Fantasy Premier League Tips and Review

Vela: Visiting Hawthorn Hitman

2011-01-30T10:42:00.005Z

West Brom have one of the better runs for the next few weeks, including a great home double gameweek in week 27 against West Ham and Wolves - there should be at least a few points in it for a Baggie player or two in this gameweek. Over the next 5 weeks, their toughest competition comes from Man City away in week 26, but is bookended with a match against Stoke and Birmingham as well as a match against Wigan in week 25. Given this schedule its easy to see some West Brom players getting in the points, and given their discount prices it may represent some good value over the coming weeks.

Most of the EPL Fantasy Football points come from the attacking end of the pitch, so midfielders Brunt and Morrison, or Odemwingie up front make the best choices at the moment.

Interestingly into this mix comes young Mexican striker Carlos Vela, previously sitting on the bench at Arsenal. His loan to the Baggies has trumped a reported move to Bolton when terms couldn't be met. Vela had a tough time of it at Arsenal, with Robin Van Persie, Samir Nasri, Andrei Arshavin, Theo Walcott and Marouanne Chamakh all ahead of him. Subsequently this season he has only played 65 minutes, but still managed to find the back of the net once. He has played over 30 times for Mexico and is a regular starter for the national squad.

His price is a mere £4.4m and if he becomes a regular starter as expected at the Hawthorns then he could be a real bargain as West Brom fight to avoid the cellar and cement their place in the top flight for another season. Definately worth saving a transfer before gameweek 27; early adaptors may want to consider him as soon as his club is updated in the Fantasy Premier League tables.

Cuellar at Villa & the Block Defence.

2010-02-12T01:37:00.000Z

Aston Villa are in a great run of defensive form at the moment, having kept 5 clean sheets in the last 6 games. One of the main beneficiaries of this has been Cuellar, who has played practically every minute of every game. He also popped up with a header goal to help Villa draw with Manchester United this week. While he hasn't been bringing home assists and goals this season, he has is good value at £5.8 million and looks likely to get at least a few more clean sheets before the season is out.

However this is a bandwagon that is fast gaining momentum, and this gameweek has seen over 10,000 managers transfer Cuellar into their squad. His price is sure to rise in the very near future, but expect it to settle very quickly, as although Aston Villa face lowly Burnley at home - a very favourable fixture - after that they miss the following gameweek 28, and will have a bye in gameweek 29 if they progress in the FA Cup being played this Saturday, which is looking likely. Or at least as likely as any cup tie can... which is to say, anything might happen.

If Villa qualify for the next round, two byes in a row will alarming to many of Cuellar's new owners, and his price may slip as people transfer him out rather than have £5.8million sitting on the bench for two weeks. It could be a wise move to consider Cuellar for gameweek 30 onwards.

Other than Chelsea, Everton and Manchester City, Villa's draw for the rest of the season is against teams currently in the bottom half of the league. Amongst this is a yet-to-be-scheduled match against Hull, which means one of these weeks will be a double gameweek.

From this point of view, Aston Villa have about as favourable a run of fixtures from gameweek 30 until the end of the season as you can get. This presents the opportunity taking two (or more) Villa defenders to form a block defence. Dunne and Cuellar are surely the men for this task. This is somewhat of a risk as if Villa slip up then you can have a low points return. However, with those 5 clean sheets in their last 6 games, if you had a Villa block defence of two or even three players in the last few weeks, you would have done particularly well. If you need to catch up ground on your mini-league, this is definately a tactic that may pay rewarding dividends.

A Villa block defence may be an excellent choice given their current form and future fixtures, but be wary of jumping on the Cuellar bandwagon too soon, as there is the possibility Aston Villa may not play until Gameweek 30. But from that point on, two or even three Villa defenders may make a good investment until the end of the season.

Fantasy League Gold: N'Zogbia

2010-01-24T19:37:00.001Z

Charles N'Zogbia is in the form of his life and with 2 doubles in GW26 and GW30 this lad could prove incredible value. He has knocked home three goals in the last six games that Wigan have played, and has two double gameweeks coming up in gameweek 26 and gameweek 30. Wigan's runs of fixtures is also appealing, the toughest opposition between now and March being Tottenham at home.

N'Zogbia has been playing almost every minute of the season, and at £5.6 million represents some good value in the midfield. Possible transfers include swapping him into your side in exchange for Valencia. Man United have a bye this week and then Arsenal away the following week. Gameweek 25 sees Man United at home to Portsmouth, which should yield some points, but week 26 is away to Aston Villa; not an easy challenge.

Conversely over the same period, Wigan will have played Blackburn away, Everton at home, Sunderland away, Stoke at home and Bolton at home. So between now and the middle of February, Valencia will play 2 tough games and one easy match. N'Zogbia will play 5 matches, all of them "easy" (or at least, not in the top 8).

With a price difference of over £3.0m pounds, its an easy decision to see that over the next few weeks N'Zogbia will be a better investment for your squad than Valencia. That £3.0m may go along way towards bringing in a premium player of the likes of Fabregas, Drogba or Terry.

Transfers for Double Gameweek Madness

2010-01-14T13:35:00.005Z

The revised fixture list for gameweek 22 has been posted to the Fantasy Premier League website, and there are double gameweeks a plenty. Liverpool, Tottenham, Bolton and Arsenal have now joined Manchester United and Hull City with two games in this round. Potentially this could be the biggest points round of the season. What are the best options for transfer targets?

First up, and notably without a double gameweek, is Tevez. His hattrick against Blackburn compounded with his recent fearsome form - 10 goals since Dec 5th, scored in 6 of his last 7 games - means he his tough to overlook. However, as we discussed last time, Tevez misses the next Fantasy Premier League gameweek; but by gameweek 24 their fixtures get much better. So, a dilemma. His form is indominatable but he doesnt get gametime next week. Put another way, he has one game in the same time that Defoe has three games and Rooney plays twice (Man United no game next week).

At Arsenal, Fabregas has stated he is rested and ready to return. If Wenger plays him in both games agains Bolton, Fabregas' points could be devastating. But will the Gaffer risk his star in a double so quickly? Wenger must surely look at these game as a must-win chance to get to the top of the table. However Arsenal's fixture list quickly hits a nightmare patch after this double against Bolton, as they face Aston Villa, Man United, Chelsea then Liverpool. Diaby is well priced in the midfield from the Arse at £5.8m and may be worth a shout for value. If Fabregas is fit then he is a must have, but with their tough draw it may be a better choice to look elsewhere for double gameweek players than to invest heavily Arsenal.

Bolton has a double this gameweek and again in gameweek 26; thats a lot of gametime. Klasnic, Cohen, or Cahill are our tips from Bolton for now.

Tottenham and Liverpool are the other beneficiaries of this draw. The 'Pool have struggled so far this season, but their fixtures are good for the next few weeks. The best picks would have been Gerrard and Torres, but they both limped out of their Cup game against Reading. This could mean extra game time up front for Kuyt over the double and he would be the best choice at this stage, but be wary as Liverpool are a team playing poorly at the moment and with the Kop booing Rafa after the game, the gaffer's future could be in doubt. And if Rafa goes, expect further bad results and few premier league fantasy points for anyone in that side.

Tottenham's forthcoming matches are somewhat middling, with Fulham, Birmingham and Villa after this weeks double, all of whom are performing well at the moment. Dawson and Defoe are looking like the best picks here, especially if Torres and Gerrard miss the second game of this week leaving a weakened Liverpool to face Spurs. We are expecting Defoe will come into some big points soon, so definately consider him if you are in the market for a premium striker who isn't scheduled to miss next gameweek.

The weather has meant this week is loaded with catch-up doubles, and Fabregas' return and Torres and Gerard's potential injuries combined with Rooney and Tevez's bye next week mean tough tactical decisions to maximise your points. Well done if you have kept your wildcard - this week would be a fine time to capitalise upon it. Good luck all, and let us know how you get on in the comments.

Tip: Think Tottenham

2010-01-11T19:44:00.003Z

Gameweek 22 sees a double gameweek for Manchester United and Hull as their match was moved due to Cup commitments. That means this weeks fixtures are, on paper, a dream for Manchester United: home to both Burnley and Hull.

Whilst on first glance it may appear to be worth loading up on Man Utd players, be wary of getting caught short for the following gameweek. Gameweek 23 will see byes for both these teams as well as Stoke and Manchester City. Then upon their return in Gameweek 24, Manchester United face Arsenal at Emirates Stadium, Portsmouth at home and Aston Villa away. So while they have a double gameweek this round - and there could be some big points here - in the following four weeks they have a bye and two tough fixtures away. It is well worth captaining a Man Utd player this week (probably Valencia or Rooney) but consider their forthcoming fixtures before using valuable transfers for importing extra Man Utd players.

Conversely Tottenham have a good run of fixtures going forward; of Spurs next six fixtures, five are very favourable. Over the next three weeks they play Hull and Fulham at home, before travelling to Birmingham. Then its Villa, Wolves and Wigan. One of the Tottenham mob most likely to benefit from this set list is Jermain Defoe.

Defoe has put away 14 goals this season at a nice even spacing, never going more than 3 games without a goal. While it is unlikely he repeat his famous "5 goals in a game" feat that he managed in November against Wigan, there are opportunities for a juicy run of goals.

It is also worth noting that the Spurs defence hasn't conceded any goals in the past four games, and Michael Dawson represents fine value from their backline at a mere £4.9m. If they can continue these defensive efforts (and their fixtures may give them that chance) then there could be decent points to be had.

Snow Making Captaincy A Gamble

2010-01-08T21:28:00.002Z

With all the cold white weather that has hit the country lately, many games have become doubtful for this weekends rounds. At time of writing a few games have been postponed, meaning your players from that team will not get a run. This will have the biggest impact on your captaincy, since the Value or Form guidelines for emergency captain have a great way of leaving you with the second (or third) best option. Bitter experience indicates a correlation between the need for an emergency captain, and progress in the Fantasy Cup. Not that we hold grudges here at Fantasy Premier League. Oh no.

Anyway, games postponed so far include:
Hull vs Chelsea
Liverpool vs Tottenham
Sunderland vs Bolton
Burnley vs Stoke
Fulham vs Portsmouth

Several more games could yet be cancelled, depending on what the weather brings over the next 48 hours. Rumour has is that the Man City game is at risk as the forecast isn't promising.

The big risk here is that players take a 4 point (or more) hit by making transfers to swap in players whose game is not yet cancelled, only to find that the forthcoming weather cuts their game down too. Compounding this is the cost factor; if you bought in a player early on who has made a significant gain in price, you will only receive half that price rise back, leaving you with the requirements to come up with the other half if you want to buy them back. And since most teams will have a double gameweek in the future to catch up, demand on them may become high.

Clearly, using transfers to make the most of the weather situation is a risky move that could pay great dividends. The two games most likely to be played at this stage are Arsenal - Everton and Birmingham - Man Utd. Captaincy choices should probably be between Rooney, Valencia, Arshavin or Vermaelen.

Be wary with transfers due to snow; this week the best options would be to consider Jonny Evans (in for Vidic) or Denilson returning for the Gunners.

The Importance of a Quality Bench

2009-12-22T21:36:00.000Z

The Wigan - Bolton match being frozen off at the end of gameweek 18 brings home a reminder of the importance of having a bench with players who are capable of contributing points if they become needed. With some notable injuries to a few marque players (ala Fabregas) having a solid line up of quality substitute players becomes even more pressing.

Compounding this are the frankly bizarre results coming out of the top of the table sides lately. It seems if you are at the top earn 1 or fewer EPL points, while the bottom sides earn 3. This makes some lower team players worthy of a high risk / high return investments. Ben Haim and Hreidarsson have made some points over the last four gameweeks as Portsmouth have started to swing their season around. In fact, over the last 4 gameweeks, Portsmouth have earned more points than Chelsea. Avram Grant seems to be working his magic at the coast.

Similarly Wolves have had a good run of it lately, particularly Jody Craddock in the defence. At £4.2m, his 46 points earned in the last 8 weeks mean he is in fine form indeed. On paper Wolves' fixtures aren't great over the next two weeks, but against a vunerable looking Liverpool anything might happen. Again, as a budget defender he makes a good choice.

For those with a little more cash to splash, Villa's Carlos Cuellar is probably the best choice. Still at a bargain £5.5m, he has played all bu 91 minutes this season, has bought home 7 bonus points, and more importantly has cashed in as Villa kept 4 consecutive clean sheets. Aston Villa's fixture list is stiffening somewhat between now and February however, with matches against Arsenal twice, Liverpool, Tottenham and Manchester United, as well as Wigan, West Ham and Fulham.

Regardless of which players you choose to add to your squad, you should always have at least a couple of players there who will take the field for their teams should you need them. That way bizarre weather or wacky team-lines will not impact on the team greatly. A good EPL fantasy football manager mitigates that kind of risk. For great success!

Klasnic, The Man From Bolton.

2009-12-16T17:36:00.003Z

Ivan Klasnic is a man in form. In the last four matches he has scored 4 goals for Bolton, and accrued 4 bonus points. Admittedly these results have come against some middling teams - Fulham, Wolves, Manchester City and West Ham, but his forthcoming fixtures look equally useful: Wigan, Burnley, Hull and Arsenal in his gameweek 20 double fixture, then Sunderland on the 9th of January.

We touched on Bolton's forthcoming double fixture a couple of weeks ago, but at that stage Klasnic was flying well below the radar. Since then however he has burst into form, and on the back of 11 points last week and 9 points in this gameweek's 3-1 win against West Ham his price is sure to rise.

The only risk is that he hasnt been playing the full 90 minutes, although he has been the starting choice and playing enough in the last month to earn 2 points for game time played. He is a large player and that suits Bolton's style of play and with his current form, he could be hard to drop.

So there is easy money to be made by acquiring Klasnic now and holding him until after the Sunderland game. With the double in gameweek 20 against Hull and Arsenal, he should at least bring in a comfortable 3 or 4 points, or more if he can tap some home. With his recent haul his price is sure to increase and his fixture list looks promising. At £6 million pounds there are a range of other strikers who have played more minutes and earned more points over the season, but for the next few weeks and given his excellent current form, Klasnic represents an excellent choice.

Blackburn Backline, Stoppin' Goals.

2009-12-15T03:10:00.000Z

While Blackburn may be struggling to score goals at the other end of the field, they continue to compensate for this by remaining tight across the back line. Blackburn have kept four clean sheets in their last five games and Sam Allardyce has emphasised the need for this to continue in order to achieve a climb up the table.

Blackburn's fixture list isn't horrible and could be a lot worse over Christmas and New Year:

Birmigham (away)
Tottenham (home)
Wigan (away)
Sunderland (home)
Manchester City (away)
Fulham (home)
Wigan (home)
West Ham (away)
Stoke (away)
Hull (home)

These factors make us suspect we will continue to see defensive returns; so lets look at the Blackburn defensive options.

Emerton has been playing an attacking midfield position wide on right, and positionally looks the best option amongst their defence, although Samba and Nelson, with set-piece goal threat, are the other worthy targets. Both Emerton and Samba are priced at £4.9m, while Nelsen is £4.4m and that price difference may make your decision much easier. Nelsen is the club captain and also has more bonus points than the other two (5 points earned versus 3 points for Samba and Emerton), however given Emerton's attacking formation he may be more likely to score.

Ultimately there is little to choose between these players; any of these three players should do well in the forthcoming weeks, particularly if Blackburn continue to keep a tidy defence.

Get Going with Tamir Cohen

2009-12-09T20:12:00.002Z

If you are looking for a cheaper midfielder for the next month or so, Tamir Cohen is a central midfielder with Bolton who may be worth considering. He is involved in the double gameweek in GW20, and compared to cheapie favorite Bowyer, has a more favourable run. Boltons forthcoming fixture list reads:

- Man City (h)
- West Ham (h)
- Wigan (a)
- Burnley (a)
- Hull City (h) Arsenal (a)
- Sunderland (a)
- Arsenal (h)
- Burnley (h)

Some of these teams present rather leaky defenses, and (at time of writing) at £4.7 Cohen seems excellent value. Even if he wasn't a 10/10 starter he might offer a nice differential to Bowyer and Eagles. He has tapped away 3 goals and 2 assists so far this season at 3.6 points per game, certainly a nice return for his price.

At the start of November he suffered an injury which saw many managers transfer him out, a trend that is somewhat inexplicably continuing. This is good news for us, as Cohen's price looks set to fall again which should bring the cost of transferring him into your squad to £4.6m. He is fully recovered now though, playing 77 minutes two weeks ago and a full 90 minutes in their 1-2 loss to Wolves last week - including earning the assist for setting up Bolton's only goal. Expect to see Cohen's price to rise by the end of January.

In the sub £5.0m range, Bowyer is current favorite, and with the game time, recent points scoring form and fantastic discipline, this is not surprising. However Birminghams fixture list is a lot trickier than Boltons - compared to Boltons fixtures above, Birmingham face Everton, Man Utd, and Chelsea twice. They also do not have a double gameweek. So all things being equal, from now until February, Cohen should perform better than Bowyer, and at a cheaper price.

Cohen scored against Liverpool and looked dangerous against Chelsea, and in his match against Wolves the majority of his passes were played in the attacking third.

He could be a real prospect for the next couple of months, particularly if Bolton get their act together and string a few wins together. Certainly they are facing opponents against which it is possible. With his low price and good looking fixtures, Cohen may make an excellent choice as a Value For Money midfielder, to free up some dosh for players from the Big Four.

