PLFantasy

Looking back at last season Managed just 48 goals (13th) which conceding 59 (14th) in what was a pretty mediocre fantasy season in the midlands.  Three of the top five points scorers from last season (Downing, Young and Friedel) have all moved on. Villa players racked up 40 assists last season, 20 of which came from Downing (9) and Young (11). After moving to Villa, Bent added 9 goals in 16 games with a 5.4 PPG . He continued his career trend of contributing little outside of goals though (1 assist, 9 bonus points). Villa racked up just 7 clean sheets (14th) though all of them came at home which ranked 7th in the league. At 5.0m the price tags might be low enough to warrant spot starting them at home this year if this trend continues. Only Blackburn had a bigger differential between home (1.00 GPG ) and road (2.11) goals allowed. After Bent joined the team in January, Villa scored in every game but one. Villa 'keepers ranked 8th in P$ at home but 19th on the road. Given is...

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 we go again. The off season seemed to fly by thanks to the World Cup and it's aftermath but the show must go on and the English Premier League is back with what promises to be a great season. I cannot pick between Chelsea and United and I genuinely feel that both Arsenal and City could be champions come May time. Add in an intriguing managerial appointment at Liverpool, drama galore at Villa and the return of a giant (Newcastle) and the season looks setup for another thriller. Week one throws up some interesting fixtures include a tone setter for Arsenal and Liverpool who clash at Anfield and a rematch of last season's Champions League decider between Spurs and City at White Hart Lane. Elsewhere, there are baptisms of fire for two of the newly promoted sides as Newcastle travel to Old Trafford and West Brom go to Stamford Bridge. Hopefully your fantasy squads are settled by now, but if not then I urge you to look back at some recent articles on goalkeeper selection , s...

Milner really bailed my team out last week, thus keeping me in the running for my office championship. I hope your teams are still alive and with 3 weeks to go there is still time to score some major points and make up ground. This week is pretty vanilla with just the 10 standard games and with Ars-MnC and MnU-Tot squaring off, it makes fantasy selections tough again this week. Villa, Liverpool and to an extent Chelsea have good fixtures though the continued absence of Torres and Fabregas along with the uncertainty around Drogba , make it tough to field a dominant side this week. Defensively there are quite a few good options and I can see several team playing 4 or 5 at the back to maximum their exposure to the clean sheet opportunities. Clean Sheet Rankings (projected goals conceded in parenthesis) Chelsea (0.34) Everton (0.55) Wolves (0.55) Bolton (0.56) Man U (0.67) Aston Villa (0.68) Burnley (0.84) Blackburn (0.90) Hull (0.98) West Ham (1.04) Liverpool (1.05) Arsenal (1.17) Portsm...

The end is in sight and the window to make up those final points is closing fast. Though far from controversial or particularly insightful, Villa players having the double this week will give you a chance to make up some ground on your league and it might be worth paying 4 points to bring a couple of these players in. The Manchester and London derbies (Che-Tot) take away alot of the value to be found in the league and Liverpool's (well, Torres) attention seems to have turned to Europe so he cannot be relied upon from here on in. Hence this week's rankings are a bit up and down and several players I have cut out could end up having decent games if they prove their fitness. I am simply not willing to have another 8m player on the bench after suffering through this several times over the past few weeks. Clean Sheet Rankings Aston Villa (1.01 and 1.18) Birmingham (0.30) Liverpool (0.49) Fulham (0.57) Sunderland (0.64) Stoke (0.66) Arsenal (0.73) Blackburn (0.77) Tottenham (0.88) Hu...

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...

While they didn't really explode, Villa players provided a decent haul for those managers who brought them in this week, led by James Milner (12), and hopefully let you gain some points on opposition managers. Agbonlahor was the big disappointment for the week with the rest of my captain picks playing out pretty well ( Milner 12, Defoe 9, Torres 19, Rooney 13, Dunne 8, Young 5, Drogba 10, Lampard 7, N'Zogbia 6). This week will likely see some huge scores and I think you need to be playing at least 5 players on a double to stay competitive. The chance of stealing points on your competition is probably less than in a week where only 2 or 4 teams have a double as less planning will have been required to get some double gamers in this week. Nevertheless, it's important to get your side right in a week where plenty of teams could top 100 points so let's look at the double gameweek sides for gameweek 31 and see where potential value might lie: Aston Villa Opponents: W...

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...

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....

Portsmouth 2-0 Burnley Burnley's woeful away form continued, while Portsmouth continue to get better, especially at home. The game saw Boateng lose his penalty duties to Dindane who squandered the chance suggesting Boateng might be taking them again soon. Dindane did manage to hit the net later in the game though, along with Hreidersson to give Avram Grant the 3 points. The popular fantasy pick Jamie O'Hara picked up an assist while one of my favourites Boateng came away empty handed. The game confirms that Burnley at home is about as good as it gets for a fantasy team while travelling to Fratton Park is perhaps not an easy game these days. Arsenal 2-0 Stoke Many thought this would be a banana skin for un der fire Wenger but Arsenal bossed the game from the off, finishing with 59% of possession. The disappointment of the game was the penalty miss by Fabregas, who rebounded somewhat by adding an assist for Arshavin's opener. Fabregas looked threatening and should have had a ...

There were eight games yesterday and two today, in what was one of the best opening weekends in recent memory. Unfortunately I was moving home so I didn't get too see much live, hence the lack of updates throughout the day. Hopefully, I will be around for some live diaries in the coming weeks. Below are a few thoughts and observations on the weekend's games as well as the fantasy impact they will have: Chelsea 2-1 Hull I did manage to see this one and Hull were unlucky to miss out on any of the spoils. It did have a sense of inevitability about it though and Drogba , who had lots of chances throughout got the winner and his second of the game. I have said before that I like the Chelsea target man and I think he could be in for a big season. His picked up all 3 bonus points along with his two goals, giving him a 12 point haul for the day. Lampard didn't look overly threatening at the head of the diamond and he will have more success in the future for sure. Mikel started i...