PLFantasy

We're under three weeks until the start of the season so team previews are more than due. In order to save time, I have kept the posts to a scouting notebook style, rather than fluffing them up with prose which doesn't really teach you anything. The aim is to post a couple a day to give everyone time to digest them, ask questions and, more than likely, object to something contained within. First up, a deep source of fantasy talent: Arsenal. Headlines 72 goals scored ranked second in the league, 2.05 GPG rate on the road better than every other team by over half a goal. Failed to score on only 6 occasions, only bettered by Man Utd (5) Second in bonus points received (142), again only trailing the Champions (154) Sixth in clean sheets (13) overall, but dramatic splits between home (9 - 4th) and away (4 - t8th) Squad depth looks worryingly deep from a fantasy perspective with arguably the best squad Wenger has had since Henry, Pires et al graced the Emirates pitch. Looking...

It's vital to keep your mind with this week and not get too carried away with tuning your team up for the upcoming double gameweeks in GW33 and beyond. No matter how many doubles you have in the future, if getting them involves playing short handed in the run up, you totally negate any value you might gain. Having said that, the two highlighted DGWs lie with Arsenal and Chelsea who both enjoy a nice run of fixtures leading into the double. Arsenal in particular look to be the best investment this week though it is tough to read their injury situation with any certainty as the promising return of Fabregas and Walcott has been limited with Wenger stating he " has not decided if they will start the game ". With Van Persie also facing a late fitness the Arsenal stars look to be risky plays this week though with by the far the best fixture they might just be worth the gamble. With Denilson sidelined I would think Fabregas is the most likely to return though I think I prefer...

Clean Sheet Rankings (clean sheets kept - opponents failed to score) Man City (7 - 4) Sunderland (7 - 2) Chelsea (7 - 2) Birmingham (4 - 5) Liverpool (4 - 3) Fulham (3 - 3) Stoke (3 - 3) Arsenal (3 - 1) Tottenham (3 - 2) Wigan (2 - 4) Bolton (0 - 3) West Brom (1 - 5) Blackpool (5 - 2) Everton (2 - 1) Man Utd (2 - 2) Newcastle (3 - 2) Aston Villa (0 - 4) Wolves (1 - 3) West Ham (3 - 2) Blackburn (0 - 1) Attacking Rankings Man City Arsenal Chelsea Birmingham Tottenham Stoke Sunderland Blackpool Fulham West Brom Man Utd Blackburn Bolton West Ham Wigan Everton Newcastle Aston Villa Liverpool Wolves Captain Stats I keep suggesting it could be a statistical anomaly but Van der Vaart continues to crush mid level teams (between 1 and 1.5 GPG conceded) for 9.57 PPG. Given that he is also averaging over 7 PPG at home and 8 PPG over his last 4 games, he remains an excellent option at home this week despite the tricky fixture on paper.  Despite th...

No time to breathe or dwell on GW 21 (which was fairly successful by recent standards) as the EPL action continues on a short week. The highlight for most will be the double gameweeks for Blackpool and Liverpool, who both also enjoy a double in GW24 (some thoughts on them below). Clean Sheet Rankings The rank order is based on the normal form adjusted expected goals per game. In parenthesis you can find the number of clean sheets (at home/away) by the listed team and the number of times the oppositon has failed to score (at home/away) Man Utd (6 - 3) Blackpool* (1 - 3) and (1 - 4) Blackburn (4 - 4) Bolton (2 - 5) Newcastle (2 - 5) Aston Villa (4 - 4) Chelsea (2 - 1) Fulham (3 - 4) Tottenham (0 - 2) Liverpool (2 - 2) and (2 - 0) Man City (3 - 1) Everton (3 - 2) Wolves (1 - 4) Arsenal (2 - 2) Sunderland (3 - 2) West Brom (0 - 2) Wigan (3 - 2) Birmingham (2 - 0) West Ham (0 - 2) Stoke (2 - 0)  *double gameweek Team Goal Rankings (form adjusted) Man City Bl...