Injury Woe To Grow For Manchester United

2009-12-07T23:54:00.001Z

Manchester United have a fantastic run of fixtures until the end of January, as we have mentioned before. So it would be no surprise to learn that 9% of teams have persisted with John O'Shea in their teams defence, despite him not playing in the last 3 weeks. However word from Old Trafford today is that both O'Shea and Jonny Evans will be out until the New Year. Wes Brown is recovering from a hamstring problem and Vidic has the flu, although Sir Alex has said he hopes both will be ready for Saturday. Picking either of these players at this stage is something of a gamble however; it might be wise to wait until closer to kick-off to make any decisions in this regard.

Patrice Evra is the only fit and recognised defender in the team; he is in fine form so far this season and would make an excellent choice for any defensive line if you were shopping for a United defender. He has played all but 8 minutes of the season so far and is the 6th top defender. And despite the weakened Manchester Untied backline, it would still be a surprise to see them concede many goals during their golden run of fixtures, so cleansheets may be imminent.

The problems don't end here for Man Utd either, with both Rooney and Berbatov looking doubtful for the trip to Villa this weekend - Rooney due to a Hamstring injury and Berbatov with knee problems. This will be bad news for the one third of all managers that have Rooney. Its early stages yet but there is probably enough news to suggest that captaining Rooney this weekend may be a huge gamble.

Planning Your Future With Arsenal

2009-12-06T20:27:00.002Z

Both Stoke and Fulham have a double header on Gameweek 20, after missing out on Gameweek 17. Arsenal and Bolton are the other teams that gameweek who benefit from the revised fixture list.

The tricky part for a lot of players is that by now many have shaped their teams into something close to what they would like, making the dilemma not so much about who they should transfer in, rather who they will transfer out. However, this is where the points are made in the EPL Fantasy game - by picking up the players that are about to do well, rather than having the same players as everyone else who are consistently useful.

To further complicate matters, Gameweek 20 is Drogba's final game before leaving for the African Cup Of Nations. If you are one of the 38% of managers with him in your team, you should consider reserving one of your transfers to account for his prolonged absence. There are better ways to spend £11.5 million than leaving it on the bench for a month!

So our question becomes which players from the GM20 double teams will bang home the most goals, set up the most assists or scrape together some tasty bonus points? The surrounding fixtures will need to also be useful to justify their transfer, as a one week wonder will not be as useful as a player going on a 3 or 4 week run of points. You may also need to use a transfer to cover an African Cup of Nations player, so our choices should be able to bring in some points for the weeks around the double header if need be.

Fulham's lead up to and including the double gameweek is fairly grim. After Burnley away this week, they play no game in week 17, followed by Man Utd and Tottenham. The gameweek 20 double sees them face off with Chelsea and Stoke. Perhaps it may be time to unload Hangeland...

Stoke have a mixed bag, facing both Birmingham and Fulham in the GW 20 double, but do not play in 17, then face Aston Villa and Manchester City away. Etherington, Shawcross and Sorenson are the best choices from Stoke, although that is hardly new knowledge as they are all top performing cheapies. In fact, 44% of teams feature Sorenson! Any of these three would make a good choice.

The Bolton fixture list is marginally better, facing West Ham, Wigan, Burnley and Hull mixed with some Arsenal away and Man City. Their individual form statistics do not make flash reading, and while they are a team very capable of scoring, the goals have been evenly spread which means outside of Kevin Davies there is no obvious choice. They are competing with Portsmouth for last place and while two wins would catapult them up to mid-table, their points are too spread amongst the team to make any player worth grabbing. If you are inclined to a gamble then Davies could be worth a punt when he recovers from his current injury, otherwise there are better options out there than the motley Bolton crew.

It seems the best option for both Gameweek 17's short week and Gameweek 20's double is Arsenal players. In GW 17 they face Burnley away; in GW 20 they face Portsmouth away and Bolton at home. After this weeks challenging trip to Anfield they have Hull, Villa, and Bolton again. Even though Arsenal clean-sheets arent a guarenteed thing this season, budget priced Traore (£4.0m) may be worth a shout if Clichy's injury takes longer to heal than expected. Given the run of fixtures and the double header thats coming up, every team should have at least one of Fabregas and Arshavin. After his 11 point haul this week, Arshavin's price is going to rise as everyone hopes lightening strikes twice. Thats unlikely this week as Arsenal face Liverpool away, but beyond that expect to see the good times roll.

Football Soccer Rooney

2009-12-02T20:57:00.000Z

Manchester United's fixtures are approaching a golden period of unprecidented easiness. Over the next 9 weeks, the toughest fixture may well be Aston Villa at Old Trafford.

West Ham v Man Utd
Man Utd v Aston Villa
Man Utd v Wolverhampton
Fulham v Man Utd
Hull v Man Utd
Man Utd v Wigan
Birmingham v Man Utd
Man Utd v Burnley
Man Utd v Hull

A fixture list like this makes Manchester United players definately worth having. Of those most likely to benefit is Rooney. He plays almost every minute so is a guarenteed starter. His goals this season have been scored both home (4 Premier League goals in 4 matches) and away (6 Premiership goals in 3 matches), so he could be banging home goals at any stage across these fixtures. Finally, barring any injuries he is very likely to see a price rise over the course of these easier fixtures, so profit can be made.

Other comparable strikers include Bent, who is significantly cheaper and whose fixture list is also not horrendous. Drogba is an identical price to Rooney, and after seeing off Man City and Everton in two weeks time Chelsea also have a useful run of fixtures. In mid January Drogba will most likely be off to the African Cup of Nations for up to 3 weeks. In the short period in between, he may be an excellent choice for pairing with Rooney - although that is a pricy combo.

Defoe may also be another useful transfer, although trips away to Everton and Liverpool may not end well for him. And aside from his 5 goal lottery win a fortnight ago, his other points have been, well, sporadic. Consistency is something Rooney may provide in the coming weeks.

An outside option is Torres, whose injury has healed enough that he has resumed training with Liverpool. However the Liverpool fixture list is not as kind, with Arsenal, Aston Villa and Tottenham punctuating the lower teams.

Of the top strikers at the moment, Rooney is definately a fine pick, especially given Manchester United's likely haul of goals until the end of January. If you are in the market for a striker - and with their fixture list you should be - Rooney may be worth his weight in Fantasy Football points.

Franco For Forward

2009-11-27T04:06:00.000Z

Guillermo Franco is a 33-year-old Mexican striker acquired as a free signing for West Ham, and has been a starting forward since Gameweek 10. Over the last 5 games he has scored twice. At £5.0m, he represents a player who may make an excellent cheap third striker. With the long list of injuries hitting the major strikers (Drogba, Van Persie, Torres, and a possible hamstring injury to Darren Bent) and the forthcoming absences of Stoke, Fulham, Everton and Hull from Gameweek 17, active strikers may be thin on the ground.

West Ham have something of a mixed bag of forthcoming fixtures, alternating from rather favourable to really rather not. The run of games until the New Years break sees them face Burnley then Man Utd (both home), Birmingham and Bolton (both away), before Chelsea (h), Portsmouth (h) and Tottenham (a).

Looking at other strikers from the next price bracket above, ie available for under £5.5m, and Franco compares favourably. The best of this price, Burnley's Steven Fletcher, has scored 3 goals, 2 assists and earned 3 bonus points in 1030 minutes. Franco has earned 2 goals, 1 assist and 3 bonus points in 380 minutes. Burnley have a slightly better fixture list leading up to New Year, facing all four bottom teams and with only Arsenal away and Everton at home as the biggest named opponents.

However EPL fantasy football points are often more about individual performances than team results, and Franco's points haul suggest he may become something of a regular points earner at a suitably low price. If picking him up allows you to spend cash elsewhere due to the shifting injury roster of high price players, then he may well be worth a look.

Gameweek 17 Replacements

2009-11-24T20:35:00.004Z

Gameweek 17 is fast approaching, and for the unprepared may cause something of an issue as four teams do not play. And as the four teams represent some of the more popular value players, there is a risk your team may contain several players who earn no points that week. Now is the time to make some strategic use of transfers to plan ahead.

The teams that do not play in Gameweek 17 are Stoke, Fulham, Everton and Hull. All have some key players that may need replacing - today we will look at a couple of the most popular from each team and who suitable replacements might be. If your team only features one or at most two of these players then as long as you have a strong bench, you can probably get by without changing them. However, if you have 3 or more from these teams, it may be worth considering a timely transfer to avoid a dreaded 0 points return.

The two most popular players at Stoke are keeper Sorenson and defender Shawcross. It is no surprise given their excellent returns so far this season, and their absence will be noticed by many managers. At Fulham, Hangeland in defence, Dempsey in the mids and Zamora up front are the most commonly used players. For Hull, cheap options Zayette in defence and Hunt in the midfield see regular points returns while Everton are best represented by Saha in attack.

So the data above in easier-to-read list form:

Key players missing Gameweek 17.

Keeper:
Sorenson

Defenders:
Shawcross
Hangeland
Zayette

Midfielders:
Dempsey
Hunt

Forwards:
Zamora
Saha

Sorenson is having a fine EPL fantasy football season despite difficult conditions, so if you have a second keeper who will definately be taking the field, then consider benching Sorenson for the week. However, if you need to make a change then the best choice for a replacement keeper at a similar price point is Hart of Birmingham. Hart is also accruing big points this season, and Birmingham have a relatively useful match of Blackburn at home.

For replacement defenders, Alexander is an excellent choice. As we mentioned earlier in the year, he plays every game and also takes penalties. Burnley are doing well at home keeping several clean sheets. Alexander makes an excellent addition who will add value to the team if you do not have him already. However Burnley face Arsenal in GW 17, a tough test at the best of times. Other Burnley options include Cladwell and Mears, both whom will play 90 minutes, but against Arsenal may not be the best option.

Birmingham defenders have a better shot at home against Blackburn as mentioned above. Ridgewell is the pick of defenders, but Dann and Johnson R will also do the job. Dont be tempted by Craddock, who is in excellent form for Wolves at the moment - in gameweek 17, Wolverhampton face Manchester United at Old Trafford.

Cheaper midfield choices are probably Sunderland's Reid at £6.0m. Reid is a workhorse in the midfield and also somewhat of a bonus point magnet; in the last 9 gameweeks he has earned bonus points in every game bar one. Ohara may also represent a replacement at Portsmouth. This young bloke has been getting more gametime and racked up a decent tally ina short period of time, and at £4.5m is well priced. However, Portsmouth face Chelsea away so while he may accrue a useful 2 points, a larger points tally may be elusive that week.

Up front Wigan's Rodellega has proved popular and may be scouted by several managers with an eye on bringing him into their team. However, gameweek 17 is Liverpool at Anfield, and the chance of many goals is not good. Conversely, Ngog has been getting more gametime with Liverpool due to their current raft of injuries. It is a risk to bring him in this week as there is no guarentee he will still be first choice come mid-December, but if Liverpool's injury crisis has not subsided then he will represent excellent value, currently priced at £5.2m. Keep an eye on the Liverpool team news and consider him strongly if things do not improve.

Remember, if you have a strong bench you may not need to make changes. However, many popular, cheaper players will miss gameweek 17; dont let these absences impact your points tally.

Defoe Madness

2009-11-23T00:35:00.001Z

On the back of Tottenham's 9-1 trousering of Wigan, Jermain Defoe's 25 point, 5 goal haul means his price is set to skyrocket over the next week or two. The unwashed masses believe any player earning a double-figure points total one week guarantees the same result the following week, and Defoe will be transferred in so many times before the next gameweek that his price should spike by £0.2 - £0.4m. This means a comfortable price rise for any manager who grabs him early.

Tottenham are in a fine vein of form at the moment sitting fourth on the table, however their next two games aren't the easiest: Villa and Everton, both away. After those two tough matches things get a little easier, with a mixture of Wolves, Man City, Blackburn, Fulham and West Ham.

I am always an advocate of striking when the iron is hot, as the best players tend to go on runs of form. After a 25 point haul Defoe's value is definately going to increase markedly by the next gameweek, so there is value to had there. And over the run up to Christmas, the Tottenham fixture list isnt terrible. If you are looking for a replacement striker or would like more cash in the bank, then a shorter term transfer for Defoe may well pay off. If this sounds like you, act quickly to make the most of his soon-to-happen price rise.

Hot Hot Hangeland - For Now

2009-11-21T03:05:00.004Z

This gameweek is a double for a few teams including Fulham, which makes Brede Hangeland a fine pick for the next couple of weeks given Fulham's forthcoming fixtures (Bolton, Sunderland and Burnley after this week's double GW). Hangeland does well every season as a bargain priced defender, and is a key choice for those looking to hone in on Fulham's potential clean sheets.

Hangeland is 4th top defender in the bonus standings and is about due a goal. His price margin of £0.4m or £0.5m premium over Pantsil/Hughes is well worth it given his greater points potential. Expect to see a rise in his price very soon as other managers arrive at the same conclusion.

Fulham's fixture list takes a definate turn for the worse around mid Dec, so plan to transfer him out around then. However, for the next month or so Hangeland is definately worth bringing in. Get him soon and cash in on the price rise, then sell him before Dec 15.

Crashing Cudicini and the Budget Goalkeepers

2009-11-12T21:33:00.000Z

Carlo Cudicini, the Tottenham goalkeeper, fractured his wrists and injured his pelvis after being involved in a road accident this morning. A spokesman for London's Metropolitan police said the ambulance service and an emergency helicopter had attended the scene and found the 36-year-old motorcyclist suffering from injuries described by medics as "possibly life-changing".

The 36-year-old Italian goalkeeper has been admitted to hospital and undergone scans under the supervision of club medical staff.

Cudicini was selected by only 2% of teams so this wont have much of an impact on many teams, however its worth having a fresh look at the goalkeepers doing well.

What is clear is that sinking large amounts of money into a premium name goalkeeper is not the best option so far this season. In fact, many good deals can be had for under £4.5m.

Top of the list is Burnley's Brian Jensen. Burnley have only kept 3 clean sheets and have leaked 23 goals so far this season, but Jensen is always busy making stops and is playing the full 90 minutes. At £4.2m, he is fine choice for backup keeper and could even play as the lead keeper if you feel the savings would earn more elsewhere.

Sorensen of Stoke at £4.3 is the second best at this price. Joe Hart of Birmingham is also worth a look at £4.2m, and with their favourable run of fixtures until Christmas it may be as good a time as any to pick him up. Rounding out the bunch is Wayne Hennessey of Wolves, who has played every minute and is well worth his £4.0 pricetag.

Ivanovic, the Chelsea Bargain

2009-11-12T03:37:00.001Z

Jose Bosingwa is injured and out for up to 3 months, making Branislav Ivanovic a great choice. Previously Ivanovic was a rotation risk, but since Bosingwa has been out Ivanovic has played a truckload of minutes. In the last 5 games, he has picked up 4 clean sheets. Further, with Ashley Cole also injured, Ivanovic's spot in the squad is even more likely to be cemented.

Chelsea have just come off some tough games, and aside from Arsenal at the end of November followed by Man City, it is a largely golden run through the Christmas and New Years fixtures.

Ivanovic has looked like he might sneak away a goal, so there are possible points from that category. He doesnt look like much of a bonus point earner, however with his cheap price tag and his current favour with the manager, you really cant go wrong.

Chelsea are in fine form at the moment, and at the bargain of 5.6m his price is sure to rise in the next few weeks as well. This week see Chelsea at home to struggling Wolves, so the opportunity for yet another clean sheet is very high. Definately a bargain not to be missed!

Imminent Price Risers

2009-08-17T10:31:00.000+01:00

After the opening round's somewhat surprising outlay of points, there is already a wave of activity happening on the fantasy transfer market. This means some players are set to rise in value, and if you are after a short term monetary gain, then jumping on these players at the earliest opportunity is the way to make it happen.

Fabregas had a massive week and a lot of punters have already jumped on him, hoping he can get another 22 points week in week out, despite not playing in Gameweek 2. There may be some slowdown as managers become cognescent of the fact he has no game in round 2, but the numbers may already be so great that a price shift becomes inevitable.

Wigans Jason Koumas also had a great opening week, and at a budget £5.0m he is a promising player to have in your team. At time of writing nearly 20,000 managers had transfered him in so he is going to shoot up in price. Of course, Wigans next set of fixtures may not bring as much success as the opening round, but midfielders are less of a risk than defenders when it comes to suffering really bad losses.

At the other end of the scale, many managers are now moving Neville out of their squads after Everton's disasterous misadventure against Arsenal. Things do not look right in the Everton camp, and there are surely more safer bets elsewhere. Make no mistake, Neville will continue to play, but there are certainly other players at that price point who are more likely to score bigger points before Neville does. Like Koumas, Hunt, Cattermole or Thomas, for example.

Managers are also all over Rodallega, Wigans striker. He had a fine game and after Wigan's horror fixtures list has passed, he may become this seasons Zaki. Time will tell if that happens, but in the meantime his price is likely to move due to large numbers of transfers. Get on him quick if you want to ride this bandwagon to £0.1m Profitsville.

In the backlines, Stoke City's Shawcross is also making a big splash, and is highly likely to rise in price as well. Unsurprisingly Lescott is being dumped by many players after the speculation surrounding his transfer talk affecting his performance, and Rio Ferdinand is also being sold down as managers pick up his teammates Evra and O'Shea.

