PLFantasy

Blackburn 0-0 Stoke I really liked the Blackburn defense here (3rd ranked) though I didn't fancy Stoke (15th ranked) to join them with a clean sheet. They were no doubt assisted by the withdrawal of David Dunn after half an hour which came as a massive blow to many fantasy owners given his excellent form of late. Neil MacDonald, the stand in manager in Big Sam's absence reports that Dunn suffered from a 'tight calf' which hopefully doesn't sound too bad. Watch this space later in the week. Stoke's defense remain a solid option with Sorensen and Faye my favoured picks. Blackburn's away form is terrible (3.0 GPG conceded) so despite their useful home record (1.00 GPG) I think their defense in unusable right now. Attacking options for both sides are seriously limited, especially if Dunn's withdrawal was anything more than precautionary. At 5.5m Etherington is still good value but with a trip to the Emirates next week and a bye in week 17 I'd stay away f...

Gameweek 14 Fixtures Blackburn v Stoke City Fulham v Bolton Man City v Hull City Portsmouth v Man Utd West Ham v Burnley Wigan v Sunderland Aston Villa v To ttenham Wolves v Birmingham (Sun) Everton v Liverpool (Sun) Arsenal v Chelsea (Sun) I love the fixture list this week from both a fantasy and real life perspective, with Sunday's fixture list looking particularly tasty (not to mention ¡El SuperClásico! between Real Madrid and Barcelona later that evening). The stats suggest Villa, Everton, Fulham, City and West Ham should score goals, while common sense suggests that United should clearly be in this list (even though Portsmouth have actually been very solid at home 1.33 GPG conceded). Unfortunately some managers won't be very well placed to make changes to capitalise on these fixtures as they try to put out fires in their team with Darren Bent the latest to go down with injury, although the latest reports suggest this isn't as bad as initially feared. Meanwhile, Dr...

Okay, I'm not superstitious: I don't cross the street to avoid ladders, I'm not scared of black cats and I routinely open my umbrella inside the house. However, when you tip a player as your third best captain pick of the week , and post a message hours before the transfer deadline about not signing him in favour of a player you didn't rank in your top 5, and he goes on to score 5 goals in a game, you could forgive me for feeling slightly unlucky especially in week thirteen! I do not however think I was unlucky, as Defoe had the best matchup of the weekend which I why I rated him so highly in the first place. I decided to play the long game and City have better fixtures than Spurs over the next 5 weeks. What I failed to account for is the fact that sometimes a single fixture or gameweek is so appealing for a player that you should consider bringing a player in for that week alone. Now while Defoe's five goals were an amazing return, I don't consider Wigan to b...

After much deliberation, I am backtracking on my Defoe tip and hitching my wagon to Adebayor as the man to replace Van Persie/Drogba for this week and beyond. This week's game against Liverpool is admittedly not ideal (0.80 GPG) but the future is bright for City and their next few games include Hull (2.83 GPG) and Bolton (2.17 GPG). Most importantly though is the fact that in 8 games this year, Adebayor has either scored or provided an assist in every game but one. Granted, he hasn't had one of the landmark 16 - 20 point games that stamp his authority as a top fantasy player yet, but that could - and should - come before the season ends. Despite not firing on all cylinders and having injuries to Adebayor, Tevez and Robinho, City are still 6th in goals and are especially dangerous at home. Their team is getting fit though and I like City to go a run before Christmas, scoring plenty of goals along the way. Last time Adebayor played a top 4 side at Eastlands, he made the headlines...

Week 13 Fixtures Liverpool v Man City Birmingham v Fulham Burnley v Aston Villa Chelsea v Wolves Hull City v West Ham Sunderland v Arsenal Man Utd v Everton Bolton v Blackburn Tottenham v Wigan Stoke City v Portsmouth Hull City v Everton Fulham v Blackburn The run up to this week's fantasy fixtures has been dominated by who isn't playing rather than who is, with - for those who somehow missed it - Lampard and Van Persie both being ruled out for 3 - 6 weeks. The timing for Van Persie isn't disastrous as I had advocated selling him after this week anyway as Arsenal's fixtures get tough and other top strikers return to form/fitness (such as Adebayor, Torres and Agbonlahor). The Lampard injury is more of a blow as the England man was starting to find some form and Chelsea's upcoming fixtures look pretty favourable. The other headline for the week is the double gameweeks for Blackburn, Everton, Fulham and Hull with Fulham looking particularly well placed to take advantag...

With Van Persie (6 weeks) joining fellow fantasy stud Lampard (3 weeks) on the sidelines, a large portion of fantasy owners will be looking to bring in one or two big name players this week. I have therefore ranked the 10m+ players at each position who will provide the best bang for your buck over the next 6 weeks: Cesc Fabregas - his fixtures aren't great but as with Ronaldo in previous years Fabregas is now a must own player and should probably be captained most weeks. He is the natural replacement for Frank Lampard and will even save you 1.1m as an added bonus. You can make this change with confidence and perhaps target the week 17 game against Portsmouth as a good time to bring Lampad back if you so wish. However, with 43% ownership I'm sure most of you already have Cesc, so lets look slightly down the ownership ladder for our next pick. Andrei Arshavin - Arshavin is the least held of the 10m midfielders and is well placed to prosper in the absence of van Persie. Befor...

