PLFantasy

I try not to get involved in too much "will-he-won't-he" speculation in these pages with, for example, the weekly statistical rankings being provided regardless of rotation risk. I'm not saying, of course, that this shouldn't be a factor, only that I'm in no position to offer a worthwhile opinion, other than collating other news stories (which are often based on nonsense quotes from managers anyway). There are plenty of other sites who offer opinions on whether Tevez will play or if Vidic has recovered from injury but in almost all cases it's pure guess work and so I try and stay away from such discussions. With that in mind, my initial reaction to Ba's move was negative. I have no idea whether he will play every week at Chelsea, and while you'd think it would extremely odd for a player to leave a good team to go and ride the bench, other players have done the exact same thing before. All I therefore see is a player who has gone from being the e...

I've missed a couple of 'fanning the flames' pieces over the festive period as the games have simply come too quickly to stay on top of. Given the fact that the wildcard window is about to open, I thought it might be useful to look over the last four  gameweeks of action and perform the same analysis as we normally do; deciding whether their success is legitimately repeatable. As in prior weeks, each player is assigned a 'buy', 'hold/monitor' or 'sell' status. These do not necessarily reflect what I would personally do, rather what I suggest to be a decision based in logic. For example, I might feel that Rooney represents better value than van Persie, but I would still 'buy' the Dutchman's success and consider him very ownable. The different assigned statuses are summarised as: Buy - the player can be purchased immediately taking consideration of his playing time, fixtures, injury status etc. This status does not necessarily mean yo...

Most of the transfer dealings of the past few months have been discussed at large so I'm not going to labour over every signing and let you know that van Persie is going to do well at Old Trafford or that the loss of Wayne Bridge probably won't end City's title challenge this year. There are however several transfers whose impact needs to be further explored, not just for the arriving player, but also for the existing players whose role or playing time can be impacted. Please also note the absence of the phrase 'window slamming shut' which appears to be a mandatory term for a well known deadline ending for another year. Original metaphor ideas should be forwarded to your local media outlet immediately. Arsenal The three big signings of Podolski, Cazorla and Giroud are already bedded into the team and have had a major impact already. All three look like they are going to play significant minutes this year leaving Walcott, Gervinho and Oxlade-Chamberlain figh...