Week 2 EPL Cheapies

2009-08-17T04:49:00.000+01:00

Now the first EPL round has been played we get a clearer idea of which lowest priced players are getting game time. From the defenders, Wilkinson earned 6 points in Stoke's clean sheet against Burnley. Their fixtures are something of a mix, facing Liverpool on gameweek 2 before playing a pair of lower teams. At £4.0 million, Wilkinson isn't a bad option if he can keep getting gametime. Portsmouth's Wilson may also prove useful.

In the midfield Wigan's Hendry Thomas picked up a bonus point and kept a clean sheet. Any budget player who picks up bonus points is a rare find, and we can expect to see Thomas' value increase over the next couple of weeks as players take him in. This may be premature however, as Wigan face a tough set of fixtures over the next month, including Man Utd, Everton, Arsenal and Chelsea in the next 6 weeks. Put Thomas on your watchlist and consider him then, or transfer him into the squad now while his price is low and keep him on the bench as backup. There may not be too many clean sheets in Wigans immediate future. Birmingham midfielder Fahey may also be worth considering; he played the full 90 minutes and Birmingham's fixtures do not include any of the Big 4. Henry of Wolves also played a full 90 in their loss to West Ham, but like Birmingham, the Wolves fixtures stack up slightly more favorably for the next few weeks (bar a visit to Man City in week 3). A win or two may be more likely for Wolves than the other teams mentioned here, and if this happens there may be points for the taking.

Looking at the forwards, Keogh and Ward both played 90 minutes for Wolves, and Folan played the full 90 for Hull. Both squads have a match this game week, although after facing Tottenham this week, Hull have the better fixture list for the next few weeks.

Remember, the next game week is only two days away, so be sure to set your squad early.

Low Cost Lucas Leiva

2009-08-13T06:21:00.001+01:00

Liverpool recently signed ex-Roma midfielder Aquilani. Whilst he is a very good player, Aquilani has an infamous reputation for injuries, and at Roma he was cruelly labelled by fans as 'Swarovski' due to his constant physical problems. In the last three seasons Aquilani has made just 13, 21 and 14 league appearances respectively due mainly to injuries.

Currently recovering from his ankle surgery, Aquilani is said to be out "four to eight weeks," leaving Benitez to rely on the likes of Javier Mascherano and Lucas Leiva to deputise in midfield.

Whilst preseason matches are not the be-all and end-all of team starting indicators, in Liverpool's last 5 preseason games Lucas has started them all and played quite an advanced role - and performed well there. He scored against Athletico and made lots of incisive passes into the final third of the field; just the kind of pass that leads to assists.

Until Aquilani returns, Lucas is a likely starter in the Liverpool midfield. Assuming Aquilani takes 4 gameweeks to return (and it may be longer), that is plenty of time for other FF managers to notice that Lucas is a starting Liverpool midfielder at the low low price of £5.0m. Typically that will lead to many people transfering him in, so Lucas could represent a good price increase by the time Aquilani returns.

We recently covered cheap midfielders. There is obvious competition for the discount spots in the midfield, but all this potential good value should be helping EPL managers fit their expensive big name players into the squad.

Alexander For The Bench!

2009-08-12T04:40:00.001+01:00

Graham Alexander is Burnley's captain, is £4.5m, and best of all is likely to line up in front of his stated position. Alexander is listed in the game as a defender but he's really Burnley's defensive midfielder. While he likely won't be earning clean sheet points every week, every little bit helps. And on top of that positional bonus, Alexander is Burnley's penalty kick taker, scoring nine of them last season. The 37-year-old captain, who should operate mainly as a holding midfielder, started all last season’s 61 games and scored 9 goals last season. He also played 5 times for Scotland last season.

At £4.5m, Alexander will be worth having on the bench, and when other managers see he plays a regular 90 minutes or if he even pops away a penalty in the opening few weeks, his price is likely to rise.

Burnley don't have the best opening fixtures list, facing Stoke, the Big Three and Everton in the first five weeks. After that things start to get a little better for them, although as Premier League new boys every game will be tough. Still, there are plenty of newly promoted teams who have survived, or even done well, in their first season.

The Guardian's season preview predicts Burnley to finish 16th; the Times predict a 15th place finish. Most bookmakers however have Burnley as the favorite to be relegated. Clearly there is some mixed opinions on the team, and they obviously won't win the league. But once Burnley have moved past their horror opening fixtures expect to see occasional points coming their way, and as the club captain and penalty taker, Alexander represents a decent bench player with potential for price increases.

Gerrard, International Man Of Injury

2009-08-11T21:58:00.000+01:00

All the news outlets are reporting that Gerrard is going to miss the friendly international against Holland due to a groin problem. The Times reports "the Liverpool captain trained yesterday but felt a slight soreness in his groin and did not travel with the squad this morning. He has returned to his club as a precaution."

Gerrard had a groin problem for much of last season. The man himself states "It is not an easy decision. I am 32 so I don't want any problems with anyone. This is not a silly thing. You are playing with the hearts of people. It [an England cap] is not something you can buy in a shop."

Despite these fine words, this move is most likely a preventative measure. With four days until the start of the EPL season it is not a surprise that Gerrard has chosen to rest. While not definate, it would be an incredible surprise if Gerrard does not start for Liverpool, and we believe if you have Gerrard in your squad, do not transfer him out until any news gets worse.

It is likely that there arent many players who are keen on these international friendlies 3 days before the start of the season. Dave Whelan, owner of Wigan, feels much the same about the international fixture schedule. Whelan told Sky Sports News: "It's absolute madness, we've got players flying all around the world. The Premier League, the biggest league in the world, and we've got players thousands of miles away playing and we don't know whether they are going to come back fit."

Herein lies the problem Fantasy managers face from these fixtures. There is a long list of EPL marquee players taking part and injuries are a real risk to almost every competitive FF squad. We will look at the internationals and bring you the injury tally on Thursday; fingers crossed that the players get thru unscathed and we get a full roster for the EPL openers.

Man United defensive issues?

2009-08-09T22:21:00.001+01:00

The Charity Shield illustrated several points of concern for EPL FF managers looking to Man Utd defenders, and has started to turn decisions on players into something of a headache. Vidic has been ruled out for up to two weeks with a calf injury, Ben Foster had some shaky moments in goal which may have opened the door for Kuszczak.

Of course, neither Birmingham, Burnley or Wigan are likely to test the Manchester United defence as much as Chelsea did in the Community Shield, however it is worth keeping in mind that Man Utd have lost a couple of key players who made their defence so solid in the first place.

Additionally, Sir Alex may well rotate several players in his backline. As a longer term choice Rio Ferdinand's previous back injury may mean he may not make it through a whole season, although it would be bad luck for managers to lose him in the opening rounds. At this stage Evra and Ferdinand are the two most likely starting defenders, with all other MU defenders looking a gamble at this point.

Other points thrown up from the Charity Shield match:

Bosingwa and Ashley Cole both look likely starters in the Chelsea defence.
Rooney is in good form for Man Utd up front, as is Valencia in the midfield.
Nani dislocating a shoulder and will definately miss the opening game.

The Cheapest Midfielders

2009-08-09T05:14:00.000+01:00

The base price for a midfielder in the EPL fantasy league is £4.5m. Like most other seasons, this year most of the key all-star players have increased in price, meaning a lot of people are looking to squeeze in base price players to accomodate their bigger names.

Today we are looking at the basement priced mids, and trying to find players who are likely to earn enough points to make them worthwhile additions to your team. Successful discount midfielders will play regularly - ideally 75 minutes or more - and this will lead to an increase in price during the season, as more managers try and spot these budget points earners.

Muamba (Bolton):
Bolton's Muamba had the third highest point total last year among £4.5 midfielders and first in minutes played. Muamba has looked really good in the U21 European Championships for England and this may be his break out year if things go smoothly for him in the EPL. He also had some assists in preseason as well as scoring recently against Hearts. Bolton have no fixtures in gameweek 2 but two good starting fixtures in Sunderland (H) and Hull (A). Unless he gets an assist or goal in the first week then he is unlikely to see much price rise as the bye will make him less attractive to managers looking at £4.5m who played in week 1.

Carsley (Birmingham):
Carsley is a certain starter, which is the first attribute you should look for in any player. A former Irish international, Carsley is going to be a reliable backup worth at least two points every game. Birminghams opening fixture, against Man Utd away, isnt kind, but things get better after that. They also do not have a bye in Gameweek 2.

Edwards (Wolves):
Edwards scored three times and started half of last season's games, taking the field in over 40 of them. He is a likely starter against West Ham although may not get to the 90 minute mark. Despite their grim preseason results, Wolves have favourable set of opening fixtures and Edwards is certain of 1 point - and possibly more if Wolves can take advantage of West Ham at home.

Etuhu (Fulham):
A Nigerian international, he started the last 22 games of last season and is a prefered central midfielder. He missed Fulham's most recent friendly, because he was home for the birth of his son. Fulham are not playing GW2.

Hull have the mega popular Mendy (selected by 11% of teams), Marney and Ashbee as possibly contenders. However, its hard to tell what Brown will do with the Hull team from week to week, and use to drop Mendy and Marney randomly all last season. Hull have a tough opener against Chelsea at Stanford Bridge, and are also expected to have a difficult season, with the bookmakers expecting them to be the second team to be relegated. Keep these gents on the watchlist and if they are getting gametime, it may just be worth giving them some consideration.

Lee Bowyer at Birmingham might also be worth watching; he is suspended for the first game of the season but is likely to earn 2 points when he reaches the field. De Ridder at Wigan is having a good preseason - however that is no guarentee of game time. We were stung recommending him in the same circumstances last year! Worth putting on the watchlist as well.

What The Bookies Think

2009-08-07T01:23:00.001+01:00

Bookmakers always provide an valuable insight into professional football research, since they above anyone else have shedloads of their own money on the line. That makes their offers not only interesting but relevant to the Fantasy Football manager. Lets look at a few, starting with goal scoring options.

Who will be first to score 5 goals? The bookies have Man Utd is slight favorite ahead of Liverpool, both between £2.75 - £3.50. Chelsea and Man City are offering odds in the £4.50 - £5 range. Arsenal rounds out the likely outcomes here at £7.50. This is no surprise given the tough fixtures Arsenal face relative to the other candidates.

In the Most Goals Scored This Season option at Coral, Man Utd are again favorites at £2.50, followed by Liverpool (£2.75), Chelsea (£3.33), Arsenal (£3.5) and Man City (£7).

First player To Score A Hattrick odds from Paddy Power are Torres (£7), Drogba (£11), Rooney (£12), Anelka (£14), Owen (£16), Adebayor (£18) and Van Persie (£20).

In FF terms, this reinforces the belief that picking a main striker from either Man Utd, 'Pool or Chelsea is a good idea. With Liverpool its Torres. At Man Utd, after Rooney its a tough call between Owen and Berbatov as to who will get the most goals. The odds offered by the bookies has Owen ahead of Berbatov for the golden boot. At Chelsea there is little information at this stage to seperate Drogba and Anelka.

Defensively, the odds offered by SkyBet for Most Clean Sheets suggest value may be found in Fulham and Tottenham defenders. They are both seventh-equal favorite, and players from both teams Defender rosters cost £5.5m or less. However, Paddy Power sees things a little differently in the Least Goals Conceded market. Tottenham is again seventh favorite, but Fulham are a decidedly mid-table 11th favorite. Given the raft of injuries across the Tottenham backline, Corluka isnt a bad pick at £5.5m, nor is Assou-Ekooto at £5.0m. Plus he has a funny haircut. From Fulham, Hangeland is already selected by a huge amount of managers - although this can count for very little - and is rumoured to be moving to Arsenal. If that happens he would be well worth the £5.5m pricetag currently on his head.

Like all other betting options there is little to seperate Man Utd, Chelsea and Liverpool at the top of the table, so a defender or two from these teams is clearly a good option.

Potential discipline problems are highlighted with the odds for the first player to get 5 bookings. Players to avoid from this category w(ith prices in brackets) include Fellaini (Everton, £11), Palacios (Tottenham, £12), Cattermole (Wigan, £14), Samba (Blackburn, £20).

Cheap Keeps at the Man Utd Inn.

2009-08-06T05:12:00.000+01:00

Freshly spashing around the news headlines at the moment, Edwin Van der Sar is out for two months after surgery on a broken finger and bone in his left hand.

The Guardian reports Van der Sar sustained the injury saving a penalty during United's shoot-out against Bayern Munich in a pre-season tournament in Germany last week and United have confirmed he will be out for "up to eight weeks".

His absence opens the way for Ben Foster to prove his worth at Old Trafford. Foster has been described by United's manager, Sir Alex Ferguson, as England's best goalkeeper but the 26-year-old has had few first-team chances because of injuries and Van der Sar's excellence.

Despite this article, Foster is far from a nailed on starter as Tomasz Kuszczak is Man United's other option between the sticks. So far this preseason Van der Sar has played in 4 games for 225 minutes, Kuszczak has played 3 games for 180 miuntes, and Foster has played 3 games for 135 minutes. Like everything else Man Utd or Chelsea related, the Community Shield will be the best indicator of what might happen for team lineups in the EPL season opener.

Van der Sar's injury is going to be a windfall for almost everyone. Both Man Utd backup keepers are a mere £5.0m, so this transfer will free up £1.5m if you had VdS, Cech or Reina, or will replace a mid-table keeper with a premium keeper. And if Man Utd keep a clean sheet in their first game at home to Birmingham, then expect large price increases in whichever lucky keeper gets the first team gloves. Swapping in the replacement Man Utd keeper is likely to be of benefit to almost any team.

Potentially this will free up a lot of extra dosh that can be useful in so many ways. Evra can be upgraded to Vidic, who is more likely to score. Tevez or Owen, both in teams with stiff competition for starting spots, can be upgraded to the more likely starters of Van Persie, Adebayor or Berbatov. Any basement priced players in your starting squad can get swapped out for slightly more reliable ones.

In any case, Van der Sar's injury means good things for Fantasy League managers. But keep an eye on who starts in goal during the Community Shield!

Young Jack Wilshere, Early Doors.

2009-08-05T00:33:00.001+01:00

Anyone who saw the results or headlines from the two preseason Emirates Cup games will no doubt be impressed with the 17 year old Arsenal midfielder Jack Wilshere. He was easily Man Of The Match in both games, including scoring 2 against Rangers, the second of which was a glorious rising drive on the half-volley into the top corner. Not a bad way to perform in front of the England manager Fabio Capello, who was watching in the stands.

Wilshere had a great Emirates Cup and is very much in the Arsenal mould of player, with 2 good feet, and good passing and movement. The newspaper headlines are full of his praises, and it may be easy to consider him as an option in your fantasy squad.

While his potential is undoubted, what remains to be seen is whether he will get enough starts in an already packed Arsenal midfield. If he can get a run of games, he could be a snip at £5m. However, all indications is that this looks unlikely.

Wenger has experimented with a 4–3–2–1 formation in pre-season and with captain Cesc Fábregas certain to be one of the regulars, competition would come from Alex Song, Denilson, Abou Diaby and Aaron Ramsey. It is a tough midfield to crack, even with Wilshere's obvious talent.

Arsenal do have a schedule of 5 games in 15 days however, so it is possible he could form part of a rotation policy. However, Wenger's thoughts on how much Wilshere will play this season:

“I don’t know how much he will play. I speeded him up, I put him at 16 years of age in the dressing room and gave him a chance to practice everyday with the first-team players. If I had taken him out of the youth team now you would not have seen what you have seen today. That means he has benefited a lot from special treatment and an acceleration of his education because he plays for one year with the first team. But how many games? I don’t know. The only problem in England is knowing the impatience of the people is that it will be difficult to keep the right pace in his progress.

“Could he play the whole Premier League campaign? Certainly not. He is physically strong because he has a strong body, Jack. It’s difficult to predict.”

Gametime is the cornerstone on which EPL fantasy football points are accrued. If Wilshere is not starting games for Arsenal then he shouldnt be in your starting 11, and your subs should all be playing at least 75 minutes regularly so they can provide points when needed. Young Wilshere is a definate talent and a huge prospect for the future of the England squad, but for this season's fantasy league he is not worth buying at this early stage. Squad injuries may open the window to him throughout the season, but preseason he is too great of a gamble.

Premium Attackers: Big Guns, Coming Through.

2009-08-03T22:41:00.001+01:00

Perhaps the toughest question of this year's EPL fantasy preseason is which of the biggest EPL strikers should be used. They are all costly, and there is uncertainty over starting lineups and succeptibility to injury. But choosing the right striker force early is vital, particularly as many opening fixtures provide the opportunity for some big points.

One approach to choosing your star striker depends who else you have in your team. If you have gone with a high priced central midfielder (which is definately a good policy this season) then pick your striker from a different team, and rotate the captaincy between whoever has the easiest fixture. For example if you have Lampard, then Torres/Lampard offer good captaincy choices for the opening alternate weeks. GW1 - Lampard, GW2 - Torres, GW3 - Lampard, etc. If you have Gerrard then by the same logic go with Drogba or Anelka.

Another approach is to try and find who will have the most success early, regardless of your other players. This is a much tougher question to answer.

From Liverpool it is an easy decision; choose Torres. He is a certainty to start and on simple goals to games ratio he is perhaps the best striker in EPL. There are question marks over his fragility, although in the opening weeks this should not be a problem. Torres is definately a good choice - as the most expensive striker in the game should be! Torres is the bookies favorite for the EPL golden boot this year.

