Sky Sports Focus – Gameweek 23

Our weekly look at the Sky Sports Fantasy Football game returns this Friday evening. As always, we bring you the usual info from the previous week’s data, including Man of the Match (MoTM) awards, bonus point beneficiaries and a look at the Scout team and our future plans.

Gameweek 22 Man of the Match Awards

These were the players that caught the eye of the Sky Sports reporters from last weekend’s fixtures achieving the Man of the Match award (worth an additional five points).

David Silva picked up a fourth MoTM award in his last five appearances, highlighting his superb run of form. With Sergio Aguero expected to return to the City starting XI this weekend, it will be interesting to see the impact on Silva’s output – for better or worse. Alexis Sanchez is another player in great form and he now finds himself on five awards overall, level with Silva. Diego Costa was the only other big name to earn the accolade this week and turned out to be a great captain choice for those who selected him ahead of Eden Hazard in Chelsea’s win over Newcastle.

Gameweek 22 Bonus Points

Three goalkeepers achieved bonus points from collecting five or more saves. Hugo Lloris, Tom Heaton and Robert Green were the men in question – the latter is still the top of the bonus point rankings, on 18 overall.

In defence, nine players grabbed bonus, five for tackles and four for passes completed. Villa’s Jores Okore came closest to earning both, missing out by just 12 completed passes. Dejan Lovren, Martin Skrtel and Cesar Azpilicueta are leading the way for defenders, all with 14 additional points.

In midfield, there were 24 beneficiaries in total: 15 for tackling and ten for passes. Michael Carrick was the only player to achieve both to earn an extra four points. Nemanja Matic is now the game’s overall highest bonus point earner with 32 points credited.

Fantasy Football Scout members can access all information regarding bonus points using player stats and clicking the Sky Sports tab.

My Team

Fabianski
Bertrand Hutton Van Aanholt
Hazard Downing Sigurdsson Fabregas Di Maria
Rooney© Giroud

ITB: 0.9m
Transfers remaining: 17/40
Last week’s points: 48
Overall points: 1267
Rank: 323

Notes
A poor week overall for me with two captain failures in Eden Hazard and then Wayne Rooney. The lack of Alexis Sanchez in my team was the real killer and lead to me dropping around 100 places overall. I thought Olivier Giroud would be able to somewhat cover the Chilean’s points points but on this evidence it’s looking unlikely; however, Giroud’s role as the lone striker persuades me to hold for now.

Aside from the lack of Sanchez, I’m happy with my team overall and my only real decision now is whether to bring in Sergio Aguero for Wayne Rooney for Sunday’s match or to stick with Rooney through United’s good fixtures and hold off until City play Hull at home. I’m really unsure here, as with Robin Van Persie looking likely to be sidelined, Rooney’s points potential could be boosted with a shift further up field. Can I ignore Aguero home to Arsenal and away to Chelsea? With any other player I would but we all know what he is capable of. Another decision for me to mull over on Sunday morning.

Captain plan
I’m locked into Rooney as captain for his trip to QPR on Saturday, though for Sunday, my armband will go to either Stewart Downing or Aguero – if I decide to bring the latter in. Olivier Giroud is another option for me but away to City, it’s hard to see him having much of an impact.

A reminder that Gameweek 24 is a blank week and so you can use a free skipper change in this period to set yourself up for the following round of fixtures.

The Fantasy Football Scout League

Once again, we’re running our own Fantasy Football Scout League this season and were currently topping the Private League rankings. With a £1000 prize to the winner, you’d be mad not to get involved. To join, visit Sky Sports Fantasy Football and key in League Name: FFScout, League Code: 8009000.

The Fantasy Football Club

This Friday The Fantasy Football Club show, where you can catch the rerun of Fenners and Merse at 18:30 SkySports One HD where they will be discussing the upcoming week’s Fantasy Football, quizzing former England defender Terry Butcher and asking former Barcelona star Eric Abidal for his #One2Eleven.