Six Degrees
Six Degrees gives you two famous players who never played together, often from different countries and different decades, and asks you to join them up. The ball starts with the first player. Name anyone who played alongside him at the same club in the same season and the ball passes to that player; then name one of his teammates, and so on, until the ball reaches someone who played with the second player and you can name him to finish.
Every puzzle has a par, the fewest steps it can be done in, worked out in advance using only players with a hundred or more league appearances. Finish at par or better for three stars, one over for two, two over for one. A name that was never a teammate of the player with the ball is a yellow card, and three yellows end the round, so it pays to be sure before you pass.
How to play
- You get two famous players. The ball starts with the first; name anyone who played alongside him in the same club and season.
- Keep passing, one teammate at a time, and finish by naming the second player when the ball is with one of his teammates.
- Par is the fewest steps possible. A wrong name is a yellow card, and the third sends you off.
From the coachWork from both ends: think about who the second player played with, then find a way to one of them.
Where to start
Read both names and think about the second player first. Where did he play, and in which seasons? Who were the famous names in those dressing rooms? That list is your target, because the last pass has to come from one of them. Then look at the first player and ask which of his teammates went on to play anywhere near those clubs or those years.
Expect to need a step or two more than par the first time. That is normal: par is set by a computer that knows every squad, and your first chain will wander through the players you know best. Use the back pass freely to try another route, and use the hint if you are stuck, because it shows the initials of the next player on a par route from wherever you are.
How to get better at Six Degrees
Look for the travellers. The players who make chains short are the ones who moved a lot: a striker with eight clubs in four countries, a goalkeeper who spent his thirties as a back-up across Europe, a manager's favourite who followed him from job to job. One of them in the middle of your chain can bridge two leagues and two decades in a single pass, which is usually how par is made.
Use the big clubs as hubs. A great club's dressing room in any season holds twenty-five players, and over a decade it holds most of a generation, so if your first player ever played for one of them, the second player is often only a step or two from someone in the same building. Real Madrid, Barcelona, Juventus, the Milan clubs, Bayern and the English giants all connect huge parts of the football world.
Be certain before you pass to a name that ends the round. Yellow cards are not handed out for slow play, only for wrong links, and the most common one is a pair who were at the same club in different seasons. If you remember two players at a club but not whether they overlapped, find a name you are sure of instead. A safe extra step costs a star; a third yellow costs the round.
Where rounds get lost
- Same club, different seasons — Two players who wore the same shirt years apart were never teammates. This is the yellow card almost everyone picks up first, so check that their time at the club overlapped.
- Racing towards the famous names — The best links are rarely the stars. A squad player who moved between the right two clubs at the right time usually gets you closer than a superstar who stayed in one place.
- Never stepping back — A chain that has drifted into the wrong league will not come back on its own. Taking passes back is free, so return to the last useful player and try a different direction.
Common questions
- What counts as a teammate in Six Degrees?
- Two players who both made a league appearance for the same club in the same season, in the leagues we cover. Cup games and international teams do not count, and two loan spells in the same season at the same club do.
- How is par worked out?
- Before a puzzle is published, a computer finds the shortest chain between the two players using only links who made a hundred or more league appearances. So par is always reachable with names a fan could know, and every puzzle has at least one route at par.
- What happens if I name someone who was never his teammate?
- You get a yellow card and the ball stays where it was. Three yellows and you are sent off, and the round ends. Repeating a player already in the chain, or a surname that matches two people, costs nothing.
- Can I take a pass back?
- Yes, as often as you like and for free. A detour still counts against par only if you finish with it, so if you have wandered off towards the wrong league, step back to the last player who was helping and try another way.
It’s you if you can tell anyone how Alan Shearer is connected to Kylian Mbappé, and you enjoy proving it.