Choosing just one forward from Chelsea is not as easy. Both Drogba and Anelka are fine choices and are equally priced at £10.5m. Some of Ancelotti's comments seem to favour Drogba, but there is speculation he is more likely to get played in a deeper role than Anelka - which may mean fewer goals. The community shield should throw up some clues as to the preferred Chelsea formation. Most bookies have Drogba as slight favorite for golden boot ahead of Anelka, but it is very close. Go with your gut instinct on this one, both players are sound options.

With the arrival of Michael Owen, Man Utd has three strikers in contention for gametime. The BBC reports that with Carlos Tevez and Ronaldo departing the club over summer, Ferguson is likely to use Rooney as a central striker alongside either Owen or Berbatov. Similarly, the Guardian writes "...Ferguson indicated he saw [Owen] as support to the existing strike pairing of Wayne Rooney and Dimitar Berbatov. "We can carry Michael Owen. I won't ask him to play every four days, I might ask him to play every 10 days," the manager said. "We can do it because I always rotate my squad." Interestingly, many bookies dont see it this way and have Owen and Rooney at almost equal odds at around 12-1 for golden boot ahead of Berbatov at 20-1.

It will be interesting to see how many games Owen does get. Again, watch the community shield for more clues on this one. At this stage, Rooney seems the best choice, followed by Berbatov then Owen.

Arsenal have a tough opening fixture list including Everton, a bye in gameweek 2 and Man Utd within the first four weeks, so at this stage their top attacker, Van Persie, is not recommended.

There is very little to seperate the top 4 strikers in EPL fantasy league for the first few games. Torres seems like the top bet but this is no guarentee of the largest points haul from the premier strikers, and any of the key players could be number one in the EPL by the end of August. Further to this, the extra £ saved by choosing someone other than Torres may make a big difference to another position in your squad.

The decision is yours!

Diversify Your Midfield With Milijas

2009-07-30T22:33:00.000+01:00

One of the tricky parts of any new FF season is choosing players from promoted teams that could represent good value. Established favourites like Cech, Lampard, Gerrard and Torres are always going to score points and be selected by thousands of managers. But its the new squads that often have the cheaper players that hit form early and whose value rockets as players jump on board the bandwagon early - think of Geovanni's early success at Hull last season.

Nenad Milijas is a new signing for Wolverhampton Wolves and is listed at £6.0m. He scored 22 goals last season for Red Star Belgrade and had a lot of chances in his debut against Bristol City as well as taking a couple of decent free-kicks and corners.

Further, Milijas likes to push forward and is likely to provide support for Ebanks-Blake (another usefully cheap Wolves player). Said Milijas in an interview after the Bristol game: "I do like to get forward inside the penalty area when I can and try and get shots in and score goals". This was shown as he had several shots and an excellent free kick that was turned around the post by Bristol's keeper.

Adding to his attractiveness is that Wolves have a decent opening set of fixtures, facing West Ham at home on opening day, followed by Wigan, Man City, Hull, Blackburn, Fulham, Sunderland and Portsmouth. Certainly kinder and gentler than, say, Burnley, who face Man Utd, Everton, Chelsea and Liverpool before Gameweek 5.

One sticking point may be his £6.0m pricetag. Certainly there are cheaper players who will be easier to fit into a lineup, but will they provide as useful value, particularly early on? Lets look at last season's Value stats and continue our Milijas - Geovanni comparison. Last season Geovanni was the second cheapest player to crack 120+ points, and was the second best Value (Season) midfielder. The best value midfielder was Murphy from Fulham, and the third best was Brunt from West Brom. Clearly, value in midfielders is often found from the "lesser" teams - including those who were relegated. This season’s best value midfielders will probably come from a similar set of teams.

This season Milijas starts at £1.0m more expensive than Geovanni did last year, but the Serbian international is a likely starter and set piece taker for a squad with a significantly easier opening fixture list than the other promoted sides. He also somewhat unknown and will not be selected by many managers, meaning it is highly unlikely that managers will lose money on him, at least in the first few weeks. If you are looking to diversify your midfield away from the same old players that 35% of all other teams have, Milijas may be just the player.

Mini League 2009

2009-07-29T06:08:00.000+01:00

Last season our mini league was fiercely contested and attracted a lot of quality managers. Well done to all the players who challenged for the title - collectively the league finished 31st from over 140,000, which shows the calibre of the managers joining the mini league. Congratulations to Mingyu Wong whose Agents Of Change team won the league.

This season the code for the mini-league is 238543-119698

Can Agents Of Change do the double, or will you stand in his way?

Possible Penalty Takers

2009-07-28T09:37:00.005+01:00

Possibly the best attribute a player in your EPL fantasy team can have is to be a penalty taker. But until the season is underway, it can also be one of the hardest things to tie down. Preseason games are indicators only, and the presence or absence of something happening in a preseason game does not indicate we should take that as a given either. After all, Gerrard playing for the Liverpool reserves in a recent preseason EPL friendly does not mean we should bet on him struggling to make the Liverpool First 11.

Equally, Liam Lawrence will be hoping preseason counts for little in his gaffers mind, as he missed a penalty kick as Stoke went down 2-1 at Championship team Preston yesterday. It shouldnt affect his position as the teams penalty taker however.

The list below shows expected penalty takers for each EPL side. These are a based on a mix of information gathered from last season matches, pre-season friendlies and also the a player’s role at previous clubs. Players are listed in the likely order of priority, e.g. the first name in the list is the preferred taker.

Arsenal - Van Persie, Adebayor
Aston Villa - Milner, Young, Carew
Birmingham -
Blackburn - McCarthy, Roberts, Santa Cruz
Bolton - Elmander, Taylor
Burnley -
Chelsea - Lampard, Ballack, Drogba
Everton - Arteta, Jo, Cahill, Yakubu
Fulham - Murphy, Johnson, Kamara
Hull City - Geovanni, Bullard
Liverpool - Gerrard, Torres, Alonso
Man City - Robinho, Elano, Bellamy
Man United - Berbatov, Rooney, Carrick
Portsmouth - Kranjcar, Crouch, Kanu
Stoke City - Lawrence, Higginbotham, Fuller
Sunderland - Whitehead, Cisse
Tottenham - Defoe, Modric, Bentley
West Ham - Noble, Ashton, Cole
Wigan - Zaki, Mido, Valencia
Wolves -

This list is a guide to who MAY take penalties this season, however this may change so keep an eye on preseason injuries - and of course transfers!

Tough Value In The Arsenal Midfield

2009-07-23T06:39:00.001+01:00

Samir Nasri played the second most minutes of the Arsenal midfielders last season, although that was still a season hindered by injuries. This week he suffered a fractured fibula in a leg clash with Abou Diaby while training in Austria; he is expected to be out for up to 3 months.

So if you were in the market for an EPL midfielder from Arsenal, which options would be worth considering now? Arshavin is practically a guarenteed starter, but his price might be prohibitive for those who have gone for a Gerrard + Lampard midfield solution. However, if the budget exists to bring Arshavin in, he is certainly a fine option and is likely to be in the goals (and points) this season.

Beyond that it is a gamble trying to pick regular starters at this stage from the Arsenal midfield. Wenger has a range of talented players he is likely to rotate throughout the season to accomodate injuries and Champions League matches.

Last season Denilson played the most minutes of the Arsenal midfield, but his points did not match his minutes and he is hardly a bonus point magnet. Fabregas is an excellent player and would make a fine midfield choice, but his gametime is tough to forecast and his track record of injuries is worrying. Rosicky is appropriately priced at £7.0m and will compete for early minutes with Walcott.

Overarching this is Arsenals's tough start to the season from an EPL Fantasy Football point of view. In the first 5 weeks they face Everton, a bye, Portsmouth, Man Utd and Man City. These fixtures are tougher than the other Big 3 clubs face, and none of Liverpool, Chelsea or Man Utd face a bye in Gameweek 3.

At this stage, Arsenal midfielders are a tricky proposition to recommend. Arshavin is expensive and beyond that Arsene's rotation policy, the tough early fixtures and the gameweek 3 bye mean larger point hauls may be found in the mids from the other Big 4 clubs.

Vidic and the Man Utd Defence

2009-07-21T10:15:00.001+01:00

Man Utd are likely to be one of the top two best defensive teams in the league, and with their especially easy opening three fixtures, a Man Utd defender - or two - will make a very good choice.

Of their backline, Vidic is the premium choice. Although expensive for a defender, if he can repeat last seasons points haul then he will be worth the price. At 8m he is the same price as the likes of Young, Defoe, Agbonlahor and Keane, and Vidic outpointed all of these players last season. He plays a role at attacking corners which gives him frequent chances for goals or assists.

As well as this Vidic collects bonus points and clean sheets. He is probably Man Utds most reliable defender, and possibly the most consistent Big 4 defender other than Carragher, only with further goal and bonus potential, averaging 5.5 pts per game last season.

The other prominent Man Utd defensive options are Evra and Ferdinand.

Evra's points over the last few seasons are average at best for a Man Utd player as he tends to pick up injuries, rarely gets assists and almost never gets bonus points. However he is good value for money for a Big 4 defender and assuming he can avoid injuries, should return suitable points and at a more affordable price.

Rio Ferdinand got a little unlikely on the injury front last season; he's not necessarily a player who over his career has been especially injury prone but did have a bad time of it last year. For 1m less than Vidic, he's decent in the air, gets into the box, will pick up a few bonus points and you can always sub him if the worst happens and he gets injured.

Vidic has ended up with the odd red card, although he is not exactly in the same anger management league as Lee Bowyer or Joey Barton. The major concern over Vidic is his fitness - he is currently injured and missed the preseason tour to Malaysia.
Keep a close eye on Man Utd's preseason lineups over the next few weeks, particularly the Charity Shield match, which is often a good indicator of the regular squad lineup. If Vidic is not healthy for the start of the season, Ferdinand will become the next best choice.

Given that Man Utd are playing over Gameweek 3, have an easy opening set of fixtures and are consistently one of the best teams defensively, a defender or two from their lineup will be a very sensible choice.

CNN: 2007-2008 Winner Reveals Secrets Of Success

2009-07-19T00:36:00.003+01:00

CNN posted an interesting article interviewing the 2007 - 2008 Premier Fantasy League winner John Frisina. He is fairly coy about his winning formula but does offer some sensible maintenance strategies around injuries.

Im not sure how far I would carry his comments about "taking a chance on three or four undervalued players"; apparently Frisina was running several teams that were almost identical with only one or two players difference, something that many 'serious' players considered morally wrong, some even claiming it was outright cheating!

In this situation you can afford to "take a gamble", but for the rest of us only maintaining 1 team, proper research is a better strategy. After all, there is no guarentee any player will be a star, so in that regard all players are a gamble.

In any case, it is still interesting to see such a large American media outlet produce such an interesting article on th EPL Fantasy game. Here is the write-up:

LONDON, England (CNN) -- "Incredible" is how John Frisina remembers the moment he logged on to Fantasy Premier League and discovered he was beating nearly two million other competitors.

It's the stuff dreams are made of for the millions of people managing fantasy football teams in online leagues around the world every year.

But in most players' experience, for one reason or another, the glory of victory always remains just out of reach.

It's hardly surprising, given that this year alone 1.9 million fiercely competitive fans played the game billed as "the ultimate Fantasy Football."

So, then, what separates the players who get to the top from all the rest? Is it instinct, or, maybe knowledge, or is it simply old-fashioned good luck?

Frisina, who is Australian, went on to win the Fantasy Premier League in 2007/2008, beating hundreds of thousands of would-be managers both from England and around the globe in the process.

It was the fourth year he had played the game and he says he was surprised to remain so competitive through the season.

"Really only in the last couple of years I have been in the top 200 or so. I was nowhere near the leaders before that."

Frisina felt striking a balance between superstars and cheaper players was crucial to his fantasy football success -- as was a bit of luck.

"Having a well balanced side with not too many superstars is important. I think you need to pick three or four players who you feel are undervalued and take a chance on them."

For Frisina, taking a chance on players like Sunderland's Kenwyn Jones and Ryan Taylor of Wigan paid off -- and he found himself still around the top 100 by mid-season.

There were a couple of other tactics that helped Frisina rise to the top.

"I think it happened after I started watching a few more games on television. I got to see first-hand who was playing, what form they were in and I learned a lot from there. Having a good knowledge of all the players across all of the teams is really important."

Checking teams for injuries and selections close to the deadline was also important, he said.

Seven weeks out from the end of the 2007/2008 season, Frisina hit the lead and managed to hold on for the rest of the season.

"I came out of nowhere really. There was one week where I just logged on to check my team and I found myself in front. It was incredible."

From out in front, Frisina said the tactics were slightly different during his once-a-week team assessment.

"I kept having a look at the guys below me and tried to keep a similar sort of team so they couldn't catch me."

Creator of the Fantasy Premier League game, Mark Hughes of ISM Games, said he had never done well in the game, but it appeared those that won followed the game very closely.

"You tend to see the same players up there year after year. They would follow the fixtures closely and know all of the players.

Hughes, despite being the brains behind the game, says he doesn't have any answers to the question of how to play world-beating fantasy football.

"I don't know if I have any secrets, though, because if I knew them I'd be a lot better at the game," Hughes said.

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/SPORT/football/03/20/win.fantasy.football/index.html

The New Season Fast Approaches...

2009-07-16T11:39:00.003+01:00

Another season that looks completely different to last season, yet somehow the same... its just another year in the Fantasy Premier League! Some big players have up and gone whilst at the same time the tough decision hasn't gotten any easier over which key central midfielder to pick. New strikers glisten with the promise of points Points POINTS, while the likely suspects remain tempting.

The 2009 - 2010 season is just around the corner and we are gearing up for a wave of analysis as more and more news starts coming through from the pre-season results. We will be looking at who represents excellent value this season, who isn't, what managers may be thinking for starting lineups, who is taking the penalties this year, and of course, what the bookies think.

A new code for this season's blog mini-league will soon be posted as well as thoughts on the new rule changes and the best methods to work them to your advantage.

So lots to look forward to in our usual pre-season flurry of analysis and reports, followed later by dwindling enthusiasm and slacking off as the season grinds on...

This season's first real post will be going out tomorrow. Watch this space!

Last Ditch Cellar Dweller Picks

2009-05-13T00:30:00.000+01:00

We are almost at the end of another season but there are still plenty of EPL fantasy points up for grabs. As the cellar dwellers battle it out to avoid the drop, there is opportunity to bring in a couple of relegation battlers. At the bottom it's do or die for 5 of the clubs and there may be some points being scored, probably in the attacking areas (there probably will not be any defensive spoils. Here are some relegation options for the final 2 games:

Sunderland - POR {a} CHE {h}
As Pompey make their own safety will they slack off a little here? The Black Cats have to go for it here as it is unlikely they will get a thing against Chelsea, even if they need to. Saying that, Sunderland were plucky in their last game and their current league standing seems to see them as the most likely to survive out of these 5. Good Pick: Mabranque - his work-rate in the center of the park might be just what they need and he has had some of the cleanest assists this season.

Hull City - BOL {a} MAN U {h}
Free fall has never meant more than Hull's slump since last year. The Bolton game is a must-win. They are capable, but must not rely on the others below them (although one suspects it will be the bottom 3's failures that keep Hull up). That said, they still need to pull their finger out because relying on the United game is a big mistake. Good Pick: Geovanni - I think the loss of confidence and disagreements with the manager might not stand in the way of one last piece of magic...

Newcastle - FUL {h} AST {a}
Fulham can still spoil the party here with a very serious European challenge. And can Newcastle do it on the last day of the season against a Villa side wanting to secure 5th spot? This is a taller order than first glance of the fixture suggests. Good Pick: Duff - it might just take a chance shot at goal or a last stitch cross or crucial surge of pace, and this guy has the ability.

Middlesbrough - AST {h} WES {a}
People have mixed views about Boro - they are without resources or confidence, but have some decent young unknowns and a dedicated manager. They beat Villa away and can probably beat the Hammers on their turf too. Its a big "if" but I believe they will give it everything and anything can happen. Good Pick: Downing - this would be the perfect time to get his first goal of the season, this might also show his commitment to stay in the Premier League.

West Brom - LIV {h} BLA {a}
It would be great to see West Brom make a remarkable escape and join their Midland rivals Wolves and Birmingham in the big league next season. But to beat Liverpool at home? I route for the underdog here big time but don't see it happening. Away at Blackburn, they can certainly ruffle their feathers and come away with a last day victory. Good Pick: Brunt - an unsung hero at the Hawthorns, his ball possession, edge of the area passing and right-place-at-the-right-time mentality could make him more heroic than ever.

Is It Ronaldo Time?

2008-10-07T09:40:00.003+01:00

Ronaldo is back, and priced higher than ever. There is no doubt that he is a phenomenon in FF terms. But is he worth the £14.2 (and climbing!) pricetag?

Lets see what else £14.2 could buy you:

Liverpool defender Arbeloa (£6.0m) AND
Everton midfielder Arteta (£8.0m)

Liverpool look like they are mounting a serious Premiership challenge this season, and are keeping several clean sheets along the way. Arbeloa has played almost every minute this season which means guarenteed Clean Sheet points - however he does have 4 yellow cards. Between now and Jan 31st, the 'Pool face only 3 Top 4 games: Chelsea twice and Arsenal just before Christmas. Favourable times ahead.

A lot of people predicted big things for Arteta this season, and he hasn't disappointed so far. Two goals, 4 assists, 8 bonus points and a maximum compliment of minutes played points to a regular points-accruer. Everton face the tough line-up of Arsenal and Man Utd as their next two games, but then have fairly easy sailing until 22nd Dec.