Football 365 were reporting earlier in the day that Frank Lampard was about to be shut down for the season after he aggravated a thigh injury on the flight to Doha this week. Poor old Frank had to suffer the frankly medieval conditions of sitting in economy class ! Perhaps Blatter and Ronaldo were right when they described modern day footballers as slaves - imagine having to sit in economy class for almost four hours. Well it seems that F365 have backtracked somewhat and the mention of being out for the season has now been removed, with the Chelsea official site suggesting three weeks and Goal.com suggesting the rest of 2009. This story could have huge fantasy implications with Lampard being considered by many (not me) to be the fantasy player and is owned by 30% of all players (6th most in the league). With Gerrard struggling for fitness and form and Fabregas in majestic form, the transfers between these two players could be monumental. The extra week off and high publicity the i...

After the Villa double gameweek and a few injuries and suspensions I assume many of you will be looking to make changes this week. The natural choice would be to gravitate to towards Fulham and Everton defenders due to their double gameweeks but a few other teams also look appealing. Over the next eight gameweeks, the average GPG scored by opponents at home/away in brackets, the average goals each team have conceded per game this season and their calculated strength of schedule are as below: The top two aren't exactly big surprises historically though United have been far from reliable this season and it's encouraging to see them on this list. Blog reader Andrew pointed out how good United's fixtures are in the coming weeks and the above stats back it up, with United getting the fourth best opposition GPG. Their only red light game (1.7 GPG+) for United is the trip to Upton Park to play West Ham (1.8 GPG) while the visit of Villa (1.33 GPG) also looks like it could be trick...

I guess Liverpool have become so irrelevant in this year's title race that I am wrapping up the week before they've even played. With Gerrard on the bench, Torres out and the Liverpool defense in tatters, Rafa Benitez's side have become equally irrelevant in fantasy circles. The teams of the week were Villa and, once again, Arsenal who provided 5 and 4 goals respectively, though each annoyingly conceded a worthless goal. Fabregas was once again sublime and recorded his 6th goal of the season along with his - what must a record - 5th straight man of the match. Clean sheets were once again at a premium with only two teams managing to keep the opposition out (Chelsea and Spurs). John Terry and John Carew led the week with 15 points, though I don't really value either as long term option. A couple of bargain players had nice weeks including David Dunn (7 or more points in 5 of 8 games), Matt Etherington (at least 5 pts in 4 of his last 5 games) and Graham Alexander (4 goals...

Suspensions Plenty of suspensions this week as the 5 yellow cards start to kick in and the raft of red cards last week: Jamie Carragher Habib Beye Gary Neville J'Lloyd Samuel Philp Degen Stiliyan Petrov Barry Ferguson Diniyar Bilyaletdinov Geovani Lorik Cana Kenwyne Jones Note that Jermaine Defoe is back after serving his recent 3 game ban. Injuries A few headlines this week, none more so than some potentially disastrous news from Anfield: Fernando Torres - Rumours are flying round that Torres might need surgery though Sky Sports suggest that having seen a specialist this week, El Nino could avoid any procedures and even play this week against Birmingham. Still held by an incredible 26% of owners makes Torres overpriced and too risky right now. Weeks 14 - 19 look good for Liverpool and Torres might be worth a look then for Van Persie owners spooked by Arsenal's tough schedule but until then I would stay away for now. Steven Gerrard - Phyio Room rate Gerrard as very doub...

Week 12 Fixtures Aston Villa v Bolton Blackburn v Portsmouth Man City v Burnley Tottenham v Sunderland Wolves v Arsenal Hull City v Stoke City West Ham v Everton Wigan v Fulham Chelsea v Man Utd Liverpool v Birmingham It seems like forever since I last posted a review, which is worrying seeing as it was less than two weeks ago! Last week saw a bit of order restored to the top of the league with the best three sides right now dishing out beatings to lesser opposition. Liverpool continue to struggle and are pretty much a fantasy minefield, especially in light of Torres' continued injur ed woes . Six teams face green light defensive fixtures this week, which considering last week's season high seven clean sheets suggests defenses could be back in the money. Captain picks The rich keep getting richer at the moment and though I can't help but expect this production to stop, the trends are still strong so I'm going to keep pushing these guys while the fixtures are hot. 1. Ces...

Great work everyone during my off week, I'm gonna have to get some serious research done after alot of your captain and clean sheet picks worked out well last week. Seven clean sheets gave a few teams some better returns from their back line, particularly with three of these coming from Arsenal, United and Chelsea. Heartbreak for fellow Ashley Cole who missed the clean sheet after Cole was a late scratch from the team sheet. Arsenal's clean sheet was a bit more surprising with Spurs averaging over 2 goals on the road this year and it was encouraging to see Song and Diaby dropped deeper as time went by which suggests Arsenal defenders could be more reliable in the coming weeks. They have frustrated us on several occasions this season throwing away the odd goal after the game was already won, so I was pleased to see them protect their clean sheet against Spurs. I like Song alot for 5.5m though some caution must be placed on his value as he could lose his place when Denilson retur...