PLFantasy

Apologies to all readers but I am not going to be able to write a preview this week due to work commitments . Normal service will resume after the weekend with hopefully more time to discuss and review all the fantasy news from around the league. - Chris -

Apologies for the lateness of the post this week, its been really tough to free time to write it so I'm afraid its a bit condensed. Hopefully be back to normal in a week or two. Gameweek 10 Fixtures Wolves v Aston Villa Birmingham v Sunderland Burnley v Wigan Hull City v Portsmouth Tottenham v Stoke City Chelsea v Blackburn Bolton v Everton Liverpool v Man Utd Man City v Fulham West Ham v Arsenal Two very appealing fantasy fixtures see Chelsea entertain Blackburn (3.67 GPG conceded) and Arsenal travelling to a struggling West Ham team (2.33 GPG conceded). A couple of clean sheet plays also look good with Spurs welcoming Stoke (0.50 GPG scored) and City getting Fulham (1.00 GPG scored). Clean Sheet Rankings 1. Chelsea 2. Aston Villa 3. Tottenham 4. Man City 5. Sunderland You have to love Chelsea this week in every facet of their game as they welcome a Blackburn side averaging just a goal a game on the road this season. Villa are statistically an ever stronger pick as they average ju...

The Juice scored a solid 53 points this week, hindered somewhat by the Benitez-like blunder of benching not just James Collins (10 points) but also Michael Turner (6), instead favouring Cole (0) and Assou Ekotto (1) at the back. A look down my local league showed a sight familiar from last year, but unexpected at this early juncture: consistency. Now this can mean one of two things: either everyone is suddenly making great individual decisions each week, or teams are starting to merge and its becoming harder to differentiate yourself. I think we can safely say that option A is the likely truth. Up front, Drogba (32%), Bent (31%) and Torres (30%) have all cracked the 30% ownership barrier along with Fabregas (31%) and Sorensen (42%). Gerrard (28%) could well be there on return from injury while the likes of Shawcross (27%) Lennon (26%) are also knocking on the door. Injuries to Rooney, Torres and Gerrard along with the continuing struggles of Lampard could well see ownership of Drogba a...

Another interesting week is in the books, which seemed to follow the recent trends of striker goals and a clear scarcity of clean sheets. Drogba, Van Persie and Bent ( sort of ) all managed to find the back of the net, while the fortunes of the other big strikers were much worse with Torres and Rooney missing through injury, and Defoe being sent off against former club Portsmouth (having scored earlier in the day). Only Sunderland and Fulham managed clean sheets despite good prospects for the likes of Arsenal, Everton and United. It is becoming clear that until one of the big five or six sides can sustain a run of clean sheets the best strategy is to load up on mid price/cheap defenders and play them based on matchup. Transfer Watch Defoe owners will likely want to move early in the week as the Spurs striker is set to miss the next two gameweeks after his suspension. His price has already fallen in the past couple of weeks due to a run of three games without a goal. At the time of wr...

Apologies for not getting this out sooner. I hope no bad decisions were based on a lack of decent information. Injury roundup from around the league: Gerrard and Torres are both confirmed to be out ( Football 365 ). For weekly replacements I still like the Arsenal pair of Fabregas and Van Persie. I also really like Adebayor's matchup against Wigan and he is a long term buy so might be a good fir for Torres owners. Rooney is confirmed as being out ( Football365 ). With his upcoming fixtures, Rooney is a sell rather than bench player and as with Torres I'd go with Van Persie or Adebayor to replace him. Van der Sar is definitely back which spells the end of Ben Foster ( Football365 ). I considered replacements earlier in the week here . Michael Ballack will miss the Villa game after a tackle from teammate Yuri Zhirkov while on international duty ( BBC ). Is there anyone I tipped this week and haven't cursed! Eduardo is out for the Gunners ( BBC ) Lescott, Toure, Bellamy and De...

A few fantasy owners (including me) have grown increasingly frustrated by the 8m midfield talent on offer, namely Wright-Phillips, Young, Cahill and Benayoun. Aside from Lennon (who himself is out of form a bit) no players in this price bracket have been consistent with huge weeks (Benayoun week 5) followed by several weeks of mediocre production. Another option, held by just 5% of owners, is Michael Ballack (8.0) who traditionally has been an inconsistent fantasy performer during his time at Chelsea due to rotation and injury. This year though, Ballack has missed just one game (week 7) and has contributed 36 points in the other 7 games. His three goals are encouraging while his lack of assists (zero) does concern me a bit. I like Ballack to score 10 goals for the season, adding a couple of assists and bonus points along the way. This kind of production isn't outstanding for a 8m midfielder but so long as he is playing every week he should average out at about 6 points, which is be...

I'm jumping the gun a bit here as I'm sure the inevitable international injury bug will bite someone midweek but I wanted to give everyone a jump on the upcoming week as we look to come out strong from our week off. Four of the big five teams have good looking fixtures and with double gameweeks on the horizon , the next few weeks could be very important. Gameweek 9 Fixtures Aston Villa v Chelsea Arsenal v Birmingham Everton v Wolves Man Utd v Bolton Portsmouth v Tottenham Stoke City v West Ham Sunderland v Liverpool Blackburn v Burnley Wigan v Man City Fulham v Hull City United are the pick of the week as they welcome a Bolton side that have not won at Old Trafford in their last 6 attempts, conceding 18 goals in those losses. Historically, Rooney has done pretty well against Bolton and I like him this week should he bounce back from the calf strain that kept him out for England. The United defense also looks like strong selection to coincide with the probable return of Edwin v...