Villa striker Carew (£7.7m) AND
Chelsea defender Bosingwa (£6.5m)

Carew has scored in 4 of the 7 games played this season, chalked up a couple of assists, and also made away with 7 bonus points. Villa's fixtures list through till Christmas isn't perfect, but whether they keep a clean sheet or not is of little concern to the in-form Villa striker's points tally.

Chelsea, like Liverpool, are shaping up to be contenders for Most Clean Sheets this season. And since Bosingwa is playing practically every minute for Chelsea, he earns lots of juicy Clean Sheet points. He has also potted a goal, and its likely he will pull in some assists over the course of the season as well.

But will these two combinations add up to more points than Ronaldo's total? He has started with a bang, but I do not believe he will repeat last season's heroics of 280+ points; it was such a freakishly outrageous performance I do not think anyone can do it two seasons back-to-back.

There is definately an element of "Keeping Up With The Joneses" in FF, and if loads of other players have Ronaldo and he DOES start to look like he might repeat his mammoth points tally, then it will become important to have him in the squad. But by then his price will have risen even more...

It is early days yet, but Man Utd have a good fixture list between now and Christmas. However, that £14.2m will buy a lot of other quality players. It is a tricky decision.

What do you think - buy Ronaldo early, late, or not at all? Let us know your thoughts on the issue in the comments below.

ps: Apologies for the lack of recent posts; I've been in Australia visiting me Nephews. Normal service is now resumed!

Zaki, Zaki, Cheap and Good

2008-09-01T10:41:00.000+01:00

Amr Zaki is the breakaway leader in the early stages of the FF season for Top Striker. And at only £6.2m he represents good value indeed; he is playing every minute, has 3 goals and 1 assist to his name, and perhaps more importantly is proving to be a bonus point magnet. He has earned a bonus point every week for the first three weeks, and enviable achievement that is unmatched by any other player.

Wigan also have a favourable run of fixtures ahead. Between now and December they only face one of the Big Four teams - Liverpool away on 18th Oct. The rest of the fixtures include middle-ground teams like Villa, Middlesborough and Portsmouth. Zaki's next three games are Sunderland (home), Tottenham (away), Man City (home).

Zaki's bargain price has him head and shoulders above other strikers on Value (Form), a measure of points as a ratio of player cost. Given his current form - and Wigans fixture list - it is very likely that Zaki will tuck another goal or two away in the coming weeks. And even if he doesn't get any himself, he may very well set someone else up for an assist, or draw himself a bonus point or two that the Press Association analysts seem to love giving him.

Zaki's price is set to keep rising, so picking him up at this early stage and holding him for the next 4 or 5 weeks should see a decent return on investment. It should also continue to return decent points. Definately recommended as a second striker.

Wildcard Theories

2008-08-22T08:10:00.001+01:00

In the sport of Premier League.com fantasy football, the Wildcard is the one-use golden ticket allowing unlimited transfers. Although it can be played any time, it is always enticing to make several transfers after the first gameweek. Seeing other players scoring 5, 6 or 7 points for the same price as players in your squad who scored 1 or 2 points makes it tempting to commit to wholesale changes very early on.

There are a few schools of thought when it comes to Wildcard theory:

* Play your card very early, jump on every bargain player from gameweeks 2 - 4, hope they increase in value quickly, and take the money and run.

* Play it during the first long International Week, Aug 30th - Sept 13th (after GW3). By then it will be clear who is in form and who is first choice. It also provides good scope to make the necessary tinkering that may be required to bring Ronaldo back into the squad if he is nearing a return.

* Tailor a new team to monopolise double gameweeks and max out the players playing 180 mins that week. A variation on this: in the weeks prior to an appealing double GW, use double transfers to gradually recruit players who will be playing in the GWx2. Then AFTER the GWx2, you can sort your squad out using the wild card.

* Hold on till the final run when there are often double, even triple gameweeks. One for the cagey conservative here.

To establish when the best time to use a wildcard, I reviewed the overall first 11 fantasy teams from the 07/08 season. Lets see how last year's winners did it - the data for the week of their wildcard use is formatted as Week Of Transfer (# of Transfers made):

3(8) 38(14) 14(8) 30(5) 28(2) 30(5) 26(4) 6(7) 8(15) 28(3) 28(3)

average: 21.7 (6.7)

This works out with an average of around GW 21-22 and a spread of more or less the whole season. With an average number of transfers per Wildcard of nearly 7, the top managers looked to make large changes to their squads.

Conclusion: the Top 11 managers from last season used their Wildcards more or less evenly across the whole season. Personal preference seems to be the best guide - although it would pay to wait at least two weeks to get a feel for consistent performances rather than one-shot flashes. That aside, any time is a good time for a wildcard!

When do you think you will be using your Wildcard? Give us your views in the Comments below.

Villa Offensive Players

2008-08-21T04:02:00.001+01:00

This week Villa players look like they might be a Good Thing. They are in fine form after thumping Man City, and this week they have a trip to Stoke - a promising fixture indeed. So who are the better options of Villa offensive players?

Agbonlahor got off to a flyer, scoring a second half hat-trick in the space of 7 minutes. The bookies have responded by slashing his odds of being top goal scorer from greater than 70:1 right back to around 17:1. And starting at £8.0 million, his large points haul make him an attractive target for players looking to transfer him in. But despite the great start and this weeks newly promoted opposition, it is unlikely that he will put away another 3 goals this week. In fact Agbonlahor has a bit of a track record for scoring FF points in bursts, before going long periods only pulling in the base 2 points per week.

Carew is the other Villa striker, and is possibly a better choice as he is more of a target on set pieces because of his physical prowess. Carew also scored in Saturday's rout, and as a result of Villa's promising start the bookies have adjusted Carew's price for top goalscorer; from around 70:1 he has narrowed to between 40:1 and 50:1, depending on where you do your bet-shopping.

In the midfield Barry picked up where he left off last season, and was instrumental in the Villa win with 2 assists. Ashley Young lived up to expectations and scored an assist and bonus points - he could become a bonus magnet this season. Both Barry and Young are £8.5 million, or for the same price you could have Man City's Elano, who is their penalty taker this season and as such will pop a few away from the spot.

Of course its not entirely roses: there is risk in bringing in a Villa player as their fixtures get a little gloomy after the Stoke match, specifically Liverpool at home before Tottenham away. But there will be points to be had in both games, and you should always be able to turn to your bench should you not fancy their odds.

Ashton: All Clear

2008-08-19T03:35:00.000+01:00

West Ham United's website is reporting that Ashton's scan on his injured leg has reported no problems and come back all clear. They state he will "continue to be monitored but is hopeful of being back in action this coming weekend". Expect to see him playing between 70-80 minutes.

This is good news for West Ham and also for the 19,000 fantasy managers who had transferred him into their squad already. At £6.5 million pounds, his price is very likely to rise within the day, as the number of transfers required to drive up the price of a player owned by 15% of the competition seems to be around 20,000.

West Ham have a promising run of fixtures through September and into October: City away, Blackburn at home, West Brom away, Newcastle at home, Fulham away then Bolton at home and Hull away. If Ashton remains fit, his personal and his team's current form indicates there could be some good points to be had.

FF is a game about resisting temptation and making longer term decisions. Having waited out the possible injury scare on his leg, Ashton now makes a good choice as a cheap striker, in good form, facing a useful run of fixtures.

£6.0m backs: Liverpool vs Chelsea

2008-08-19T01:02:00.000+01:00

With the season underway it is already looking like it may be dominated by at least 3 of the Big Four teams. The top teams will concede fewer goals and keep more clean sheets, so their defenders make fine choices. We looked recently at Arsenal defenders; but which team will provide better value in the backs between Liverpool and Chelsea?

Liverpool have gotten off to a shakey start. After an unconvincing win against Standard Liege, they escaped wth the points from their opening game at Sunderland - although only just. Both Murphy and Diouf had fine chances to score; likewise against Liege, Liverpool conceded a couple of golden opportunities that their opponents conspired to squander, including a saved penalty.

Part of the problem is the injuries they have in their backs. With Agger injured, Rafa the Gaffer handed Sami Hyypia a start. Arbeloa and Dossena, both at £6.0 million, represent the best value from 'Pool.

Chelsea played a five man midfield which limited Portsmouths chances. The club has looked solid in defence throughout their preseason and now thru the first game. Both Reina and Cech are excellent keepers, but at this stage it looks like Chelsea will concede fewer goals than Liverpool this season.

Chelsea defenders are mostly more expensive, but they do have one £6.0 million defender - Jose Bosingwa. A new arrival at the club during the off season, he gets around a lot and provided a couple of good crosses in the Portsmouth game, expect the occasional assist as well as many clean sheet bonuses. And against Wigan this week, Chelsea is not expected to struggle.

So for £6.0 million, Bosingwa makes a better choice at this stage than Arbeloa and Dossena.

Ashton's Calf vs Knee Jerk Transfers

2008-08-17T01:18:00.002+01:00

Dean Ashton had a stunning season opener for West Ham against Wigan, scoring twice and racking up 10 points. And at £6.5 million, many people will be looking to transfer him into their squad as a cheap but highly effective points scorer; a completely understandable reaction to his point scoring heroics.

However, Ashton had to leave the field in the 73rd minute with a calf injury sustained when he took a free kick. Will this affect his ability to make the starting lineup next week? With 9 other first team players sidelined through injury, Alan Curbishley may not want to risk furthering Ashton's injury. He is to undergo a scan on Monday; in the meantime he has been ruled out of England's friendly against Czech Republic at Wembley on Weds (20th Aug).

We've previously looked at transfer usage by the top 50 managers overall in last year's Fantasy Premier League competition, and seen that they averaged 1 transfer per week. This seems fairly obvious - the best teams kept to 1 transfer per week and did not lose 4 points by making double changes. Bringing Ashton in at this early stage potentially risks having to make a second transfer - something you should limit whenever possible.

At the time of writing, over 3400 FF managers had transferred Ashton into their squad already. There can be some advantage in immediately transferring in a player who did well, to capitalise on the likely price rise as other managers pick him up over the week. But transferring Ashton this early may well backfire if he is not cleared to play next week - a tougher match against Man City away. Some reports are touting his injury as "a severe cramp", but other agencies, including Sky Sports and BBC, are listing it as a calf strain.

If he were fully fit and you were looking to transfer a striker, Ashton would make a fantastic purchase. At this stage it is too early to tell - and that means its too early to risk making knee jerk transfers by bringing him into your squad.

The Baines Gamble

2008-08-15T09:41:00.003+01:00

David Moyes has stated publically that Leighton Baines is considered the best left back at Everton. However competition for starting spots in the Everton backline is fierce, and the things have been shaping up that Baines may not have gained a starting role. His smaller size seems to have counted against him as Lescott and Yobo are more robustly built, and these players seemed to be the favorites of the gaffer.

So Jakielka, Yobo, Neville and Lescott are the likely defensive starters; Everton are strongest with these four at the back.

Surrounded by a fully fit squad, things might not have looked good for our Bainesy. However, the recently broken toe of winger Steve Pienaar may yet turn Baines into FF gold.

For starters, Baines is cheap. At £5.0 million he is certainly one of the cheaper defenders. With both Pienaar and his fellow midfielder Cahill injured, Everton now face a midfielder crisis. One likely solution is that Moyes elects to play Baines at left mid. If this happens, Baines could be in for an absolute torrent of points in the first week.

Because Baines is listed in FF as a defender, he gets a Clean Sheet bonus should Everton shut out Blackburn on Saturday. If Moyes plays him as a midfielder, he is much more likely to score or be involved in assists. If he scores a goal, it is worth 6 points instead of 5 (for a midfielder) or 4 (for a striker). Basically, players listed as defenders but playing as midfielders are worht their weight in gold.

Blackburn have lost Brad Friedel and David Bentley, and Roque Santa Cruz suffered an Achilles injury during Blackburn's 4-2 friendly defeat at Wolves at the start of August. There is a possibility he may not be available for the season opener, which will make Blackburns tough task even tougher. Finally, Everton have home ground advantage. The bookies have Everton as clear favorites to win. Baines is between 8:1 and 14:1 to score a goal, and most bookies expect between 2 - 3 goals in the game.

There is a lot of "maybes" in this equation. But if Baines does play in the midfield, and Everton keep a clean sheet or Baines scores - or both! - then Baines owners could be in for a big dividend. All for a mere £5.0 million. Could be well worth a gamble.

One To Watch: Pompey's Mendes

2008-08-14T12:16:00.002+01:00

This season Portsmouth have shifted formation from the the 4-3-3 cum 4-5-1 system largely used last season to a greater emphasis on a 4-4-2 shape. To this end, manager Harry Redknapp has signed midfielder Diarra as well as Nigeria striker John Utaka, who is likely to compete for a midfield spot (Crouch and Defoe having secured the striking roles).

But it has been Pedro Mendes who has started every one of Pompey's friendlies, as well as the Community Shield against Man Utd. Listed in FF at the cheapest possible £4.5 million, Mendes will represent fantastic value if he gets a starting spot.

Mendes has scored a couple of goals in preseason games, and took some of the corners in the Community Shield match. With Pompey having some tall players in the squad, including Crouch up front, Mendes' crosses are likely to lead to assists as well as goals.

It was expected that Mendes would likely challenge Diop for the remaining central midfield spot alongside Diarra, with Krancjar and Utaka taking the wide berths. But the Community Shield saw Diop take the wide position from Utaka, and Redknapp put his faith with Mendes in the centre for 90 minutes. Whilst the majority of points from Pompey's midfield will probably come from Kranjcar, if Mendes is given a starting role he will certainly be worth attaining.

We recommend keeping an eye on him for Portsmouth's opening fixtures, and if he starts then consider picking him up as another bargain basement midfielder.

An Arsenal Preview

2008-08-13T07:56:00.004+01:00

Arsenal are one of the favorite teams from which to draw drawing FF players. Arsene Wenger doesnt rotate the squad too frequently and generally persists with a favoured starting line-up, so you can get a clear idea of which players should expect big minutes. They are also a very attacking team, most of which seems to go through Adebayor.

Additional to these team traits, this season Arsenal have a fantastic opening list of fixtures. They open the season with West Brom at home, followed by Fulham away, Newcastle at home, Blackburn away, Bolton away, Hull at home and Sunderland away on 4th October. They have by far the best opening run of the Big Four teams.

So clearly, having some Arsenal players in the squad is a good idea. But who?

Almunia in goal isn't the best choice for £6.0 million. Arsenals weak points in FF terms is that they tend to concede late goals, which keeps precious Clean Sheet bonus points away from defenders and keepers. Also Almunia wont be called on to make a lot of saves this season, so there will not be many points for Saves or Bonus Points, since he probably wont be called into action often. Plenty of other keepers out there for that money.

Defensively, Clichy or Sagna make the best choices as they are both defenders who will play every game, like to push forward and provide the odd cross and assist. Both are excellent choices. Gallas and Toure are also likely to play a lot, and Gallas even chipped in with 4 goals last season.

In the midfield, Fabregas should be a certaintly in any team that doesn't feature both Gerrard and Lampard. However, Fabregas has picked up a thigh strain and will miss the opening game against West Brom. Rosicky and Diaby are also both injured, Song is at the Olypmics with Cameroon, but Nasri is expected to be ready for the opening of the season. Fabregas should be making big points by the time the season ends, but he wont be making any points in the first week. Nasri and Denilson are the two best picks from the Arsenal midfield for the opening round.

Up front, the talents of Adebayor cannot be overlooked. Ade will start every game and is the Arsenal penalty taker. The bookies have installed him as the second favorite to be the leading goal scorer this season, behind Torres. But where Torres has Keane to share the goalscoring duties with him, Adebayor is accompanied by the somewhat injury plague Robin Van Persie. Old RVP struggled with injury last season, with Walcott playing more minutes. Eduardo is also injured, although £8.5 million spent on him is, frankly, a waste. The definitive choice for an Arsenal striker is Adebayor.

So a good opening fixture list but a bad opening injury list. Could be an surprisingly tough campaign for The Arse in 08-09, which relies on one or two key players to bring in their points. This might be a Fantasy goldmine for those players!

Clichy

2008-08-11T16:57:00.001+01:00

Everyone likes having defenders from the Big Four clubs, but picking the regular starters can be deceptive. Ranking defenders for minutes played last season, of the top 25 only 5 come from Chelsea, Man Utd, Liverpool or Arsenal. Many of the big fours' defenders get injured or rotated during the season - picking the few players who regularly start can be tough in the preseason. Last season one of the most prolific players from the Big Four was Gael Clichy of Arsenal.

Defensively, Clichy is a star for Arsenal. Last season he intercepted the most passes (134) of any player in the league, and was the fourth most prolific tackler in the game, winning 120 tackles during the season. Form like this meant Arsene Wenger had no trouble locking Clichy in as a starter, and he took the field in every Premiership match last season. Regular minutes is the first attribute any player in your Fantasy squad must have, and Clichy certainly meets that criteria.

Further, Arsenal have a great start to the season as far as fixtures are concerned. Their first six matches are against West Brom (H), Fulham (A), Newcastle (H), Blackburn (A), Bolton (A) and Hull (H). This lineup looks promising for at least a couple of clean sheets; far better than Man Utd or Chelsea's substantially tougher opening opponents.

A lot has been made of Almunia being a little leaky in goal for Arsenal, and it is not expected that they will keep as many clean sheets throughout the season as Liverpool or Chelsea. But for the opening month or two, Clichy is likely to play almost every minute in a team that is expected to challenge for the title and should pick up the odd clean sheet as well.

