These replotted fixtures are coming in thick and fast, just like the snow that preceded it. Yesterday evening Stoke City announced that, after having their GW23 slate wiped clean to allow the Manchester sides to finish up their Carling Cup semi-finals, their game hosting Manchester City will now take place on Tuesday 16th or Wednesday 17th Feburary.
The snow has been a ramshackle cause of endless trouble and fears amongst all of us studious fantasy managers, but now once again, we have but another double gameweek set to take place in the not too distant future…
Both teams will be missing the aforementioned gameweek 23 so at this point stocking up would seem cavalier, but afterwards Stokes fixtures (sun, BLA, wig, MCY, por) look reasonably strong, at least from an offensive viewpoint – and if they can continue to score like they did in the first half of their fixture with Fulham just last week.
If he can recover from his slight hamstring tug the ethereal Tuncay becomes an option again, much like his equally classified midfielder Matthew Etherington. Popular selections in defence Faye, Shawcross & Sorensen may enjoy spells on the bench in gameweek 23 to allow people to once again roll the dice one the double gameweek.
Manchester City however have the really tempting fixture list that will surely prick a few ears (POR, hul, BOL, stk, LIV). The best bucks obviously lie with current hot topic Carlos Tevez, who is subject of well over 160,000 transfers in this week alone and has been recently rocketing up in price as much as he has been scoring (7 goals in his last 6 Premier League games).
If Petrov proves to be a regular starter once Shaun Wright-Phillips and Stephen Ireland return from injury he too will prove a steal at a mere £6.5m. Tempestuous striker Craig Bellamy has also been having quite possibly his best season to date, so if he keeps his head will also tempt a few souls. Shay Given could be considered the best defensive option too if Mancini’s side show they can continue to keep the clean sheets – perhaps against teams a bit more potent that Stoke, Wolves & Middlesbrough who they have so far faced since Roberto arrived in Eastlands.
Now let us hope the cold, snow and most treacherous of all, the ice refrains from postponing any more fixtures for now this weekend – it’s beginning get hard to keep track of all of this. We however at Fantasy Football Scout will of course endeavour to keep you all well up to speed.