PLFantasy

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...

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...

Sorry for the delay again this week, some joker at my job has got it in his head that any of those pesky clients are worth more than fantasy football rankings. Has he seen my team? I haven't topped 50 points for five weeks. Five weeks! Hopefully the below will help: Clean Sheet Rankings Sunderland Chelsea Liverpool Blackburn Arsenal Birmingham Stoke Man City West Brom Bolton Tottenham Wigan Newcastle Wolves Everton Fulham West Ham Aston Villa Attacking rankings (team goals) Liverpool (2.67) Sunderland (1.87) Arsenal (1.76) Chelsea (1.76) Blackburn (1.66) West Brom (1.42) Stoke (1.36) Birmingham (1.25) Man City (1.14) Newcastle (0.93) Bolton (0.82) Wigan (0.78) Tottenham (0.74) Fulham (0.67) Aston Villa (0.44) Wolves (0.44) Everton (0.31) West Ham (0.30) Captain Stats Tevez - Tevez has strangely been a lot better away from Eastlands (7.43 PPG) than at home (4.86 PPG) but has been very useful against sides conceding more than 1.5 GPG (7.25...

When a team loses badly they always say that the best thing is to play again soon to banish the bad memories. I am therefore very thankful for the midweek action so I don't dwell on my disastrous wildcard forray last week resulting in a miserable 24 point week. The weekly wrap up will go up Wednesday night for GW11 and GW12 combined to allow for me to get the preview column out now. Clean Sheet Rankings Chelsea (0.15) Birmingham (0.36) Aston Villa (0.35) Tottenham (0.44) Liverpool (0.79) Newcastle (0.81) Everton (0.91) Arsenal (0.92) Stoke (0.97) Wigan (1.01) Man City (1.35) Wolves (1.37) West Ham (1.43) Man Utd (1.57) Bolton (2.00) Blackpool (2.03) West Brom (2.11) Sunderland (2.14) Blackburn (2.72) Fulham (3.39) Attacking rankings Chelsea (3.39) Newcastle (2.72) Tottenham (2.14) West Ham (2.11) Aston Villa (2.03) Everton (2.00) Stoke (1.62) Man City (1.57) West Brom (1.43) Arsenal (1.37) Man Utd (1.35) Birmingham (1.16) Liverpool (1.01) Wolves...

Clean Sheet Rankings  I am hesitant to try and over-engineer these rankings but it has always been my view when I read other fantasy sites that I'd prefer to have as much info as possible and then use my own judgement to decide what is best to rely on. Therefore, given that we are now 6 weeks in, I am going to include the rankings to reflect both the hybrid stats (based on last year's results and this years) as well as the rankings if you purely use this season's data. I have also included below some trends that need factoring into your decisions this week. Hybrid rankings (based on 2009/10 and 2010/11 seasons) Birmingham (0.51) + Tottenham (0.53) Liverpool (0.56) - Stoke (0.62) Man City (0.66) + West Ham (0.76) West Brom (0.78) Chelsea (0.79) Everton (0.91) + Wolves (1.11) Wigan (1.13) Man United (1.20) + Sunderland (1.31) Fulham (1.63) + Blackburn (1.67) + Aston Villa (2.00) Newcastle (2.13) Bolton (2.16) Arsenal (3.17) Blackpool (3.68) 2010/11 ran...

It's that time again to take a ramble around the league and pick out the key fantasy news, trends and stats from the weekend's action. It was an unpredictable week from both a fantasy and real world perspective and my - along with many others' - teams suffered accordingly. Six teams managed clean sheets (ranked 2nd, 7th, 11th, 12th, 14th, and 15th) though few (sane) managers will have started City players against the mighty Chelsea or indeed West Ham defenders for, well, any reason. That made defensive points aside from Birmingham somewhat sporadic as seen by Pure Juice's poor showing this week. My prediction spreadsheet also whiffed on several games only getting 9 teams' score correct within 1 goals and two teams being more than 2 goals wrong, though to be fair these were both in the wacky game at the Emirates (West Brom predicted to score 0, Arsenal predicted to score 4). Let's run round the key news for the weekend and assess the fantasy impact: Arsenal...

Before I get too carried away with the World Cup , I want to take a bit of time to look back over the season and hand out some well deserved awards. I will be posting some further analysis throughout the season as soon as I have managed to build a decent database that I can use. Premier League Blog Champion Congratulations to Ahmed el Kassar whose 'No Mercy' team won the blog league with a very impressive 2441 points to place just outside the top 1,000 in the world. I plan to comment more on the status of the league next year so please re-join next season and invite your friends as I look to integrate the progress of the team into the blog. PL Team of the Year I have selected the below squad which was available for under £100m at the start of the year, as my team of the year. I would guess that this might be the most controversial section so please post your alternatives below and we'll discuss: GK T.Sorensen (4.0m) Fourth among GK in points scored despite missing...