Clean Sheet Rankings Chelsea Tottenham Liverpool Man City Sunderland West Ham Arsenal Everton Stoke Birmingham Fulham Wigan Man Utd Newcastle Blackpool West Brom Wolves Bolton Blackburn Aston Villa Attacking Rankings Man City Chelsea Man Utd Sunderland West Brom Newcastle West Ham Wigan Tottenham Blackburn Arsenal Everton Stoke Wolves Liverpool Birmingham Bolton Blackpool Fulham Aston Villa Captain Stats Van der Vaart is playing equally well at home and away though he is crushing mid level team for 10.8 PPG. As Spurs welcome Fulham this week he is a very good option and projects to score more points than anyone this week. On the flip side his last two home games have yielded just 4 points so his owners must decide whether he is a funk or just a dip in form. Tevez isn't necessarily better at home than away but he is crushing weak sides at over 7 PPG and welcomes a Blackpool side who are giving up over 1.6 GPG. As with Van der Vaart his...

At time of posting I am working on the basis that all games will go ahead as planned this week, though at least the Blackpool-Liverpool game is already looking doubtful. More updates on this will of course come later in the week but I would recommend holding off on your transfers for now and definitely not paying 4 points for any moves until we are more certain who will actually play. Clean Sheet Rankings Fulham Man Utd Blackburn Wolves Blackpool Everton Aston Villa Birmingham Arsenal Man City Bolton West Ham  Wigan Stoke Chelsea Newcastle Tottenham Liverpool Sunderland West Brom Team Goals Bolton Man Utd Blackpool Aston Villa Man City Arsenal Blackburn Wolves Fulham West Brom Newcastle Chelsea Everton Tottenham Birmingham Liverpool Wigan Stoke Sunderland West Ham Team Goals (form adjusted) Bolton Man Utd Man City Blackpool West Brom Blackburn Everton Arsenal Tottenham Chelsea Liverpool Fulham Birmingham Newcastle Stoke A...

No rambling this week as I've been moving home with boxes stacked high and much upheaval. This isn't unlike my fantasy team which is chaotic and unpredictable and might need a renovation of it's own very soon. I was saved last week by Vidic and Adam's performances but cruelly punished by last minute goals conceded by Williamson and Jaaskelainen. As you have hopefully noticed I am starting to re-design the site a bit to give everyone constant access to the stats I try and incorporate into my work. I have started with the aPPMS and aPoints to the right of this post and I will be adding short and long term strength of schedules soon. Any requests for specific data to be posted would be welcomed. Without further delay then, here are this week's rankings: Clean Sheet Rankings (expected goals conceded in parenthesis) Birmingham (0.28) Sunderland (0.38) Man Utd (0.40) Blackburn (0.60) Fulham (0.64) Arsenal (0.69) Chelsea (0.98) West Brom (1.02) Everton (1.0...

I'm putting all the design nonsense to one side to get down to some actual fantasy writing. As I'm sure most of you are chomping at the bit to get into your transfers/lineups so I will get straight down to business. Clean Sheet Rankings Aston Villa (0.43) Arsenal (0.49) Chelsea (0.56) Man City (0.69) Everton (0.72) Bolton (0.72) Newcastle (0.72) Fulham (0.77) Man Utd (0.82) Blackburn (1.26) Wolves (1.26) Wigan (1.60) Blackpool (1.72) Liverpool (1.74) Stoke (1.93) Sunderland (1.95) Birmingham (2.05) Tottenham (2.44) West Brom (2.79) West Ham (4.53) Captain Rankings Cesc Fabregas: Arsenal are the top rated team for the week with an expected 4.5 goals. Arsenal have scored 10 league goals with Fabregas on the pitch this season and he has scored or assisted three of them. This would suggest he should notch points this week and I wouldn't bet against him getting one of each, even after his penalty miss last week. Dimitar Berbatov: 38 points in 4 home ga...

The pessimist in me is wondering where I go from here after a very successful first week in which my predictions did well and my team dominated to a three digit score . However, I am going to be positive and look to have another good week of predictions and hope to show that last week was no fluke (in reality it was probably was a fluke, as my countless failed predictions in the past show). One thing I didn't focus on last week, which I now wish I had, is the prediction tool I use to create my clean sheet rankings. Without getting too bogged down in Excel nonsense, the basic idea is to break down teams historic performance at home/away, against other teams and against certain types of team along with the corresponding data for their opponents. To get the historic data for the promoted sides I used a historic relationship between teams' performance in the EPL and the Championship to try and gross up/net down the expected goals conceded/scored. Anyway, the poin...

