PLFantasy

In hindsight perhaps this wasn't perhaps the best game to review these two teams in. We knew Chelsea were good and that West Brom were somewhere between solid and inconsistent though ultimately lacking a great depth in quality. Both these hypotheses proved accurate this weekend as Chelsea not only won the game but did so with almost embarrassing ease. 74% possession, 21 totals shots and eight shots inside the box (versus 24%, 5, 1 for West Brom) go some way to illustrating Chelsea's dominance but while they do capture the result, they don't quite show the ease as which that result was obtained. One positive - at least in terms of forming a nice narrative to fit into a 500 word review - was the fact that Chelsea's dominance was only matched by the predictability of how that dominance came to be. Fabregas led the way with the created chances (5), Costa contributed his customary shot haul (4 SiB, 1 goal) and Hazard came inbetween the two with a piece of both pies (4 crea...

As we enter another drab international week, it presents a well-overdue chance to dig a little deeper into this year's model and look at some of the results which don't necessarily align with what the majority of people appear to be thinking. I don't want to get too bogged down in the merits of any particular assumption in the model, though obviously as we look back and see where the model missed reality, tweaks can and are made. I do however want to illustrate how individual forecast numbers are made up and why that leads to the situation, for example, where Alexis Sanchez has so-so forecast numbers despite leading all midfielders in points to date (by a distance). Regressing conversion rates The first and most obvious point to note is that Sanchez has a particularly high goals per shot on target ratio (50%) which based on history is unlikely to be sustained. The model uses a regressed conversion rate based on a combination of a player's history (where applicable)...

Barring any unseasonable weather this is likely to be the last significant double gameweek of the season so you better make it count. I won't re-tread much covered ground here but I would urge, if not demand, that you trundle over to the double gameweek analysis posted earlier in the week. Clean Sheet Rankings (Team clean sheets - opponent failed to score) Arsenal (4 - 5) and (4 - 5) Birmingham (4 - 5) and (4 - 3) Liverpool (6 - 6) West Brom (1 - 6) and (1 - 5) Blackburn (5 - 3) Man Utd (7 - 4) Stoke (2 - 4) and (2 - 2) Sunderland (7 - 2) Blackpool (0 - 5) and (0 - 2) Tottenham (1 - 2) and (1 - 0) Newcastle (3 - 3) and (3 - 4) Chelsea (3 - 2) Fulham (6 - 5) Bolton (3 - 3) Everton (2 - 3) Wigan (3 - 1) Wolves (1 - 2) and (1 - 3) Man City (4 - 0) West Ham (0 - 2) Aston Villa (0 - 0) Some will no doubt take objection at not ranking all the DGW teams at the top but, for most, the fixtures are just too tough to justify such a ranking. If your plan is to take t...

It seems that the majority of things I have done wrong this season revolve around Fabregas. I have been on the Fabregas band wagon since his stunning appearances in the U-17 World Championship back in 2003 and this sometimes perhaps clouds my judgment. I am therefore only going to make statements below that are based wholly in fact. Arsenal's run in By my calculations, Arsenal don't face a single game from here on in where they are expected to score less than one GPG and only two games (@Tot and @Bla) are less than 1.5 GPG. They have 6 games in which they are expected to score at least 2 goals. Compared to the other top teams, we see Arsenal are very well placed: Expected games scoring 1.5 GPG or less: Arsenal 2 Man United 4 Tottenham 8 Chelsea 8 Man City 9 Expected games scoring 2 GPG or more: Chelsea 8 Arsenal 7 Man Utd 7 Newcastle 6 Tottenham 2 Man City 1 When you consider the fact that Chelsea's goal scoring numbers are massively influenced by their in...

A few readers, along with 23% of all fantasy players have been speculating of late over the virtues of Samir Nasri and while he is indeed having a fine season (67 points, 0.714 aPPMS, 86 aPoints) I am not totally convinced that his fantasy future is as bright. The closest Arsenal have come this year to a full strength side was probably GW5 against Sunderland. That day, Wenger lined up with Song and Wilshere as the holding pair, Arshavin and Nari as the wider forwards, Fabregas in an advanced role and Chamakh up front. Sounds okay so far, however, now bring in Van Persie, one of Arsenal's best players and an every week starter and I have an issue: " We can play Chamakh and Van Persie together. We can play Chamakh up front and van Persie behind . . . What is interesting is we can play all kinds of formations with the two. " (Wenger) So if Van Persie will play; who won't? Let's start with the central pairing. This season Wenger has gone with following pairs: W...