Last week was a bit of a let down for many fantasy owners, with many - including me - struggling to top 40 points. The big name players continued to hurt owners with Torres sitting this week to join the likes of Rooney and Fabregas on the sidelines. With Liverpool all but out of the Champions League race and Torres focused on facing his former club Athletico in the Europa Cup, I am skeptical as to how much he will figure in the league from now on. Rooney might return this week but is a risk due to both the unpredictability of big games (nevermind big derby games) while Drogba and Lampard face a tough derby of their own as they travel to Spurs. The team of the week is therefore Villa by some distance who not only enjoy a double gameweek but also have two decent fixtures - @Portsmouth and @Hull. While I am not condoning selling Rooney for Carew straight up, if you have a high priced player and a scrub, it might be worth splitting your cash and getting a pair like Young and Agbonlahor. Th...

It's starting to get serious now. With Chelsea's win at Old Trafford and Arsenal's last minute winner against Wolves, the title is race is fully on with all three teams have a legitimate chance to win it. With the cancellation of the Stoke-Fulham game, gameweek 34 becomes a standard 10 game week, though with no top of the table clashes, there should be points on offer so long as we don't suffer any more big name casualties. Clean Sheet Rankings Liverpool Wigan Stoke Wolves Chelsea Hull Aston Villa Man City Tottenham West Ham Man Utd Portsmouth Blackburn Everton Arsenal Sunderland Birmingham Fulham Burnley Bolton The stats suggest that no less than 8 teams will concede - on average - less than a goal this week which makes for some potential gains from our defensive lines. Liverpool, Wigan and Stoke are a cut above the rest this week and it would be wise to try and get at least three of these in this week. Normally I would stay a million miles away from Hull but with a gr...

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...

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...

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...

Another average week in the books for Pure Juice and I'm strongly considering drastic action. I'm out of the cup now and find myself 38 points adrift in my work league. I have Hart, Sorensen , Fabregas , Milner , Bent and Tevez who are all owned by at least 28% of all managers. None of these players have had much joy in the past few weeks and I particularly frustrated by Milner , Sorensen and even Bent's form. Add this to the fact that Valencia's place in the United team might be in jeopardy and suddenly my team looks weak. I think Fabregas is too good to drop while Tevez gets a double gameweek in week 26. The others are all on the block and I am looking to move to players held by 10% of managers or less over the coming weeks, ready for the late season push. For that reason I will be featuring players' ownership every time I mention them from now on. Clean Sheet Rankings Man United Birmingham Stoke Tottenham Burnley Liverpool Sunderland Chelsea Wolves Bolton M...

The Christmas period was tough for many managers (me included) who suffered through unexpected injuries and then the disruption to the fixture list. This will also be the first gameweek without the departed African players thus testing many managers' squads further. The defensive fixtures aren't too bad this week and with the frigid weather not going anywhere one may expect a few defensive struggles this week and playing 5 at the back might be worth considering. Clean Sheet Rankings Fulham - BUY Burnley - HOLD Man Utd - BUY Arsenal - HOLD Man City - BUY Aston Villa - HOLD Chelsea - HOLD Birmingham - HOLD/SELL Sunderland - SELL Wigan - HOLD West Ham - HOLD Liverpool - HOLD Stoke - HOLD Portsmouth - SELL Hull - SELL Bolton - SELL Wolves - SELL Tottenham - BUY Blackburn - SELL Everton - SELL Defensive fixtures don't get much better than Fulham at home to Portsmouth to the point where if you're squad is thin, Fulham defenders might even warrant some captaincy consideration....

I've been using my favourite new analysis tool to look at some of the weekends performances to see if we can draw some conclusions on the future success of fantasy players. The analysis and fantasy impact for several key fantasy prospects can be found below: Andrey Arshavin I spoke about Arshavin after the Portsmouth game , where I concluded that despite the lack of shots, the Russian magician was sufficiently involved in the action to still give value for money. However, with zero shots this week and only assist and no goals to his name despite Arsenal scoring 10 in their opening two games, I am a little concerned about his production. His passing analysis from the Portsmouth game is below: Arshavin played very deep - around the halfway line - and only played one ball into the box from his right sided position. His total pass total of 38 is okay as it shows that he isn't running the game as one might expect but is involved regularly none the less. I am far from ready to give...

Its no secret that I am not a huge fan of this year's striker class. There are very few strikers who are guaranteed a game every week, nevermind guaranteed fantasy point production. Many strikers are currently involved in transfer speculation and others have already moved so lets run round the league and sum up whose moving where and how that might affect their production. Done deals Michael Owen (8.5m) Owen has made an impressive start to his United career during the pre-season and the indications from Alex Ferguson are that Owen will get a decent chance to shine during the season, suggesting that the English hitman can reach 15 goals this season . Owen's career Premier League goal ratio is one every 1.64 games which over a 38 game season would give 23 goals. However, Owen has only played in more than 20 games in the league once since 2004 and with Rooney reverting to a central role and Macheda looking like the real deal it is hard to see Owen topping 20 or so games this te...