Magnus Carlsen plays FPL anonymously after getting 'sick of people asking about it'

Magnus Carlsen, the world's strongest chess player and an ardent fantasy sports fan, anonymously plays the Fantasy Premier League (FPL) these days. The Norwegian Super GM said he decided to go incognito on FPL because he "got sick of people asking about it all the time."

FPL is the official fantasy game of the English Premier League, with over 10 million players. It runs parallel to the Premier League season, and participants are rewarded with points based on actual player performances. Carlsen famously became World No. 1 in FPL midway into the 2019-20 season.

In an interview with Gambling Insider, Carlsen said he remains obsessed with fantasy games and plays the NBA and NFL fantasy. "My fantasy football team has not been doing so well this season. I honestly got a little bit sick of a lot of people asking about it all the time. I now play anonymously because people always check out my team and ask me about it and so on," Carlsen said.

The five-time World Chess Champion reiterated that his FPL strategy relied on stats and luck. "The fact that I've had the heights that I've had in fantasy football is mostly down to luck. I think you need a certain amount of skill to be consistently decent. But to compete against the very, very best, you also need tons of luck."

In 2019, shortly after becoming the World No. 1 in FPL, Carlsen put out a tweet: "World Chess Champion. The highest-ranked chess player in the world. Current (live) #1 Fantasy Premier League player."

But when it comes to chess, with an Elo rating of 2831, Carlsen remains the World No. 1, a position he has held since 2011. Carlsen recorded the highest-ever Elo rating of 2882 in 2014. Elo ratings are a measure of a chess player's relative skill level.