The Pre-match Preamble – Gameweek 11

Everton’s incredible schedule up until the New Year has given me an opportunity dig up an old argument.

“Form or Fixtures” is a hackneyed and tired debate amongst these pages and Fantasy Football managers – so, if I’m going to revive it, I’m going to have to try and inject it with new life.

Let’s start by saying that, in my view, tracking and speculating on fixtures provides the platform for those who aspire to “maverick” management.

Similarly, when we become over-reliant on form to guide our decisions, seeking comfort in proven trends rather than attempting to seek out and exploit new patterns, we are, by that description, favouring the “dullard” management style.

Despite the fact that studying fixtures involves scanning spreadsheets and schedules, I therefore see it as the “sexy” and “aspirational” option.

Fixtures can provide some basis of logic to fuel speculative and risky decisions. Those decisions may backfire and that’s how form gets widely established as the most reliable and effective factor behind winning at Fantasy Football.

However, without some influence of fixtures and the thinking they promote, Fantasy Football management can become a turgid and repetitive experience.

I look to Andy at this point, riding high at the top of our contributors league and placed in the top 150 overall.

When he signed Harry Kane in Gameweek 9, he wasn’t basing that decision on his form. Kane had just a single goal to his name and yet, with the luxury of a strong rank, Andy made the decision to draft him in and was rewarded with his Gameweek 10 hat-trick.

I imagine Kane’s fixtures – the trip to Bournemouth and now four home matches in the next six – played some part in reassuring Andy’s maverick urges.

I now look to the top transferred-in players this week and note that Jamie Vardy sits just behind Kane. The Leicester man has struck goals in seven consecutive Gameweeks and is in the form of his life.

The decision made by those 140,000 FPL managers is clearly based on Vardy’s current form and yet, there’s an argument to say that Romelu Lukaku could outscore Vardy over the next eight Gameweeks.

There can be no question that the Vardy transfer is more logical. As such, we can also associate such a decision with typical “dullard” behaviour.

Is Vardy the better option? Our Watchlist says so and I find it difficult to argue against every team requiring the Foxes striker. However, I also think there’s every chance that Vardy’s output will regress and that Lukaku will exploit Everton’s schedule and outscore him.

It would take close scrutiny of the Toffees’ schedule to arrive at that theory; it would also take a brave Fantasy Football manager to back it.

I’m not sure on Andy’s methods but, as a Fantasy Football manager that loves to speculate – that enjoys seeking out the 30-yard Hollywood ball rather than opt to keep possession with sideways pass – I realise that I put too much stock in fixtures.

At this point it’s normally appropriate to say that there is no wrong or right approach. However, I think that’s nonsense.

Form is so often the most important factor – consider player form, then team form and only then bring fixtures into the equation.

However, I like to think that the really successful Fantasy Football managers need more than that basic framework to play this game.

Studying fixtures allows us to branch out – it’s the comfort blanket that we cling to when we make a transfer that walks on the wild side.

Those transfers make Fantasy Football worth playing and the highs you get from those trades so often outweigh the satisfaction gained from another Vardy goal.

I like to consider form as my cosy and reliable local. Then, every so often, I willingly allow the fixture list to tempt me into more exciting venues, where lady luck perches at the bar, seductively flicking through pictures of Lukaku’s goal celebrations.