Torres

2008-08-10T08:17:00.000+01:00

Last season Torres scored 24 goals, joint-top for Forwards (shared with Adebayor). This season he is the bookie's universal favorite to be the leagues Golden Boot, followed by Ronaldo, Adebayor and Drogba.

As far as price goes, these are the lads you will be paying top quid for to have in your team. Torres is £12.0 million; Drogba, Adebayor and Rooney are each £11.0 million. One million pounds makes little difference for the top strikers, but it can certainly go a long way in goal or in the defence. Is Torres worth that extra £1.0 million?

Liverpool have a good opening run of fixtures: Sunderland away, Middlesborough at home and Aston Villa away. Torres will be playing almost every minute of these games, and the strike partnership with new teammate Robbie Keane is expected to deliver goals. Paddy Power have a book open for First Hattrick, and it is no surprise that Torres is the favorite here too.

Perhaps the only reason you wouldn't select Torres for your Fantasy team is due to the fact that 45% of all teams have him already selected. This is further evidence of the expectation of Big Things - but it does mean that you will need to find another point of difference between your squad and most others. It also mean that should Torres have a bad game, almost half the league will be encumbered with it.

There is definately hype around Torres winning Euro 2008 with his spanish teammates. However, there is also little doubt that he is expected to be one of the stars of this years premiership. He is slightly more expensive than other strikers, and that will be the deciding factor in his acquisition. If the extra £1 million will significantly strength your squad in another position, then consider Adebayor, Van Persie or even Keane. However, if the money is available, then Torres represents as good an option as any for a 08-09 Fantasy squad.

Private League 08-09

2008-08-06T23:32:00.002+01:00

Just like every other Fantasy blog, we've established a private league. Sign up using the code below and see how you fare against other readers of our blog.

PremierFantasyBlog league: 26301-136791

Lampard vs Gerrard

2008-08-06T23:13:00.000+01:00

Lampard and Gerrard are consistently among the top points scorers in FF, and are priced as such. If you can only choose one, which one should you take? Both are very good players with not a lot between them in terms of FF points, but we favour Lampard.

Both are penalty takers and both are key team members who will play almost every minute this season (barring injury). And both Chelsea and Liverpool have good early fixtures. Doubt over Lampards likelihood of starting has been largely dispelled through the course of the Chelsea preseason. Lampard has played in, and scored in, almost every game. He is in good form and the coach has faith in him.

Gerrard's preseason suffered a setback against Valerenga when he suffered a thigh strain that is likely to keep him out of an early Champions League match. It is only minor and Liverpool are hoping that he will be fit for the start of the season, but it does play against him when we are choosing against a fully fit Lampard.

From a selection point of view, Lampard is only selected by 5% of people, whereas Gerrard is selected by 28%. This means 28% of the league will overtake you if Gerrard does well but if Lampard does well you'll overtake 95% of people.

Further, with Keane now playing behind Torres at 'Pool, Gerrard may be in a more central midfield roll which may reduce his goal threat (although increase his assist threat).

Both players are fine choices and there is not much to decide between the two. However Gerrard's recent injury may leave him less than 100% on opening day, and given that only 5% of opposition managers have chosen Lampard in their team, he makes for a marginally better choice.

The Only One

2008-08-04T21:09:00.001+01:00

Nicolas Anelka has something of a bad rep for a fantasy football striker. I've never been keen on having him in my squad - perhaps I bought into all those "sulking" rumours. Or the hype that he was going to be a hat-trick-per-game striker, and then felt let down when he wasn't. Or maybe its just cos he's French.

Normally my bias would rampage on unabated this season and I wouldn't for a moment consider him; but circumstances have conspired such that today we are looking at his chances of being a worthwhile striker in an FF team.

First up, lets look at his previous year's results.

06/07:
11 goals, 8 assists, 17 bonus points, 3012 mins

07/08:
11 goals, 8 assists, 11 bonus points, 2575 mins

So we see he is playing games, and actually scoring decent points. He also only picked up one yellow card over both seasons, a good disciplinary record.

Like Darren Bent, Anelka is coming into some good form during preseason. Further, Drogba's knee injury is going to keep him from participating until September, and Scolari has said he won't be playing Drogba until he is 100% fit.

That means Anelka is a very likely starter for the first two or three games of the season. Scolori himself said to The Times "In the last few games he has been making more runs through the middle than before. I asked him to do that and I wanted him down the middle, not down the left or the right. That is important because we have one striker, and that is Anelka."

So perhaps we can look at Anelka in another light. Avram Grant preferred to deploy him on the flanks last term, which he did not like and did not suit his style of play. But Scolori is eager to get Anelka up and firing in his natural position, especially given the injury problems of Didier Drogba, Andriy Shevchenko and Claudio Pizarro. Perhaps we can call him The Only One.

And it seems my bias against Anelka is not unique. Last season he ranked
12th top striker for points, 11th top for minutes played, 14th for goals scored, and 6th for assists. Yet this year he is ranked 55th for percentage of teams selected by.

Because so few players have him, his price will only climb and cannot fall - just like D. Bent. His preseason is working well, especially when linking up with his wingers. He scored four against an understrength AC Milan yesterday - see video below. He is going to be the starting Chelsea striker for the first two, and possibly three, weeks. He is going to earn points again this season, no doubt.

And yet without good reason, I still can't bring myself to have him in my team.

Here are the Chelsea - AC Milan goals, all 5 of them.

Discount Dan, The Wigan Man

2008-08-03T01:13:00.003+01:00

We've already looked at Wigan defenders as likely cheap value this season, and today we look at a Wigan midfielder. Anyone would think I was a Wigan fan (I am not). However they are a solid squad that even the bookies think will not be relegated; most betting outlets putting them a comfortable 3 teams above the drop come the end of the season. As such, we are finding some cheap quality players in their squad - if you know where to look.

Daniel De Ridder is one of Wigan's new midfield signings, and his first couple of outings have been very promising indeed. In Wigan's most recent preseason friendly against Sheffield Wednesday, De Ridder played the full 90 minutes and accrued 2 assists, both from corners. He also had a fantastic 25 yard free kick superbly saved.

This looks promising that he will take a lot of Wigan's set pieces, which always equates to Fantasy points in any sport.

He also scored a hat-trick in their previous friendly against Barnsley, including a very impressive 20 yard thunderbolt off the bar. In the same game he took (and missed) a penalty. Actually, "missed" is harsh, as the Barnsley keeper made a fine low save to deny him.

This isn't a sure lock that he will take Wigan's penalties during the regular season, but at the same time it is certainly is an indicator that he is one of those in contention to step up to the spot when penalties occur.

You can never read too much into the early preseason friendlies, but we are only a couple of weeks away from the season kicking off now, and De Ridder has played a full 90 in both of Wigan's matches since he signed from Birmingham. He looks like a solid starter and a very lively winger - and the best part is he is the cheapest midfielder in the game, at £4.5 million pounds.

De Ridder is definately a fine choice as a bench, or even a regular, starter who should increase in value and accrue some good points during the season.

Darren Bent, Dark Horse

2008-07-29T09:00:00.000+01:00

Robbie Keane has completed his move from Tottenham to Liverpool, much to the dismay of Spurs fans. His move now pushes Darren Bent back into contention as a starter alongside Berbatov, and at £7.5 million he looks promising for another large season.

Whilst pre-season games are not always a true indicator of who will make the starting line-ups come August 16th, Darren Bent has had a successful run so far and is in the kind of form that will make the coach pay attention. Bent scored in their Spanish training match against Hercules CF, and netted four against Norwich on the day Keane's transfer was finalised. Hardly top notch opposition, but definately the right time to show the gaffer you are keen to reclaim the starting spot.

The bookies have picked up on this as well; Bent's odds of becoming the leagues top scorer have been shortening across most outlets. He is now ranked between 12th and 19th favorite player in the league to win Golden Boot; favoured ahead of Fabregas, Shevchenko, Ashton and Gerrard, and with similar odds to Roque Santa Cruz and Peter Crouch.

Tottenham's opening three fixtures are a mixed bag: Middlesborough away, Sunderland at home and then Chelsea away. Although they are not likely to bag too many goals at Stanford Bridge, the opening two fixtures have Goalfest written all over them.

But Bent's forthcoming glory season is not quite guarenteed just yet - Tottenham are rumoured to be interested in acquiring Russian striker Andrei Arshavin. If that occurs then Bent's likelihood of being a regular starts becomes somewhat reduced, and for around the same price other strikers like Ashton, Crouch or Yakubu become more attractive.

This is certainly the view adopted by most other Fantasy Football players so far. Only 1% of teams have Bent in the squad. This low number means his price will go up quickly once others start buying him; but at the same time he is immune to price drops since there will not be enough managers selling him to negatively impact on his price.

The same cannot be said for Defoe (20% of teams have him). Portsmouth have a horror opening 3 matches, against Chelsea and Everton away, and Man United at home. If another striker scores a few goals in the opening weeks, owners of Defoe will be moving away from him quickly if he doesnt score any himself. His price will plummet as thousands transfer him out - this cannot happen with Bent who is only owned by a few. Bent's risk of price movement against the chance of high returns is far better than several other, more popular, attackers.

Darren Bent is having a cracking preseason, and if he can bag a starting spot he could be good as a dark horse worth a lot of points this season.

More Injured Defenders

2008-07-28T10:05:00.000+01:00

Nothing like playing in a friendly to get yourself injured... This week saw two popular defenders injure themselves: Bosingwa of Chelsea and Bouma of Villa. Both are likely to miss the start of the season.

Bouma sustained the worst injury, dislocating an ankle in Villa's Intertoto Cup third round victory over Danish side Odense. Initially thought to be a broken ankle, the Villa manager Martin O'Neill had this to say on the Villa website:

'The doctor is back from the hospital and says it's a dislocation. Thankfully the skin isn't broken, which is really good news. They've re-set it and he's now in plaster. It's obviously a serious injury to a player who's been playing exceptionally well - he had a great, great season last year and he will be missed.'

Meanwhile Chelsea are without Bosingwa after suffering a thigh injury. Sky Sports reports Big Phil as saying

"He is out for two weeks minimum for treatment and he won't be able to play for three weeks," said Scolari. "At the moment, he is out of the first game against Portsmouth."

In Fantasy terms, at time of writing 14% have Bosingwa (£6.0m) and 4% have Bouma (£5.0m). Both were key defenders who were likely to play a full 90 mins for the first few games. Bouma will not be back for a while, if at all, this season. Bosingwa will return after the first few weeks, and he will be good value.

Most of those 14% with him in their squads will sell him after he doesnt play in the first couple of gameweeks. His price will fall, he will return, and he will be a bargain. Assuming his injury doesnt niggle at him off and on throughout the season, of course...

In the meantime, suitable £6.0m replacements include Laursen of Villa, Neville and Jagielka of Everton, and if you can stretch to £6.5m, Clichy of Arsenal.

More Cheap Defenders - Wigan

2008-07-26T02:41:00.002+01:00

Alphabetically Wigan may be the rock bottom of the Premiership, but last season they managed 10 clean sheets - equal with Arsenal and bettered only by Man U, Chelsea, Liverpool, Pompey and Everton. This hasn't helped with the bookies at all; Paddy Power has Wigan ranked 15th favorite at 250:1 to keep the most clean sheets this season.

Of last seasons spotless games, 11 from the 12 came after Steve Bruce was appointed as Manager towards the end of November. Late last season was definately a golden time to have Wigan defenders. Pre-season they have not appreciated in value, so may provide excellent value if they can repeat their late-season tricks again this year. But who to choose?

Here are Wigan's very likely starting defenders:

GK - Kirkland £4.5

RB: Melchiot £4.5
CB: Boyce £4.5
CB: Scharner £5.0
LB: Taylor £4.5 (or Figueroa £4.0, bit of a gamble at this stage).

Of these players, Malchiot is the best choice. Scharner was Wigan's Player Of The Year last season and is a class act. However he "is in no rush" to sign a new contract at Wigan, and has been linked to Villa as a replacement for Olaf Melberg. Taylor's position at Left Back is far more open, and he isn't recommended as a choice since it isn't clear how much gametime he will be getting.

Kirkland and Melchiot make the two best choices from the Wigan defence.

Sunderland's McShane Is Injured

2008-07-24T02:36:00.001+01:00

Breaking news, if you'll excuse the pun. This from VitalFootball:

"Sunderland defender Paul McShane is likely to be out for the start of the season after injuring his knee while on holiday.

The Ireland international has cut his holiday short to have an operation on his knee.
Sunderland`s club doctor Glenn Rae told safc.com "It was a very complex fracture but we managed to get Paul back with us straight away so he could get the best possible attention."

"The operation was a success and Paul will now undergo intensive rehabilitation during the course of the pre-season, and we`re hopeful he`ll be able to return to action by the start of the new season".

10 percent of teams registered in EPL FF have McShane in their squad, and (at the time of writing) he is the second-favorite sub £5.0 defender. His injury will see a lot of benches not contributing much.

Everyone loves a quality cheap defender, but it looks like McShane might be a risk for now. Popular replacement £4.0m defenders include Bolton's Meite (who is unhappy & looking to go to Hull or West Brom) & Fulham's Baird (also rumoured to be changing clubs), but better £4.0m bets would include Mendy, Brown or Rickets at Hull, who have a much easier fixture list in the opening rounds.

Arsenal's New Boy Nasri

2008-07-16T08:30:00.000+01:00

Samir Nasri has confirmed his signing at Arsenal and has a starting cost of £7.5m in EPL FF midfield. According to all reports, the 21 year old Nasri is quite the versatile guy - able to play on either wing or in the hole behind the strikers.

His signing will put pressure on Hleb to depart; Hleb was a central player being forced to play wide as Fabregas and Rosicky controlled the centre spots. Now Hleb must compete with Walcott and Nasri for the right wing spot... it may be tough for him to stay, especially with offers from Barca coming in, and his stated distaste with the hectic London lifestyle.

Nasri managed 6 goals, 11 assists and no cards playing in 30 games for Marseille last season. A reasonable tally for a talented prospect, but to discover if he will become a star midfielder the £7.5m question is: will he start?

He has been bought into the squad as a long term prospect, part of Arsene's rebuilding brought on by "17 years of selling top players to fund Emirates Stadium". And when Rosicky is less than 100% fit, Nasri may well take his spot; the rest of the time he may find himself coming off the bench or being rotated with Walcott.

From an FF point of view, it is probably better to take a wait-and-see approach before acquiring him. Nasri will join the Arsenal squad on their pre-season tour of Austria on July 21; this will give a glimpse into possible lineups. The first three gameweeks provide a middling challenge for Arsenal as well, so those matches will provide a good indicator towards what sort of minutes Nasri can expect to get. Arsenal look to have the easiest Christmas and New Year opponents so Nasri may be worth looking at after the first month.

There is no doubt he is a fantastic young talent that will add depth to the Arsenal squad - but if he just doesn't get enough game time then he will not be worth it for FF managers. Just like Kalou at Chelsea last season.

In summary: do not purchase until Hleb leaves and Rosicky is injured. Watch the pre-season matches and early Champions League game to check for game time. At £7.5m Nasri could go either way - an absolute gem if he plays lots, or a money sink if he spends most of his time on the bench.

Players Missing Games By Playing At The Olympics

2008-07-14T08:02:00.001+01:00

The Olympic football competition runs from August 6th to 23rd and the Premiership season kicks off on the 16th. It is essentially an Under 23 event but each country can name up to 3 over-age players.

Coaches must released Under 23 yr players when requested to play for their national side, but since this is a non-Fifa tournament, team coaches can refuse to release players over 23. This impacts on Ryan Babel, who is a probable selection for Holland.

The final is on Aug 23rd so anyone called up (Babel, Mascherano, Lucas, Anderson, etc) will miss two FF games at most; however teams with these players may need a solid bench for at least the first week.

It has been mentioned that a player who performs well at the Olympics may see their value increase and upon return to the EPL. This seems unlikely as people will be getting their football from the Premier League instead of watching the Games (unlike the Euros), and also the calibre of the Games tournament is not as high as other footy comps. Some players might appreciate in price, but its expected that most players will not.

These players will miss the first games of the season:

Victor Anichebe (Everton ) - Nigeria
Javier Mascherano (Liverpool) - Argentina
Kim Do-Heon (West Brom) - South Korea
Jo (Man City) - Brazil
Lucas (Liverpool) - Brazil
Anderson (Man U) - Brazil

Babel (Liverpool) - Netherlands: Altho not named yet, 21 year old Ryan Babel is a likely selection for the Holland squad, despite Rafa not wanting to risk his newly healed ankle.

Ryan Nelsen (Blackburn) - New Zealand: Nelsen has been released for NZ's first two games before returning to be available for Blackburn's first fixture on Aug 16.

Which Newly Promoted Team To Use First?

2008-07-10T07:28:00.000+01:00

Quality, cheap players are vital to a top FF squad; the cheapest are often from the newly promoted sides. After the frist few gameweeks have passed we will be able to get a grasp of which squad is doing better and which players to pick, but pre-season it can be a touch difficult to tell.

Stoke, West Brom and Hull are the three new teams this season. Of the three, Hull are universally the favorite across all of the betting agencies to finish last and be relegated. On the surface, this sounds like Hull players may be a bad choice.

But we are not looking for cheap players who will be top at the end of the season; for now we just want to know which cheap players are going be top for the first couple of rounds. This will get your FF team off to a good start and not have them lose value, before transferring them out for other players that may prove to be better value.

