Scout Notes – Hazard and Chelsea Misfire

Defenders hoover up the points in Saturday’s lunchtime stalemate at Goodison Park, with Everton goalkeeper Jordan Pickford the star of the show, while there are slim pickings to be had from Manchester United’s men as they are held by ten-man Leicester City.

Much of the pre-match concern at Goodison Park on Saturday centred on Eden Hazard’s reduced attacking threat in the absence of Alvaro Morata.

And so it proved.

The Belgian managed three attempts on goal against Everton, but then again so did N’Golo Kante, as Sam Allardyce’s men kept Chelsea at arm’s length for much of the early kick-off.

That means it’s just four goals in as many matches for the Blues now, and three of those came in the Gameweek 17 win at Huddersfield.

Hazard has produced just a single assist from those four fixtures, an output that simply doesn’t wash when there are a host of midfielders easily outstripping him at present, many of them for rather less than his 10.9 price tag.

Morata will be back from his one-match ban for the Boxing Day visit of Brighton – a fixture that now looks vital for Hazard’s Fantasy stock as his 14.5% ownership survey the wealth of alternatives.

The Spaniard’s stock will have been boosted by Chelsea’s recent failings, with Antonio Conte’s post-match comments underlining Morata’s importance to their cause.

“Don’t forget our striker, Morata, was out and I think he’s very important because he’s our finisher. At the same time we played with another option, three number 10s, and we created many chances to score 10 but we must be more clinical.”

At least there was some festive cheer at the back for Conte and the Blues.

Marcos Alonso produced a clean sheet for his 136,000 new Gameweek 19 owners, building on his goal and assist returns from the previous two. He is now the top-ranked defender on 96 points.

Meanwhile, Andreas Christensen recorded his sixth shut-out from his last nine starts and enjoyed an overnight price rise to 5.7.

Rooney misses out as Pickford shines

Close to 230,000 managers had made Wayne Rooney the second most bought player heading into Gameweek 19, only for illness to mean that he failed to make Everton’s matchday squad.

The striker had been in astonishing form, with six goals and three assists from his last five Gameweeks, and his ownership was up to 21.4% as a result.

But whether Rooney would have had much opportunity to extend that run against Chelsea is debatable.

The Toffees were set up to soak up pressure, the home side failing to record a single shot on target in the match as six Chelsea players (including two defenders) had at least as many attempts as the two managed by Everton’s Dominic Calvert-Lewin.

That was of secondary concern to Allardyce as his charges kept a fourth clean sheet in six matches.

Chief beneficiary, points-wise, was goalkeeper Jordan Pickford, who pulled off five saves and earned maximum bonus for his third double-digit haul since the former England manager took the reins at Goodison Park. Impressively, he now has eight bonus points from his last six starts.

Pickford, at 4.8, is offering increasingly good value, while the even cheaper charms of Jonjoe Kenny (4.4) were also on display.

Everton’s next two fixtures (wba bou) offer the potential for more of the same, before things stiffen considerably in the New Year, with a visit from Man United and a trip to Spurs.

United assets disappoint

The woes for Manchester United on the pitch were reflected in the lack of returns from the star Fantasy assets in their line-up.

Jose Mourinho’s men failed to put away ten-man Leicester City and were left to rue their profligacy when a late Harry Maguire goal secured the Foxes a 2-2 draw.

Four United players had enjoyed ownership boosts of more than 100,000 going into the Gameweek, but only one them – Jesse Lingard – produced a worthy return.

The 6.0-valued option provided an assist and now has two of those, and four goals, from a fine six-match run of form that continues to promote him as a fourth or fifth midfielder.

By contrast, more than 153,000 managers had welcomed Paul Pogba (7.9) back from the cold of a three-match ban, only to be treated to a generally subdued two-point performance.

Only the 1.9% owned Juan Mata produced a telling score, the Spaniard’s brace bringing in 15 points. Meanwhile, the 14.49% of managers who still trusted Romelu Lukaku with the captaincy had to make do with observing some encouraging link-up play, to suffer a fifth blank from his last seven starts.

United’s defence, meanwhile, continues to live in the shadow of its early-season greatness.

Having kept eight clean sheets in the first ten matches, they’ve now managed just two more from the past nine, with the 4.7% of managers owning Chris Smalling handed extra discomfort when the defender limped off with a groin problem.

Should he sit out the Boxing Day clash with Burnley as expected, that would surely cement the starting role for Victor Lindelof. The Swede came in at right-back on Saturday, with both Antonio Valencia and Matteo Darmian sidelined. Marcos Rojo also seems a likely starter against the Clarets having been preserved on the bench at the King Power Stadium.

Maguire leaves it late

Foxes centre-half Maguire continued to keep his 9.4% ownership in profit with yet another timely attacking return.

The England international’s late, late equaliser, from a fine Marc Albrighton cross, made it two goals and four assists for the season – excellent compensation for a defender with just four clean sheets to his name.

He has now surpassed last season’s output of two goals and three assists, which is just as well as Leicester’s immediate schedule (wat liv HUD che) offers only patchy prospects of further shut-outs.

Their big guns combined for the opener last night when Riyad Mahrez superbly set up Jamie Vardy for the striker’s first goal in five matches.

Vardy’s owners have been a generally loyal bunch, although more than 130,000 of them finally jumped ship ahead of the United match and were duly punished.

Mahrez was another to suffer Gameweek 19 sales, with 104,000+ getting rid.

But the Algerian has provided either a goal or an assist in five of the last six Gameweeks and has now moved ahead of Manchester City’s Leroy Sane in the midfield standings, sitting in sixth place on 99 points.