Here in the UK, Spain's chances are considered to be greatly hampered by the injuries to Torres and Fabregas, but in reality they still have an extremely strong team and should feature heavily in most fantasy conversations. Fabregas was, and is, likely to take the number 12 shirt ie being a very gifted substitute. Not much has changed since Euro 2008 when Cesc only started in the third group game (after Spain had already qualified) and then the final. He has played in more qualifiers lately but Xavi, Iniesta, Silva and company is far from a bad bunch so I am not sweating Cesc's absence despite my full blown man crush. Torres however is a different story as the Liverpool hitman started every game of the Euro champs (aside from the meaningless 3rd group game) and has featured in most games during the qualifying period. In the 23 man squad, there is only real Fernando Llorente who would be identifiable as a 'striker' to partner Villa with the other forwards being more supp...

Due to a lack of time I am going to cut short this week's preview to give you an idea of which players to target this week. Clean Sheet Rankings Birmingham Stoke Liverpool Tottenham Man Utd Everton Portsmouth Arsenal Fulham Sunderland Aston Villa Burnley Man City Bolton Hull Chelsea Blackburn West Ham Wigan Wolves Captain Rankings Bobby Zamora Mikel Arteta Samir Nasri Danny Murphy Matt Etherington James Milner Carlos Tevez Fernando Torres Didier Drogba Frank Lampard The choice this week is really between your elite players against a top side (see Chelsea and United) or your form players against weaker opponents (see Arteta and Zamora). The exception is Arsenal who get Wolves at home but with Fabregas and Van Persie out, it's tough to be totally sold on any of their fantasy prospects. As always, why not post your thoughts below or @plfantasy .

Before we get stuck into gameweek 32, I am going to quickly fly through my top strikers for the remainder of the season, as promised yesterday. I also urge, nay implore you to look at yesterday's ramblings on midfielders which while somewhat of a Cesc-love-fest contains at least a few useful stats for your amusement. I am limiting this discussion to the big three strikers (Torres, Drogba and Rooney) though that is not a slight on the prospects of Tevez, Bent etc, more that most of us can only afford to employ one or at most two of these stud strikers and so we really need to know which one (or two) we should hitch our wagon to. It must also be noted that Van Persie still leads all strikers with 7.7 PPG, an astonishing stat given the plaudits Rooney (7.4 PPG) has received this year. While some reports are suggesting Van Persie may be back before the end of the season I will only entertain the prospect of spending 10m+ on a player when he is a lock to start, which just isn't th...

The week isn't quite done but as it's been so disjointed I figured I'd add to the mess by wrapping it up before it's finished. It was a pretty unexciting week that I feel was there to survive rather than thrive on. Captain-tip Fabregas looked to be cruising to a big score with an early goal on Saturday but he then limped off and may now even miss the game with Hull next week . Nasri played well and earned the man of the match and followed that up with a goal and assist tonight in the Champions League. He might be worth a look if you can't afford the dynamic duo of Fabregas and Arshavin. I made a big mistake not bringing Lee in this week and he shone again against West Ham. I think he could be a real gem to close the season with and is well worth his price tag. Elsewhere United disappointed without Rooney though the England frontman is due back tomorrow night so he should be okay for the weekend if he avoids a set back. Another clean sheet showed that Ferguson's...

As the season heads into the home straight, I get the feeling that this week could be an important one in our quest for the top of our respective mini leagues. With 6 teams (including Chelsea, Villa, Spurs and Fulham) out of action I think several teams will be starting with just 6 or 7 men while many others will splash 12 points or more on transfers. Hopefully we all have had plans for the week in place for the last couple of weeks and only need to make a transfer or two to rectify the situation. For advice on which players you should hold and which you should dump, check out my earlier post. Clean Sheet Rankings Everton Arsenal Man Utd Liverpool Sunderland Wigan West Ham Stoke Burnley Portsmouth Birmingham Bolton Wolves Hull I think the top four teams rank significantly above the rest and if you can secure 4 defenders from this pack you will be in great shape. I think Everton and Arsenal defenders are worth paying for due to their favourable schedules with Baines and Vermaelen being ...

Its nice to have a gameweek wrapped up by early evening on a Sunday to get some thoughts down on the week's action without it dragging into Tuesday and Wednesday. In truth it was a pretty average fantasy weekend, with far more drama in reality than for us fantasy managers. With horror tackles , cup heroics , multiple red cards and handshake snubs . However, big games from fantasy favourites like Lampard, Tevez, Fabregas and Torres gave some managers some joy, as did clean sheets from consistent bargain defenses like Birmingham and Fulham. Clean sheets were at a bit of a premium again this week though the consistent units of Birmingham and Fulham once again delivered. Bolton and Sunderland aren't widely held and the absence of star units like United and Villa hurt many teams' defense this week. Blue Moon Rising I wasn't expecting big returns from City players (I didn't rank any in my captain picks ) and I was shocked to see Bellamy, Tevez and Barry all have big games...

