PLFantasy

WARNING: The below was written at 2am in a post-football coma, fuelled by Pepsi Max and Gatorade. I therefore apologise for any typos or nonsense but I wanted to get this out before the folks in the UK set their lineups. @hvsauce How do you rate Joe Allen of swansea? Looking for a replacement for Bannan. Allen has proven to be a decent goal threat this year with a couple of goals already, though I would be somewhat concerned that they have come off just 5 shots on target (9 in total) - a rate which on average looks unsustainable. He also hasn't provided a great deal of creativity though does again have a couple of assists to his name. I like his ability to contribute across three categories, which has helped him avoid too many 2 pointers since earning a starting spot in the first team. However, it's his teammate Mark Gower who excites me the most in that ~4.5m range. One a per game basis, Gower's 2.7 key passes leads all midfielders, not in his price bracket, but th...

I wouldn't say that I'm superstitious, but I'm definitely stitious. Gameweek 13 was unlucky for most of us with Adebayor, Kompany and Terry being the only widely held players to have really big weeks. Aguero, Van Persie and Rooney managed just an assist between them despite playing for the majority of their respective games. Just like their real life teams, you need to quickly shake off a down week and not get too bogged down with the odd blank from our stars. Of those three, I am most concerned about Rooney, purely because of the way he is being deployed, though I thought he was excellent in the first half against Newcastle and will bounce back soon. I would however fully condone holding someone else while we wait for that to happen, particularly given the somewhat tricky trip to Villa Park this week. The form of City's defense is starting to become somewhat of a concern with Lescott's own goal making it 6 straight without a clean sheet. They aren't s...

Arsenal Szczesny, Djourou, Mertesacker, Vermaelen, Santos, Song, Ramsey, Arteta, Walcott, van Persie, Arshavin. Subs: Fabianski, Diaby, Koscielny, Frimpong, Gervinho, Chamakh, Benayoun. Djorou over Koscielny made sense at right back given his impressive physical capability, though I'm still not personally convinced this unit can be relied upon given their lofty price tags. Gervinho impressed off the bench and I was surprised to see him there in the first place. I had hoped he might push on to become a useful asset but without guaranteed minutes he joins a long list of overpriced forwards. Diaby returned from injury but didn't look particularly sharp and I wouldn't expect him to get back in the first team next week. That situation is worth monitoring for Ramsey owners. Aston Villa Given, Hutton, Dunne, Collins, Warnock, N'Zogbia, Delph, Herd, Bent, Agbonlahor, Heskey Subs: Guzan, Jenas, Albrighton, Delfouneso, Clark, Cuellar, Bannan. Not too much note in terms...

For the first time this year, I have included data based purely on the current season as 12 games appears to be a relatively useful sample size. I apply a small adjustment to try and account for the strength of schedule already faced (ie. have you played, and been destroyed by, City yet?) but I'm not sure that is tough enough to make the data really reliable. Hence, I am still leaning on the hybrid (current and prior year) data but it's useful to start factoring in the pure current year rankings at this stage. Without running through each difference individually, I just want to highlight the difference a season can make. City rank 14th in this week's rankings but would be number one based purely on their 6 road games this year (in which they've scored an astonishing 23 goals despite travelling to Old Trafford, Craven Cottage and White Hart Lane). Given the way the team has changed in personnel (hello, Mr Aguero) and also tactical deployment (hello, attacking play)...

As we approach the time of the year when managers are increasingly interested in playing their wildcard, it's time to start thinking about some of the key principles and themes to bear in mind when making those all important transfers. In Part I we looked at the importance of looking forward and not dwelling on the past successes of players to date. We now turn our attention to the importance of building a squad, rather than a team, and how this can make the difference between average and bad or great and good weeks. By my count, only six players managed to play every game last year, four of which were goalkeepers (Baines and Skrtel were the other two). As the chart below shows, the majority of 'keepers played a lot of minutes but the other positions (particularly midfielders and forwards) were less predictable. Just 29% of forwards played in 26 games or more and only 49% even managed to appear in half of their teams' games. So what does this mean? Well, in shor...

It's getting to that time of year when fantasy squads start to develop too many common threads and managers begin to longingly look at that 'play wildcard' option when making transfers. With the second wildcard window looming in GW20-23, realistically the two strategies are to: play your first wildcard now, re-load in GW23 and hope to survive the remainder of the year with that team, or hold off until GW20, maximise your squad for the busy Christmas period (possibly taking advantage of the inevitable DGWs) and then switch out to a new team in or around GW30 for the final stretch. There are advantages to both strategies and in all honesty, the fact you have made it this long without using your wildcard puts you ahead of many other managers (even if you have used your first wildcard, you might still pick up a few things to thing about below, so keep reading!)  The choice of when to use your wildcard is going to greatly depend on the idiosyncrasies of yo...

Arsenal Szczesny, Koscielny, Mertesacker, Vermaelen, Andre Santos, Ramsey, Arteta, Song, Walcott, van Persie, Gervinho Subs: Fabianski, Rosicky, Djourou, Arshavin, Chamakh, Benayoun, Coquelin. Koscileny got a start at right back here in Sagna and Jenkinson's absence, though you have to expect he will drop out of the side when either recognised right back returns. Aside from that it's as expected with Van Persie underlying his claims of being the top fantasy option around. There is value to be had in this side with Ramsey, Arteta, Walcott and possibly Gervinho looking they need to be in at least included in the player pool. Blackburn Robinson, Salgado, Hanley, Dann, Givet, Rochina, Nzonzi, Dunn, Pedersen, Hoilett, Yakubu. Subs: Formica, Petrovic, Blackman, Roberts, Goodwillie, Henley, Bunn. The goals are a promising sign but it's still hard to know when and where the production is going to come from for this team and thus it's all but impossible to include any...