PLFantasy

Suffice to say, you're going to want to go big on United players this week, and if you stuck with Rooney (which your humble blogger did not) you face an extremely tough decision whether to captain him or not. It is there our focus lies for this week. Option 1 - Captain Rooney Rooney seems to have recovered quicker than expected , but with Hernandez and Wellbeck now also fit along with Berbatov waiting in the wings, I am not convinced he will start the game. United have been scoring goals for fun this year and there seems little motivation to rush Rooney back if he isn't 100% and risk losing him for bigger games on the horizon (Liverpool and City are next for United). If he starts, he is probably the best captain play this week and his ceiling remains higher than anyone. If he doesn't play at all then it isn't too big of an issue as your armband passes to someone else. My concern, and the reason I would ultimately not captain Rooney is that he might only get 45 ...

Sometimes it pays to build a squad of 15 good players, sometimes you have to go with a 'stars and scrubs' approach and hope to find just enough talent at the bottom of the barrel to allow you the freedom to pack your side with Rooneys, Agueros and Silvas. So far this season, we are well and truly in the latter situation. Just look at the top 5 midfielders and forwards. The forwards are packed with 10m+ players while in midfield you have yet more 10m+ guys and then a group of players who've enjoyed one big week and then average production (good luck guessing which player that will be each week). In previous years we've had players like Charlie Adam, Andy Carroll and Steve Ireland emerge as elite options for mid-range price tags, thus freeing up a couple of million to use elsewhere. No one has really emerged like that this term, so we need to dig deeper and find some players who may not be ideal, but may have a part to play this year. I'll be honest, I'm probably ...

Shots on target per 90 minutes (minimum 3 starts) 1.      Rooney 3.0 2.     Van der Vaart 2.8 3.     Aguero 2.4 4.     Dzeko 2.4 5.     Adebayor 2.3 6.     Van Persie 2.2 7.     Defoe 2.1 8.     Anelka 1.9 9.     Suarez 1.5 10. Di Santo 1.5 We've seen that correlation between shots on target and goals is (unsurprisingly) strong and the majority of the above players have benefited from that fact. Van der Vaart and Di Santo stand out for me and deserve a couple of words. Owned by just 3% of managers, Van der Vaart is somewhat of a forgotten fantasy force but the above indicates his lack of goals is not through a lack of trying. In his career, Van der Vaart is averaging a goal every 4 shots on target so if he carries on his current pace (9 shots on target in just 287 minutes) he should see his points tally start to rise quick...

In order to keep the length of this post down, and to get it up as soon as possible, I am only going to comment on lineup issues for the week. I will then add general thoughts/news/trends in a separate scouting notebook piece later in the wek. Arsenal Szczesny, Sagna, Mertesacker, Koscielny, Gibbs, Arteta, Song, Ramsey, Gervinho, van Persie, Walcott Subs: Fabianski, Rosicky, Andre Santos, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Arshavin, Frimpong, Chamakh Not really sure what happened with Santos, who was replaced by Gibbs for the week. I'm not sure he's worth owning anyway as better options exist on his own team (Mertesacker or Koscielny while Vermaelen is hurt) and of course across the league. Arshavin was benched here which really underlines how that trio of Gervinho/Walcott/Arshavin is tough to predict, leaving Arteta and Van Persie as the only real reliable options in this side offensively. Aston Villa Given, Hutton, Collins, Dunne, Warnock, Petrov, Ireland, Delph, N'Zogbia, Agbo...

There could be some high scores this week as four of the historically stronger teams face weaker sides at home, not to mention a United team off to a historic season already. I've spent some time talking about the teams on Manchester this week ( United and City ) but it's Chelsea who could steal the show this week and if you still own any of their high priced assets, you better captain them this week, or ask yourself why on earth you own them. Clean Sheet Rankings Chelsea vs Swansea (0.79 11 - n/a) Liverpool  vs Wolves (0.81 9 - 8) Man City vs Everton (0.81 14 - 7) Arsenal vs Bolton (0.95 10 - 7) West Brom vs Fulham (1.26 2 - 7) Stoke vs Man Utd (1.29 8 - 5) Newcastle vs Blackburn (1.29 5 - 7) Fulham @ West Brom (1.31 5 - 5) Tottenham @ Wigan (1.31 4 - 2) QPR vs Aston Villa (1.33 n/a - 6) Man Utd @ Stoke (1.38 6 - 4) Wigan vs Tottenham (1.48 4 - 5) Sunderland @ Norwich (1.49 7 - n/a) Everton @ Man City (1.53 4 - 3) Bolton @ Arsenal (1.64 1 - 5)...