football, and see if you can beat the Squadguru!â€?

Fantasy managers can compete with Squadguru’s AI-fuelled 11 in a ‘Challenge the Squadguru’ league which is available in the free Fantasy Premier League game by entering league code 2917382-677658.

The Squadguru system was built using two steps. The first harnessed Bayesian Machine Learning techniques and five years of past football data to create and train a predictive model which forecasts the outcome of future matches and, more crucially, the performance of individual players. They next created a combinatorial optimisation algorithm which worked out the best transfers to make given the allowed budget and other constraints on teams that can be formed.

Gopal, a member of the University of Southampton’s Agents, Interaction and Complexity (AIC) research group, co-developed the algorithm with Dr Tim Matthews as part of his MSc project. This resulted in a publication at the world’s top AI conference back in 2012. Over the last five years, they have made significant improvements to the Squadguru and offered it as a free service for visitors to fantasyfootballfirst.co.uk. The system’s algorithms have been used to provide transfer advice to over 30,000 subscribers and helped optimise human teams’ performance.

“We’ve now got a robust implementation of the platform,â€? Gopal says. “The next step involves developing a mobile app to serve insights to users in real-time and allow them to do transfers automatically or on the go. We are always open to investors and we’ve had a few approaches this year.â€?

Students in Electronics and Computer Science (ECS) at the University of Southampton have demonstrated excellent satisfaction levels in National Student Survey 2017 (NSS).

Data published from the highly-esteemed assessment ranks Southampton second for overall satisfaction in Electronic and Electrical Engineering (EEE) out of all UK Higher Education Institutes.

The NSS 2017 found that 99% of EEE students and 90% of Computer Science students were satisfied or very satisfied with the overall quality of their course. These approval levels even peaked at 100% among MEng Electronic Engineering and MEng Computer Science students.

The strong NSS performance has been welcomed by senior leaders from the department and follows impressive previous results in the national survey.

Professor Paul Lewin, Head of ECS, says: “This is further confirmation that in ECS our staff provide high quality research-led education that is both intellectually challenging and more than meeting the expectations of our students. I would like to personally thank all ECS staff who have contributed to our undergraduate programmes over the last year; their continued hard work and dedication are largely responsible for this result.â€?

The National Student Survey has been conducted annually since 2005 by HEFCE and IpsosMori and asks final year undergraduates for feedback on their universities and courses. This year has seen substantial changes to the NSS, including the addition of three new sections that focus on the Student Voice, Learning Community and Learning Opportunities.

In Computer Science, the NSS 2017 found that 99% of students agreed that the IT resources and facilities provided have supported their learning well. 95% of MEng Computer Science students expressed they were satisfied or very satisfied with the teaching of their course and agreed that the course has challenged them to achieve their best work. Under Learning Opportunities, 95% of students agreed that their course has provided them with opportunities to apply what they have learnt.

In Electronic and Electrical Engineering, student responses ranked the subject second for teaching out of all UK Higher Education Institutes. 100% of MEng Electronic Engineering students were satisfied or very satisfied with the teaching of their course and agreed that staff are good at explaining things, that staff have made the subject interesting and that the course is intellectually stimulating and challenged them to achieve their best work. Electronic and Electrical Engineering students also reported that they were satisfied or very satisfied with the learning resources on their course in 93% of responses.

The excellent results in ECS correspond with high scores from students studying in Physics and Astronomy in Southampton, the other undergraduate subject area taught within the institution’s Faculty of Physical Sciences and Engineering.

Professor Bashir Al-Hashimi, Dean of Physical Sciences and Engineering, says: “I’m delighted with these results which evidence that our faculty is providing the highest quality student experience and learning. We have plans to build further on this success to the benefit of our students and staff.â€?