Welcome back fantasy fans, I hope everyone didn't suffer through the bye week too much (I hate Saturday afternoon at 3pm when there are no Premier League games). Nothing good can come of these international games and the best outcome is that no-one gets injured. A few players of note have not been so lucky though most look likely to avoid missing out this week: Fernando Torres Spain coach Del Bosque: "I told him (Benitez) that we will treat Torres as if he was at Liverpool. If the boy is well and wants to play, he will play against Bosnia. And if he has any problem, he will not play. It's that simple."Liverpool play three fairly tricky games through week 11 so it might be worth employing your 11.5m elsewhere. Adebayor and Van Persie have the best fixtures of the big five strikers in the next 6 games, with Liverpool being by far the worst. Steve Gerrard The Liverpool captain is said to be close to fitness for Wednesday's games against Belarus so barring any furthe...

With Van der Sar's return to the reserves tonight, and Foster's continued struggle between the posts for the first team, it is likely that the English World Cup hopeful will see the end of his extended run and be replaced for gameweek 9 after the international break. At 5m he has provided decent fantasy value over the past 8 weeks and is currently held by 8% of fantasy managers. We are not seeing a massive amount of selling yet so there is no rush to act, but his owners will want to move him on assuming Van der Sar proves his fitness as 5m is too much for a 'keeper to warm your bench. The question is therefore who to get to replace him. I am not a fan of expensive keepers as 'save' points are the great equaliser that makes 'keepers from lower teams almost as valuable as the big boys. Add to that the strong performances of Birmingham, Burnley (at home) and Stoke this year and bargains can clearly be found. Last season 11 'keepers were within 36 points of ea...

Plenty of goals this week with only one clean sheet going into Monday's clash at Villa Park. The game of the weekend came at the Emirates with Arsenal hitting 6 against Blackburn, who themselves looked useful in the first half. Fabregas was incredible (getting a goal, 4 assists and 3 bonus points) and that performance should end any doubt there was over my ranking of him in line with - if not ahead 0f - Gerrard and Lampard this season. With Van Persie able to contribute goals, assists and bonus points, he also showed his fantasy class and that he can rightfully be considered alongside the top tier of strikers in the Premier League. Prediction assessment My predictions were pretty mixed the clean sheet rankings being rendered useless by the fact that only two teams kept one, one of which was Portsmouth on the road which not many would have predicted. The other was Chelsea which I did get - much to criticism of a few readers - which really wasn't all that surprising. Chelsea ...

Pretty quiet fantasy day today despite 15 goals being scored in 5 games. Goalscorers like Yebda (0.0%), Vennegoor of Hesselink (0.3%) and Fletcher (0.5%) ensured that most teams will have failed to score too many points, as will the fact that the only clean sheet was kept by Portsmouth, on the road! The only fantasy star to register a goal for the week was the impressive Darren Bent who was also credited with a man of the match award of 3 points. Having missed out through the first 6 games, Bent now seems to have got the pundits attention having notched back-to-back clean sheets, despite the fact that Cana or Cattermole were widely praised as the dominate players in the fixture. This added scoring category makes Bent even better and the fact he went to Old Trafford and scored makes him not only a guaranteed every week play, but also a captain candidate if the matchup looks good. The biggest game in fantasy terms was Sunderland's surprise draw at Old Trafford which reaffir...

02 October 2009 (Manchester) -- Pure Juice manager Chris Glover is no stranger to controversy having ditched club captain Lampard back in week 5 and shockwaves have rocked Juice again with news that both Shaun Wright Phillips and Richard Dunne have both been sold and replaced by in-form winger Aaron Lennon and Arsenal defender/midfielder Alex Song. "I feel like both lads give us something different and will help us in the long run to rack up a higher points haul" , said Glover. "I was concerned with having Dunne and Collins from Villa and we really thought it was time to ride the Arsenal fixture list while the going is good". There's no arguing about the Lennon pickup, though some pundits are suggesting that Song is not guaranteed first team football at the Emirates and therefore looks like a risk for the Juice boss: "I think with Denilson out Song is a good prospect and we are sure he can do a job for us in the coming weeks" . Glover's decision t...

Lampard not worried by Blues' form (Football365) - Lampard isn't worried by his team's form, but fantasy owners should be worried by Frank's. Only one goal this season is a worrying total for a 12.5m player, though 4 assists in 7 games is a nice return. The great asset for midfielders though is that they earn more points per goal than strikers so assists and bonuses are unlikely to get it done and justify his lofty price. I am far from ready to write Lampard off who is still the man-to-beat as the best in fantasy, but at least for now, I will continue to say he is overpriced based on his form and Chelsea's fixtures which are up and down for the next few weeks. Walcott back in Gunners mix (Football365) - Walcott and Bendtner are back though Eduardo is out for Wenger's men. I would imagine Bendtner will remain on the bench while Walcott has a chance to start in the front 3 alongside Van Persie and Arshavin . This brings into doubt the fantasy future of...

The dust has settled from the Champions League which brings to a close a mixed midweek for English sides. Liverpool were undone by a very impressive Fiorentina side while United's win was tainted by an injury to Michael Owen , though if any fantasy manager is sticking by the former England star at 7.9m, they need more help than I can provide in the next few paragraphs. Arsenal looked okay despite leaving it late to see off Olympiakos on Tueday , while Chelsea continued a poor weak with a mundane display against minnows Apoel . With all those distractions behind us its time to focus on the fantasy week ahead, and where better to start than at Stamford Bridge where Chelsea entertain Liverpool in the fixture of the week. Gameweek 7 Fixtures Bolton v Tottenham Burnley v Birmingham Hull City v Wigan Wolves v Portsmouth Man Utd v Sunderland Arsenal v Blackburn Everton v Stoke City West Ham v Fulham Chelsea v Liverpool Aston Villa v Man City The fixture of the week is undoubtedly t...