The chat had eleven people in it and about four opinions. Every fortnight we had the same argument, and every fortnight it died in the same place: someone half-remembered a number, someone else half-remembered a different one, and we all went to bed no wiser.
I started keeping a spreadsheet. It was, I was told repeatedly, unreadable. But it settled things, and I noticed the arguments it settled did not come back — while the ones it could not reach came back every single time.
The thing I actually wanted
Not a stats site. There are excellent ones and I read them like everybody else. What I wanted was for the number to arrive in the middle of the argument, while the argument was still warm, without anyone having to leave and come back.
That is the whole idea behind the commands. You are mid-sentence, you type four characters, and the thing you were reaching for is in the room for everyone. No tab, no screenshot, no ten minute gap during which everyone loses interest.
And then the line-ups
The other argument that never resolves is the shape. Everybody has one. Nobody can test one. So the simulator exists to let your back three be wrong in public, quickly, with a scoreline attached.
It has been wrong about mine twice this season. I have not changed my mind, but I have stopped bringing it up on Sundays.
That is the entire pitch. Rooms to argue in, numbers that turn up on time, and a way to play out the thing you are certain about. Everything else here is scaffolding around those three.