The dust hasn't yet settled on gameweek 26 - indeed it isn't over yet - but it's never too early to look ahead to next week particularly with a couple of key factors for next week's games. Firstly, United have a double gameweek and Rooney is a must own/must captain player. Given that he is already so widely held you risk losing ground on pretty much all your opponents if you don't sign the in-form Englishman. His value has risen sharply over the past 6 weeks but its likely it could move another blip or two this week as more and more owners jump on the Ronaldo-like bandwagon. I have made my transfer uncharacteristically early to avoid losing cash in delaying this inevitable move (the risk is that he gets injured midweek against Milan). A second key factor driving this week's transfer rush is the injury to Ashley Cole, that could rule him out for the season though perhaps not the World Cup . Cole was widely held in the fantasy game (14%) and these owners will now ...

After another disappointing 41 point week, I have finally pulled the trigger and made a risky play - I am putting my faith in the Mancini's frustratingly inconsistent City side. I have brought in Adebayor to play alongside Tevez in time for their double gameweek this week. I can then add N'Zogbia, Sorensen and Huth to this pair to give me 5 double gameweeks. Do I really trust this City side? No. However, as another Rooney goal hit the back of the net with me not owning him, it was time to make a move before it is too late. United have a double gameweek of their own next week and so Rooney will be a must, so I'm hoping to gain some ground this week on those who can't/won't sell him by hitching my cart to the Adebayor bandwagon. Clean sheets were fairly easy to come by last week with no less than 8 teams keeping the opposition at bay. Six of these ranked in my top 10 and four of my top six were able to keep a clean sheet. Playing the numbers, only Fulham (15th) and Vi...

Last week made waves in the fantasy league for all the wrong reasons. One team in my mini league scored zero as his only two starting players were Phil Neville (2 points) and captain Darren Fletcher (-2). Those with Tevez will have fared better, especially if they captained him, though points elsewhere were hard to find. While embarrassing to score down in the 20s, chances are you only lost a few points on your competitors. This week is more important. Playing double gameweeks well (or poorly) can make or break your league and with four of the best fantasy squads around playing twice, there could be some very large scores around this week. Man United, Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool, Bolton and Hull all play twice and some fantasy value can be had from each of these squads * For United I think Rooney and Valencia are incredibly good starts this week and are close to being the pick at each of their respective positions. Defensively, United are hard to judge but I am confident Brown will play ...

It's time for the ice to hit the fan. Two more games have been added to this week's schedule to give six teams a double gameweek including the fantasy filled squads of Arsenal, United and Spurs. Here's the fixtures along with the average goals conceded by the opposition: Man United: Burnley (3.10), Hull (2.60) Arsenal: Bolton (2.10), @Bolton (1.88) Tottenham: Hull (2.60), @Liverpool (1.10) Liverpool: @Stoke (1.20), Tottenham (1.40) Bolton: @Arsenal (1.40), Arsenal (0.90) Hull: @Tottenham (0.80), @Man United (0.80) United and Arsenal are clearly great plays while Liverpool and Spurs remain very solid options. I like Liverpool longer term due to their good fixtures from weeks 23-30 so Torres and co might be good buy low options. Defensively, United look by far the best play though again Arsenal and Liverpool are solid plays. The fixtures are averaging goals scored by the opposition are below: Man United: Burnley (0.80), Hull (0.70) Arsenal: Bolton (1.60), @Bolton (1.25) Liver...

In case I can't get a full preview up in the next day or two, I have posted below my clean sheet and captain rankings for the week. The clean sheet rankings use a new tweaked formula to give a weighted average to both the teams average goals conceded at home/away and the ranking of their opponent for the season. Hopefully this will lead to better decisions for the future. Clean Sheet Rankings Chelsea Man City Man Utd Wigan Liverpool Birmingham Burnley Arsenal Fulham West Ham Tottenham Sunderland Portsmouth Aston Villa Blackburn Bolton Stoke Everton Hull Wolves Captain Rankings Fernando Torres Cesc Fabregas Didier Drogba Steven Gerrard Wayne Rooney Darren Bent Hugo Rodallega Ashley Cole Antonio Valencia Carlos Tevez Apologies for the brief post this week, I will try and flesh this out in the next day or so. I will be on twitter and my iPhone though so please post questions below or @plfantasy and we can all discuss our plans for the week.