And for the first few rounds, Hull have the much easier run of the three promoted teams. Betting agency BetFair actually has Hull as the 6th favorite to be top of the table at the end of August - only behind the Big 4 and Everton. The reason for this is Hull's opening fixture list:

16th Aug: home to Fulham
23rd Aug: away to Blackburn
30th Aug: home to Wigan

Conversely, Stoke play Bolton, Villa and Boro - 2 of which are away games. West Brom face Arsenal away, Everton at home and Bolton away.

Cheap players are often there to keep the bench warm and free up capital for the Big Name players - but in a strong squad the cheap players are also capable of contributing points if your regular team do not play.

Even though Hull are very likely to return to the Championship next season, for the first three gameweeks this year their players may represent the best choice from the newly promoted teams.

Crouch for Striker?

2008-07-09T06:07:00.003+01:00

Peter Crouch is expected to transfer from Liverpool to Portsmouth before the 2008 / 2009 season kicks off. This will reunite him with his England striker partner, Jermaine Defoe. Sky Sports' Opta stats look at the numbers that the partnership has achieved.

The article is fairly bouyant about their work together, and provides this data:

Crouch and Defoe for England

Matches Played Together: 7
Goals Scored as Partnership: 10
Goals Scored by Crouch: 7
Goals Scored by Defoe: 3

Portsmouth's opening three fixtures are not easy: Chelsea away first up, Man Utd at home in week 2, then Everton away in the third week. It is unlikely Portsmouth will bring home a large haul of goals against these opposition.

The fixture list gets easier for them over October and November, and this might be a good time to consider Crouch (or Defoe) for your squad.

Kanu and youngster Sahar (on load from Chelsea) also makes the decision Should I Buy Crouch more difficult, since it is unclear how Redknapp will play his strikers.

If / when Crouch's transfer to Portsmouth goes ahead, if Redknapp prefers a Crouch & Defoe strike force, and if Crouch is showing good signs of form then he may be worth looking at after gameweek 3. At this early stage however there are probably better options for a striker.

Do Not Buy Ronaldo at £14m

2008-07-08T07:31:00.003+01:00

Ronaldo was last years most successful player, and is this years most expensive. As we saw at the end of last season, to finish in the Top 10 in the World, you needed to have Ronaldo.

This season he is priced at £14m, which is a massive chunk of your initial £100m budget and head and shoulders above most other strikers. That makes his purchase a tough choice - is the £14m worth it, or would it be better spent on, say, Lampard, Fabregas, or Gerrard; all of whom are significantly cheaper?

That tricky decision has been made much easier due to the Telegraph reporting that Ronaldo is to undergo surgery on his ankle, and is not expected to be fit to play until as late as mid - September.

Clearly then, the answer to "Should I buy Ronaldo" is NO. At the time of writing, Ronaldo was still the second most popular midfielder chosen - if this doesn't change then some players will be starting the season with a great Portugese disadvantage!

Fuller, Stoke City

2008-07-07T11:19:00.001+01:00

It can always be difficult in the Preseason to pick players to fill your team, especially from the newly promoted clubs. Many of them will be transferring in new players who have experience playing Premier League football, and this can mean players who played large amounts of gametime in the previous season find themselves out in the cold.

As a newly promoted club, Stoke have lots of discount players on their inventory. However cheap doesnt always equal good; starting at £5.5m Fuller is affordable, but will he be worth having?

One big plus in the Fuller column is that last season he shared penalty taking duties with Lawrence. Its always a good choice to have Penalty takers in our squad, so this is favourable. He also picked up his fair share of cards last season, so this may hinder his tally on occasional weeks.

Stoke open their 2008-2009 Premiership campaign against Bolton away; at home to Villa; then away to Middlesborough. Not a bad draw and they face none of the Big Four early on. The fixture list provides as good a chance as any for Fuller to get a goal or two much like Darren Bent for Charlton three seasons ago; if he does, his value will climb which could be an opportunity to make a quick million early before flicking him off after the third or fourth week.

But most importanty he started nearly every game last season, and is likely to get a large amount of minutes again this season. Add the occasional goal and the plus that he is a penalty taker, and he is probably a good choice as a sub to warm the bench alongside your two big name strikers.

2007 / 2008 Transfer Usage review

2008-06-29T09:00:00.001+01:00

The Fantasy Premier League game gives you 1 free transfer every week, and after that each transfer will cost you 4 points. Managing transfers is an important part of running a successful Fantasy League team.

How many transfers should you be aiming to make each week? Is it worth making an extra transfer, if needed, every month or so? If my transfer will cost me 4 points but I believe will bring more points than that this week, isn't it better to make that switch now, rather than later?

With the 07 / 08 English Premiership coming to a close, I took a look at the top 50 teams in the Fantasy Premier League to see how the best of the best were doing it. Here is the data:

# of Transfers made by the 2007 / 2008 Top 50 teams:

34 48 48 46 27 44 33 35 38 12
27 56 51 42 32 40 42 42 27 41
32 51 43 36 51 36 17 39 28 36
33 27 35 46 28 38 52 39 43 28
34 37 45 49 41 44 45 62 29 38

This works out to an average of 38.54 transfers made during the season. Given that there is 38 gameweeks in the league, this data suggests that the answer to the question "How many transfers should I make this season" would be as close to 1 per week as possible.

It's not really rocket science, but if you can plan your transfers so you do not have to sacrifice any points on additional transfers, then those points will pay off at the end of the season over rivals who made ill-disciplined transfers.

As we call those teams around here, don't become a Knee Jerk United.

They Had The Star

2008-05-26T09:58:00.002+01:00

Every season there is one player who you have to have on your team if you want to do well. In the last two years it has been Henry and then Lampard. This year it was Ronaldo.

Between the 1 Jan 2008 and 1 April 2008, Ronaldo went on a crazy points scoring spree. He pulled in 131 points in 13 matches, even though for one of those matches Man Utd had a bye.
Even without my calculator I can tell you that for one third of the season, he was averaging 10 points per game.

But at the same time there were other players also doing well. And Ronaldo was the most expensive player in the game, by £1.5m; perhaps the money spent on him could have bought two slightly cheaper players also of high calibre, whose points total would exceed Ronaldo's?

I have a friend who refused to have Henry in his squad, and then refused to have Frank Lampard in his squad. Maybe he didn't want to jump on the 'popular' bandwagon or something. He never finished higher than midtable in our mini-leagues.

The top ten managers from the 2007 / 2008 season all had one thing in common - they all had Ronaldo in their team before the New Year. Here's the data of the date they transfered Ronaldo into their squad, and who they traded out in his place:

#1: 22 Sept, Lampard
#2: Had Ronaldo all season.
#3: 13 Nov, Fabregas
#4: 27 Dec, Lampard
#5: 7 Sept, Lampard
#6: 1 Sept, Scholes
#7: 30 Sept, Downing
#8: 15 Sept, Lampard
#9: 29 Dec, Lampard
#10: 3 Sept, Lampard

So from 1,714,595 managers, the top ten all had Ronaldo in their team by christmas time, and most of them had traded Frank Lampard in order to do so.

The lesson? Some players you can trade, others you have got to have. Whilst you need different players from a rival manager in order to overtake them, you have to ensure that you are not trading out the season's star player to do so. The top ten managers of 2007 / 2008 can't be wrong!

Were The Bookies Right?

2008-05-21T11:50:00.001+01:00

At the start of the season we looked at the bookmakers odds for the two strikers that were pre-season heavy favorites to score the most goals: Drogba and Rooney. To recap, this is who the bookmakers had as favorite to score the most goals in the 2007 / 2008 season:

Bet365: Drogba $5.5, Rooney $11
Tote Sport: Drogba $6, Rooney $11
Paddy Power: Drogba $5.5, Rooney $12
Coral: Drogba 5, Rooney $8
Ladbrokes: Drogba $5.5, Rooney $11

Drogba was about 2:1 favorite to score more goals than Rooney. Ultimately Rooney proved the bookies wrong - he scored 12 goals while Drogba got 8. But obviously you make changes to your fantasy team as the season progresses, and we were using the bookies information as a guide to who would have the best start to the season.

In the first six weeks, Rooney played 45 minutes before injuring himself, earning 1 point over those 6 weeks. Drogba also had a 1 point first week, but made up for it with an 11 point week in Gameweek 2. By the time the fourth week came around, the teams had all had a shakedown and there was a lot more information available to Fantasy managers regarding wise striker transfer decisions.

If we used the bookmakers odds to choose between Rooney and Drogba at the start of the season, it would have led to the correct decision for the opening rounds. We'll be looking at the bookies odds at the start of the 08/09 season as well; join us then.

Get 'Em While They're Hot

2008-03-20T11:22:00.000Z

When a player has done well in a few consecutive gameweeks, it is easy to discount them and believe you have missed out on their run of form. That if you were to purchase them now they would stop scoring goals, stop getting bonus points or stop keeping clean sheets. That they have done so well in the last few weeks that their magic touch must surely have passed by now.

This is not always the case.

Often players will get on a roll and rake in big points several weeks in a row. This week we are looking at Ronaldo, the most popular player in the game (in terms of % Teams Selected By).

In the last five game weeks Ronaldo scored 18, 1, 0(bye), 10 and 16. He is clearly on a hot streak and chances are it will carry over into next week as well.

Don't miss out on players who are scoring big points, just because "they must have peaked by now". If you can get that player after a couple of weeks of big performances, chances are they will still be worth the investment over the next couple of weeks.

Blackburn Time

2008-02-26T11:32:00.002Z

Its new striker time - Blackburn are playing well and their fixtures are about to rain points on their FF players. Blackburn have taken at least a point in every game this year and scored in every game except for two - a goalless draw with Everton and a 0-2 loss at Highbury.
Over the next 11 weeks until the end of the season, Blackburn have some easy fixtures:

Newcastle
Fulham
West Ham
Wigan
Reading
Tottenham
Portsmouth
Derby
Birmingham

as well as Liverpool and Man Utd.

There are going to be goals, goals, goals. I forecast the main beneficiaries to be Santa Cruz up front and Bentley in the mids. Bentley is useful at getting assists and is a bonus point magnet. Santa Cruz is a regular 90 minute player whose price has fallen from 7.8m to a more reasonable 7.4m.

The forthcoming fixtures favour Blackburn. Santa Cruz and Bentley will be coming into points over the next weeks; look to make room for them in your squad if you can.

Wheater

2007-12-28T11:32:00.001Z

Yet another recommendation for a Middlesborough defender...

The Pundit, Fantasy Premier League.com's official source of hints and tips, has tipped Middlesboroughs Wheater as a player currently in good form. I think they are right; Wheater represents a good bargain.

The Pundit says "Wheater is joint top of the defender value (form) tables with Everton's Joleon Lescott... At just £4.4, with 3 goals, 16 bonus points and 5 England Under 21 caps to his name, it's worth keeping an eye on him".

I think he is a good choice that should be picked up, not just watched. He is playing 90 minutes on almost every game, as well as picking up an odd clean sheet and a decent number of bonus points.

By comparision, the cheapest Chelsea defender earning equivalent gametime is Belletti, who costs £6.6.

If you are in the market for a cheap replacement defender, especially for someone who you can swap out to your bench but still rely upon, then both Wheater and Huth are good choices at the moment.

Huth, Middlesborough

2007-12-27T11:31:00.000Z

If you are on the lookout for a new defender to make a dollar or two, take a glance at Huth of Middlesborough. He has just started getting some decent gametime, and just in time for a favourable run of fixtures against Blackburn, Wigan, Newcastle and Fulham.

For £4.8m, Huth is in with a shot to start getting some decent points if Middlesborough can string together some decent football.

As an outsider that not many managers will be looking at, Huth represents an interesting gamble if you are in need of quickly increasing your team value (as his price will rise if he gets some big-ish points) or you are after a sneaky defender that no-one has to boost your points tally of the next few weeks.

After all, if you stick with the same players that everyone else has, you will only get the same points as they do - and how are you going to beat them if you do that?

Collins

2007-10-09T11:34:00.000+01:00

Sunderland have always been favorites to do fairly well this season. Its been a surprise to me, because I was expecting them to be battling against relegation from the moment the season stared - but that hasnt been the case. Certainly during pre-season the bookies expected their latest Premiership reign to run longer than one stint, as we saw in this post earlier in the year.

Sunderland are off to an OK start in the league, and there are some cheap bargains to be picked up for your FF team. A good option in defence is Collins, currently running at £3.9m. Clearly he wont be a first choice defender for you team, but as a discount player to have on the bench, he makes a superb choice. He is looking like a fairly regular starter who generally plays 90 mins - and this is what you want on your bench.

Defenders dont get a whole lot cheaper than Collins. He will be picking up a point or two a week, and is a good option for those managers looking to save as much money as possible on their bench without going to complete 0-pointers.

Laursen

2007-09-04T10:07:00.000+01:00

Villa are always a club that has yo-yo seasons. One year they will do fantastically well, then the next they will struggle. So far this year is shaping up as an "upswing" season for Villa; they narrowly lost to Liverpool in the opening game, and knocked over Chelsea yesterday.

One of the early pacesetters for Villa in the points department is the defender Laursen. After a 45 minute run at against Liverpool, he has played every minute of the season thereafter. He has also racked up to gameweeks with 9 points, both times in the form of a clean sheet and maximum 3 bonus points.

Players who regularly accrue bonus points are the kind of players you want in your squad. A push by Fantasy Premier League to try and allocate them away from 'star goalscorers' has seen bonus points move to a different set of regulars. It looks like Laursen could become one of these regulars.

Also in his favour is Villa's fixtures list, which is rather favourable. Between now and December, Villa have:

Man City
Everton
Tottenham
West Ham
Man Utd
Bolton
Derby
Birmingham
Middlesborough
Blackburn

That is a long run with only one Big 4 opponent. This will lead to several opportunities for clean sheets, bonus points, or the occasional assist. Laursen could be a good investment as a cheap, reliable defender - especially if Villas form sticks to its calendar and has an "Up" year.

Who do the Top Teams have?

2007-08-24T06:39:00.001+01:00

A review of the overall top 20 teams after Gameweek 3 shows many of the same players appear in several teams. This is a list of players who appear most regularly in the top teams - it is not a "Dream Team" list.

If you are looking to make a transfer and are wondering which players are working best for the leading teams so far, consider the list below.

Goalkeepers:
Gordon
Hahnemann

Defenders:
Dunne
Ingimarsson
Lescott
Richards
Shorey

Midfielders:
Arteta
Fabregas
Gerrard
Lampard
Scholes

Attackers:
Anelka
Martins
Van Persie

Smertin

2007-08-22T05:59:00.000+01:00

Alexei Smertin is a Fulham midfielder who, in terms of Premier League Fantasy Football, has had a fantastic start to the Premiership. He has scored one goal, one assist and three bonus points from the first three games, and going into Gameweek 4 he is tied as the fourth highest point scoring midfielder.

The best part is, he started out costing only £4.0m pounds.

This is changing of course - his value is rising and is £4.1m at the moment. Fulham have scored at least once in each of their first three fixtures, and if they can carry this on despite the absence of injured striker Brian McBride, then it is likely that Smertin will continue to accrue points.

He plays 90 minutes most games, so is going to get at least 2 points most weeks. Should he earn another bonus point here or there, or tap away another goal or two, his price is sure to keep rising.

At £4.1m, Smertin makes a fine choice as a cheap substitute to have on the bench. His price is likely to keep rising and thus raise your team's price. He is playing in good form, and it is good to pick an in-form player as they tend to earn points in 'waves'. Finally, as he plays a regular 90 minutes for Fulham, he is an excellent choice to have as a capable replacement should any of your big name midfielders miss a game through injury, international duty or suspensions.

A Replacement For Rooney

2007-08-12T09:47:00.000+01:00

Rooneys early injury has drilled a major hole in the plans of many FF managers. The papers are expecting him to be out for anything up to 6-8 weeks, but even an absence of 3 weeks would mean you are better off transferring him out, spending the money elsewhere, and picking him up again once he returns. Rooneys value is sure to fall, and in the meantime if you replace him with an active player your team may well profit nicely; especially if you then pick Rooney up again for a few hundred thousand pounds cheaper.

One good replacement option for Rooney is Benjani of Man City. He is cheap; less than half the price of Rooney at £6.0m. He played all 90 minutes for City, and he scored a nice goal to earn 6 points. He is a likely starter again next week as well against Man Utd, who might be weaker after suffering this loss of Rooney. Then City have Bolton and Charlton; two easier fixtures.

Even if he doesnt score hundreds of points, Benjani will make a fine temporary replacement for Rooney. After scoring a goal on the opening weekend he is unlikely to lose value immediately; meanwhile Rooneys price will plummet as people dump him from their squads. And unless his injury heals in 3 weeks or under (which at this stage is looking unlikely!), many managers will be freeing up the money they have tied up in their star striker - a downward Rooney price spiral is imminent.

Its time to change out Rooney, and Benjani looks like a suitable replacement in the short term.

Penalty Takers

2007-08-07T11:46:00.000+01:00

It is always good to have players who take penalties in your squad. Most teams will earn a penalty or two during the course of the season, so most of the time this represents a very easy 5 points.

Below is a list of penalty takers from each of the 07 / 08 Premiership clubs. This list is not definative and is subject to change, due to form / managerial decisions / transfers away from the club / injury. Its not going to be perfectly accurate all season long, but it is a very good place to start.