Fantasy soccer is different to other sports for many reasons but one of the key differences is that players on the same team don't really 'take away' from each other. By this I mean that in fantasy football the presence of another running back or indeed a 260 lb goal line back, can hurt if not kill a teammate's fantasy value due to him stealing carries or, more importantly, goal line carries. The same can be true in basketball (but probably to a lesser extent) in that there are really only a finite number of possessions in an average game and so the presence of LeBron James clearly hurts the fantasy value of Dwayne Wade (how much depends on how much extra offense they can generate to share between two players - okay 2.5 if you count Chris Bosh). In soccer, nothing is really limited aside from the total time of the game. Shots can vary in a game from 1 to 40 and team possession can range from 35% to 65%. Therefore the presence of other good players can help fantasy pro...

I'm in a dangerous position. I'm happy with my team but two back-to-back average weeks (which were an Alex wonder goal away from being poor) have me feeling antsy. It's like when you're sat in a good bar on a Saturday night. You're happy. The beer is good. And the atmosphere is decent. But, you can't help wonder what else is available. Sure you're gonna have fun, but is it going to memorable? I think my team if fine. But is is memorable? There has been talk on the boards of wildcards but I've decided that with Drogba, Berbatov, Nani, Alex being locks to stay put and the fact I'm happy with Vidic, Odenwingie and Adam, there doesn't seem to be much point wasting my wildcard too soon. Hence I am looking to reload rather than re-build my squad. The obvious (and likely) choice is to switch Koncheky out for Boateng who I am very high on . I could also bring Boateng in for one of my budget defenders given that I have 2.8m sat in the bank. However, I...

Oscar Wilde once wrote that "everything popular is wrong"; a point echoed by the majority of my posts singing the praises of differentiation and uncovering the next sleeper. However, the selection of your star players is equally important and with just 7 weeks to go, now is a great time to assess who will shine the brightest. I am going to focus on midfielders today (and forwards tomorrow) given that the weekly value of defenders/keepers is driven too much by the form/fitness of the squad rather than an individual's ability/form. Midfielders Four double digit million players are available in the game, and it is here that our attention will be focused. I accept that an argument can be made for, say, James Milner over Andrei Arshavin but given the difference in price it seems illogical to compare those two types of player. In order to avoid too much text and to get into the numbers I have created a quick box score to summarise each player. This will be as below: Name (Go...

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...

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 ...

It seems sometimes that Arsene Wenger's side are polarising in the Premier League despite being, for me, the second most enjoyable side in the world to watch (after European Champions Barcelona). Fans of the other big four sides mock their lack of trophies and others call them underachievers or even cheats . Whatever their merits, they have been in sublime goal scoring form this year (17 goals in 5 games) and their upcoming fixtures look promising. A few questions have been posed over where we should rate Cesc and company and who looks likely to play in the coming weeks, so lets have an in-depth look at their team and what we can expect over the next few weeks. Who will play in Wenger's bes t eleven? It appears that eight spots are pretty much locked down, and will be occupied by the same players barring injury or the occasional rest. These are Almunia (6.0), Clichy (6.3), Gallas (6.6), Vermaelen (6.7) and Sagna (6.3) at the back; Fabregas (10.6) in midfield and Arshavin (10.7...

After two more miserable performances from Ronaldo over the Christmas period, many owners are getting close to dumping Ronaldo and the net transfers for the week are in a small outflow position. I myself was considering dumping him for Gerrard until Gerrard's off the field antics cast doubt over his future for the coming weeks. Three points need raising though before any rash decisions are made: 1. Ronaldo still leads all fantasy players with 6.67 points per game ( PPG ) which equates to a Points Per Million Spent ( PPMS ) of 0.457, which is ahead of Deco (o.444) and Fabregas (0.424) among others. If you have captained Ronaldo every week (or even just a few of his 15 point+ performances) then his PPMS will be up with anyone else in the league. It is also important to remember that value for money ( ie PPMS ) will only carry your team a certain distance and it is actual points ( PPG ) that really matters. 2. United have two double gameweeks in the next 5 and then have a 3 g...