Strategy
No league football for 11 days: keep your pool alive
Read this post in: Português
For eleven days the three leagues most pools are built on have nothing to offer. Between Monday, September 28 and Thursday, October 8 our fixture data returns zero Liga MX, LaLiga and Premier League matches. Serie A, the Bundesliga, Ligue 1 and the Champions League are empty in that window too.
That is long enough to kill a pool that has no plan, and short enough that you do not need to reinvent one.
When each league comes back
| Competition | Returns |
|---|---|
| Liga MX (Jornada 11) | October 9-11 |
| LaLiga | October 9 |
| Premier League (Matchweek 6) | October 10 |
The Premier League date is published by the league itself. The September and October international windows were merged into a single 16-day block this season, which is why the pause is longer than the usual one.
If you want the squad-level view of what call-ups do to a round, we covered that separately in what call-ups do to your pick’em pool. This piece is about the calendar itself.
What is still on the board
Plenty, as it turns out. These are the competitions with fixtures inside the window, read from our own fixture data this morning:
| Competition | Fixtures in the window |
|---|---|
| Brasileirão Série A | October 2-8 |
| Liga Profesional Argentina | October 2-6 |
| Primera A (Colombia) | September 28 - October 8 |
| Major League Soccer | October 2 and October 7 |
| Liga Nacional de Guatemala | October 3-5 |
| Liga GanaPlay (El Salvador) | September 29 - October 5 |
| Primera División Femenina (Spain) | October 3-4 |
The NFL is the other obvious board. Week 4 runs October 1-5 on the league schedule, and our own season record still reads Week 3 as current, so Week 4 is genuinely the next card to fill. We wrote up the current one in the NFL Week 3 pick’em guide.
National teams are playing as well. Mexico meets Peru on September 29, the United States on October 3 and Chile on October 6.
One thing that does not fill the gap
Formula 1. It is easy to assume the calendar covers a football pause, and this time it does not: after the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on September 26, the next race is the Singapore Grand Prix on October 11, which lands after the football is already back. If you were planning to bridge eleven days with a race weekend, there isn’t one.
How to run a pool across a pause
The gap is a format problem before it is a fixtures problem.
A single-round pool is the honest answer for most groups. One card, one result, done before anyone loses interest. Restarting after a pause is far easier than asking people to stay invested in standings that will not move for a week and a half. We compare the two lengths properly in single-round vs season-long pools.
If you already run a season-long pool, the pause is maintenance time rather than a crisis. Nothing is scored, so it is the cheapest moment in the season to fix a scoring rule everyone has been complaining about, settle a tie-break before it decides something, and add the people who asked to join in week three.
What you should not do is leave a round half-open across the break. A card that was supposed to close on September 27 and is still accepting picks on October 9 is not a pool any more. Set the lock explicitly; when picks should lock walks through the options.
Read the fixture status, not the fixture list
One caution from our own data. Of the matches scheduled inside this window, at least one MLS fixture is already flagged as postponed rather than scheduled. A fixture list tells you what was planned; the status field tells you what is actually happening.
If you build a round off a list you copied last week, you can end up with a match on the card that nobody is going to play. Check the status the day you open the round, and decide in advance what a postponed match does to the scoring. Our approach is described in how Quini works.
Frequently asked questions
Is there any Premier League football between September 28 and October 8?
No. The Premier League’s last matches before the pause were on September 19-20 and Matchweek 6 begins on October 10.
What can I actually run a pool on during the pause?
The Brasileirão, the Liga Profesional Argentina, Colombia’s Primera A, MLS and NFL Week 4 all have fixtures inside the window. Spain’s Primera División Femenina plays on October 3 and 4.
Does Formula 1 race during the break?
It does not. The Singapore Grand Prix is on October 11, after Liga MX and LaLiga have already returned.
Should I pause a season-long pool or keep it open?
Keep it open, but close the current round on its original deadline. Leaving a round open across eleven idle days is what makes groups quit.
When does Liga MX come back?
Jornada 11 is played October 9-11.
Ready to set one up? Create your pool with Quini, invite the group and let the standings update from the results.