Arsenal: G Silva
Aston Villa: Barry
Birmingham: McSheffrey
Blackburn: McCarthy / Pedersen / Bentley
Bolton: Diouf / Speed
Chelsea: Lampard
Derby: Howard
Everton: Arteta
Fulham: Bullard / Helguson / Montella
Liverpool: Alonso / Gerrard / Riise
Man City: Samaras
Man Utd: Ronaldo
Middlesboro: Yakubu
Newcastle: Ameobi / Solano / Emre / Martins
Portsmouth: Taylor
Reading: Doyle / Shorey
Sunderland: Connolly
Tottenham: Keane / Defoe / Jenas
West Ham: Zamora
Wigan: Baines / Heskey

John Terry To Miss 1st Month

2007-08-06T13:10:00.000+01:00

John Terry suffered medial knee ligament damage during Chelsea's training on Saturday 4th August. The injury ruled him out of the preseason Community Shield match against Man Utd, and is expected to keep him out of the team for a month.

These sort of injuries can sometimes take a long time to fully repair (although no doubt that Chelsea will have the best rehab that money can buy...) Most information available suggests Terry will be back for the first game in September.

As Chelsea captain, Terry was predictably one of the most popular defenders in fantasy league teams: nearly one quarter of all teams have him. With his departure, who should replace him?

Carvalho becomes an even more attractive Chelsea option, and with Terrys departure Tel Ben Haim will also get more game time. There are some questions over Ben Haim's occasionally rash tackles which may lead to the odd card, but weighed against the bonus from likely clean sheets as part of the Chelsea defense, it may be worth the risk. Man Utd's Patrice Evra is another possibility, and is also from a team likely to keep clean sheets during the first month. Carragher of Liverpool is another good option. Liverpool typically keep several clean sheets each season, and Carragher plays the most minutes of any Liverpudian defender. His disciplinary record is also fairly good.

Any of these players offer excellent, and less expensive, options to replace Terry.

£4m Midfielder: Teale

2007-08-06T12:41:00.000+01:00

Derby's midfielder Gary Teale is a popular choice as a budget midfielder. Priced as one of the cheapest players in the game, Teale makes an ideal candidate to round out your midfield. He has played in all of Derby's pre-season games, and should be expected to take the field for at least 60+ minutes each week.

However when picking any cheap player preseason, we are choosing someone who will get some game time, and hoping for the best from there. Teale is an attacking midfielder and has netted a goal and had several other chances in Derby's 07/08 preseason matches. His team mates have found

Going into the start of the Fantasy season, Teale is the 11th most popular midfielder; 10% of all teams have him in their side. His tiny price tag and consistent game time make him an ideal back-up should any of your main midfielders need a rest.

Other low priced midfielders that may be worth considering include:

Muamba - Birmingham City ( £4.0m )
Leadbitter - Sunderland ( £4.5m )
Noble - West Ham ( £4.5m )
Smertin - Fulham ( £4.0m )

Agbonlahor

2007-08-05T08:43:00.000+01:00

Aston Villa's Gabriel Agbonlahor was one of last season's best budget Strikers. He finished with the 6th most points in the Fantasy Premier League, which was significantly better than many more pricier attackers.

This season looks like it may see a continuation of his good Fantasy League form, and at the preseason price of £7.5m he is worth considering as a (now) mid-priced striker for a variety of reasons:

Last season Agbonhlahor played the most minutes of any striker in the Premiership. The most important statistic is Minutes Played, since the more time a player gets on the pitch, the more points they will earn for you. Marlon Harewood has come into the Villa strike-force from West Ham during the off season, but in most friendlies so far Agbonlahor has been getting the largest amount of game time.

Agbonlahor has a good disciplinary record. He works hard and doesnt dive, which tends to get him into the Referee's favour - so when he does fall down in the box, it is often rewarded with a penalty. And during the Fantasy League season, that is three points for Agbonlahor for an assist.

Villa's midfield of Gareth Barry and new signing Nigel Reo-Coker are both attacking minded midfielders. While this may prove a problem sometimes for Villa in defence, this is a good thing for Agbonlahor as far as the Premier Fantasy League is concerned. It will create more chances to attack, which means more chances for Agbonlahor to earn points.

The other strikers available for sub-£8m are not expected to come close to Agbonlahor. Ashley Young, another Villa striker, is available for £7m, but will be competing against the preferred Agbonlahor for game time. McBride of Fulham is also £7m, but despite his talents, his age and Fulham's struggles this season will keep his score low. Doyle of Reading (£7.5m) and Kanu of Portsmouth (£6.5m) both had superb seasons last year, but it would be a surprise if their clubs can turn the same quality of performances in again this time around.

Last season Agbonlahor consistently turned in a minimum of 2 points per week through lots of game time and good discipline. This is the platform upon which goals, assists and bonus points accrue to give a striker a large points tally. As a mid-priced striker, Agbonlahor is worth considering.

What The Bookies Think

2007-08-04T03:21:00.001+01:00

The betting agencies are a good place to look for information on the lower teams. Who do they think is likely to keep the most clean sheets - Wigan or Fulham? Which team is expected to finish higher - Sunderland or Derby?

Here is bookmaker Paddy Power's odds for Most Clean Sheets:

Chelsea 2.25
Man Utd 3.50
Liverpool 3.50
Arsenal 10.00
Tottenham 41.00
Aston Villa 67.00
Newcastle 81.00
Portsmouth 81.00
Everton 81.00
Bolton 101.00
West Ham 126.00
Blackburn 126.00
Sunderland 151.00
Man City 151.00
Middlesbrough 151.00
Reading 201.00
Fulham 301.00
Birmingham 501.00
Wigan 501.00
Derby 751.00

The surprise here is that Sunderland are half way up the list, ahead of the likes of Midlesborough and Man City. They are also expecting Chelsea to keep significantly more clean sheets then Man Utd, so if you are looking for premium defenders, Chelsea might be a good place to start.

The odds for Top At The End Of August give us an idea of who the bookies think will get the best start. Betfair has Tottenham third favorite to be on top of the Premiership at the end of August, ahead of Arsenal and Liverpool. Clearly they are expected to score goals in the first few weeks, so some Tottenham firepower might not be a bad investment for the opening weeks of the League. Here is Betfair's complete list.

Man Utd 3.65
Chelsea 4.7
Tottenham 11
Liverpool 15
Arsenal 14
Everton 22
Newcastle 26
Middlesbrough 24
West Ham 24
Aston Villa 30
Bolton 34
Sunderland 36
Blackburn 44
Portsmouth 50
Man City 46
Birmingham 80
Fulham 85
Wigan 70
Derby 90
Reading 95

Finally we will look at goalscoring head-to-head match-ups between the two premium attackers: Rooney vs Drogba. The Fantasy League has them identically priced; but which one is favorite to return more goals (and therefore points)?

Bet365: Drogba $5.5, Rooney $11
Tote Sport: Drogba $6, Rooney $11
Paddy Power: Drogba $5.5, Rooney $12
Coral: Drogba 5, Rooney $8
Ladbrokes: Drogba $5.5, Rooney $11

Clearly, the bookies think that Drogba should be in your starting line-up. A week out from the start of the season Drogba is the fourth most popular striker in Premier Fantasy teams, so this is of further benefit - a lot of other players do not have Drogba, so if you have him and he does well, you will make a big leap in the standings.

Consistancy

2006-10-18T21:49:00.000+01:00

I made the decision to make Lampard captain even though both Bent D and Johnson had served me well in the past. But the Chelsea player had a fantastic game the week before so I figured it was a safe bet. Was it a good decision? Not so much. But rathar than swap, I kept him as captain and he proved worth the punt.

KJs blogging rules mean that I can not write about the fact that I am kicking his ass but rather helpful commentary. But as this is just a fun thing on the side for a girl who still calls the sport soccer, I got nothing else.

So ride out the bad times with the good players - and it's all gravy after that!

Goalkeepers!

2006-10-16T20:51:00.000+01:00

Its a tough time to be a goalkeeper, especially if you play for Chelsea. Both Petr Cech and Carlo Cudicini were hospitalised in the course of last weekend's game against Reading. This frees up a lot of cash if you had Cech in goal and now need a replacement.

The other goalkeeper in the news this week was Tottenham's keeper Paul Robinson, who missed an absolute howler in England's international game against Croatia in the Euro 2008 qualifiers earlier this week. The tabloids were all over him, with headlines like "Misses Robinson" breaking out across the UK papers.

Tottenham have had a bad start to the Premier League season, and Robinson is not amongst the top few keepers. After his horrendous error some players might be keen to drop him from their FF squads, altho he performed admirably for the rest of the England game. Which is perhaps why he is still the fourth most popular keeper at present.

As of October 17, the highest scoring keepers were Friedel (49pts), James (48), Jaaskelainen (41), and Kenny (34) and Howard (34).

Friedel has had the highest total for a while since his freak 21pt game a few weeks ago. Aside from that one game he is middle of the table, and worth a punt if you are a Blackburn fan (or American).

It is interesting that David James is currently second, as like Robinson he also let in a few ridiculous goals in his time as England keeper. At £5.0 he has been a major benefactor of Portsmouths great start to the season, and certainly a good choice.

Indeed, the goal keepers of the Big Four are not returning good value yet. Lehmann, Van der Sar, Reina and Cech are all mid table - tho by the end of the season this will probably have changed. So between now and then they are due to go on some big point-gaining runs... the tricky part is to try and figure out when!

Defenders delusion.

2006-10-06T00:12:00.000+01:00

Well things are starting to quieten down and the regular performers are starting to shine through. For example, the likes of Lampard seem to be constantly scoring points every week. The same can be said for his team mate John Terry as well. Henry has had a slow start to the year but recent form has seen him begin to start knocking in the goals and hence, watch the points telly raise. Furthermore, the most popular defenders are still Chelsea and Man United defenders. The spin off though is they don't tend to come cheap. After Liverpool's water tight defensive efforts last season, they are a far cry this season - so far thus, I don't recommend to buy them at the moment. Same can be said for Wigan, they started off strong last season and this season I feel they will be lucky to survive in the top flight.

The defensive surprise packed to date is Portsmouth. It actually isn't to much of a surprise when they picked up the likes of Sol Campbell in the off season. That being said, the hay might have been made and sun might have shone. Still many points to still be made there. also Bolton seem to have made a good defensive start to the season. Aston Villa are another team who have started off fine with the likes of Melberg firing the first goal in at Arsenals new Emirates stadium. Also Ridgwell seems to have been firing in the points with the odd assist.

Still Man United defenders will be worth their weight in gold come the end of the season. Sadly to me, due to Chelsea's recent purchase of Ashley Cole, its time to get rid of Wayne Bridge. I cant see him getting too many more starts unless Cole is injured. Tip of the week, start looking at Arsenal defenders again, they are an unknown quantity but, are starting to hit form along with the team. With Gallas hitting spearheading the defence, I predict Arsenal are still to hit their straps and there could be many a defensive points to be scored there.

Make Money Now.

2006-10-03T23:17:00.000+01:00

If you havent used your transfer this week and want to make some money in the very immediate short term, swap one of your hopeless midfielders out for Young, of Watford. He's done fairly well every week but last night he got something like 20 pts. It hasnt been updated yet, but when it does he will rocket in value in the next coupla weeks.

So if you havent got any big plans for your transfer this week, get Young in your team and over the next 2 - 4 weeks you will make a coupla hundy thou. Be sure to act quick tho, his price is 6.0 at the moment but over the next coupla days his price will rise. Buy him today, and make the most money!

Disregard this if you have already used your transfer, or if you have already got a masterplan involving this weeks transfer.

(All of the above words stolen from KJ)

Got Injury Blues?

2006-08-29T05:35:00.000+01:00

Ashton. Riise. Carragher. Ferdinand.

Nothing can damage your drive towards fantasy football glory quite like an injury to your player. It can be tricky to know how long someone is out for, as the fantasy.premierleague.com site isnt particularly helpful in this regard. And when you've got an injured player, choosing whether to stick with him or not can become an important decision, particularly if that player is one of your stars.

Fortunately FISO has got you covered with their great list of injured Premiership players and expected return dates:

http://www.fiso.co.uk/Injuries/Injury-news.htm

This site is an invaluable reference when it comes to deciding whether to wait out an injury or to transfer your player. Check it out, its good.

Kenny

2006-08-24T22:44:00.000+01:00

Need a cheap back-up goalkeeper? Then Patrick Kenny, of Sheffield United, is your man. He plays every game, and as Sheffield will struggle to keep out the attacks of more established Premiership teams, Kenny will be called on to make many saves. After two games he is averaging 5 saves per game, and those stops are helping his points rack up.

By the time the season ends he will not have scored the same points as the likes of Van Der Sar, Reina, or Cech, but he will prove good value for money. But act quickly to get him - people are queueing up to add Kenny to their team. Last week over 13,700 people transfered him into their teams, and as a result his price rose by £0.1m. As each Gameweek passes and he consistently earns a point or two each week, more and more players will draft him into their squad - so his price will rise further.

And that is one of Kenny's best uses at the moment - as a mid-term investment. Buy now at £3.6m, wait for a month or so, and once his price has climbed enough, sell him off. Back-up keepers are only partially called upon so he can be sold without too much impact; but if he earns £0.3m for your team it could be incredibly useful when you make other transfers.

Act quickly though - the longer you wait the less profit you can make from the Sheffield stopper!

Berbatov

2006-08-24T03:38:00.000+01:00

This gameweek Middlesborough pulled out the biggest shock of the season by far when they upset Chelsea 2-1, Viduka netting a late winner at the death. On the Fantasy League front it was Portsmouth defenders and Tottenham midfielders and forwards who did well; today we take a look at Dimitar Berbatov, Tottenham's new striker.

Thie week Jenas and Lennon both accrued a cool 8 points for their efforts against Sheffield Utd, and Berbatov did well to score a goal and set up another. Pre-season the bookies had Berbatov at 25-1 to take out the Golden Boot across the Premier League, but on a club-by-club basis he was the clear favorite to be the top goal scorer at Tottenham. As far as Fantasy uptake is concerned he is the 8th most popular striker after gameweek 2, and after the first two matches is one of the few strikers in the League to have played all 180 minutes.

At £8.0m pounds he is a medium-priced striker who, thus far, has fielded good returns. However in the next four games Tottenham face Man Utd and Liverpool away, so do not expect a massive goal haul in the short-term. Things get easier after that tho, with Portsmouth, West Ham, Aston Villa and Watford, before facing Chelsea, Reading, Blackburn and Wigan.

Aside from the Chelsea game, if Berbatov is going to score goals this season, you would expect several of them to come during that 8 game window.

Tottenham have a bye in Gameweek 15, but a double-header in Gameweek 16 against Arsenal and Middlesborough.

In the last week 5927 players transfered Berbatov into their squad, so he is certainly a popular fellow at the moment. The eight million pound question is: Will he be able to keep his popularity up?

Sky Sports managed to grab a few words from the man himself in this article "Berbatov hungry for more"

Video Coverage

2006-08-22T05:09:00.000+01:00

Youtube can be a useful source of information if you want to catch the round-up of some of the weekends games. Check out the links below to view Fox Sport's World Report coverage of:

Bolton 2 / Tottenham 0
Man Utd 5 / Fulham 1
Chelsea 3 / Man City 0

Opening Weekend 2006

2006-08-22T04:37:00.000+01:00

Opening weekend threw up a few surprises, mainly from the stubborn determination of the newly promoted teams to emulate Wigan and West Ham's great efforts last season. Meanwhile two of the big four struggled, although Chelsea and Man Utd cruised to first-up wins.

Liverpool copped a couple of injuries with Carragher and Riise leaving the field. Carragher is the third most popular defender, chosen in 20% of all teams, and his injury is expected to be short term, of a couple of weeks at worst. Riise is less popular at 4%, and his injury is more long term, perhaps up to a month with early scans suggesting ligament damage in the ankle. It would be worth considering transferring Riise out for another midfielder, although Liverpool do have a week off from the Premiership due to Cup commitments.

So which midfielder should come in for Riise? Bowyer registered a strong performance for the Hammers, and his two assists and three bonus points helped him to 11 for the week. As I write this blog he is increasing in popularity to 5%, his price already increasing. Bowyer's temper is notorious however, so it will be important that he keeps it in check to earn big points. Gerrard and Lampard, the two most popular midfielders, lived up to their billings with strong points-earning performances. Campo scored a long-range goal and at only £5.5m, people are jumping all over him. Other movers include Parker of Newcastle and Ronaldo from Man Utd.

Cheap performers this week in the midfield include McCulloch from Wigan who managed 7 pts this week for only £5.5m, Frances of Watford (£5.0m, 6pts), and Mullins of West Ham (£5.0m, 2pts). It was a great week to be a Davis, as Davis of Portsmouth (£5.5m, 6pts), Davis of Villa (£6.5m, 6pts), and Davies of Everton (£5.0m, 3pts) raked in some healthy discount points.

Watford have a couple of £5.0m midfielders who played the full 90 mins, Reading have two £5.5m 90 minute players, and Sheffield United have Tonge, who represents great value at only £4.5m for 2 points. If he can continue to hold his starting spot, Tonge will definitely grow in value as by the fifth week people look to strengthen their benches with discount players who are regular points scorers.

But hindsight is a wonderful thing, and we will see how many points the new boys can take from their second round matches of Sheffield United away vs Tottenham, Reading away at Villa, and Watford at home to West Ham.

Arsenal, Wigan, Liverpool, and Newcastle all have a bye this gameweek, so if your Captain is Henry make sure you change him! Also, Rooney and Scholes start serving a three match suspension this week, so alter your Captaincy accordingly.