Double Gameweek 22 finally brings to a close a frenetic period of Fantasy action, but it’s an unhappy end for those who go big on Spurs striker Harry Kane.
Picking through the bones of Spurs’ 1-1 draw with West Ham last night makes for depressing reading for most, if not quite all, FPL managers.
Chief draw of the double Gameweek was Kane, who went into it with back-to-back hat-tricks and came out the other side with three measly points from 112 anti-climactic minutes.
Illness hit the striker over Christmas, but that didn’t dissuade close to 428,000 managers making him the second most popular buy of Gameweek 22.
More than 24% then captained him and 121,000+ played their Triple Captain chip – leading figures for both – only for Kane’s inconsistent Wembley form to bite one and all.
His eight goals in 11 home appearances looks strong, but he’s actually failed to find the net in seven of those matches.
When he scores at Wembley, he generally scores big. But not last night – despite having seven shots, five of which came in the area, against the Hammers.
All is not lost for his 43.5% ownership as Spurs entertain Everton and then travel to Southampton next.
Those match-ups have persuaded more than 100,000 managers to bring him in already, making him the second most purchased player ahead of Gameweek 23 even though the FA Cup third round has to be endured before that.
A spiteful three-match run (MUN liv ARS) then follows at the end of January, which will most likely require a re-evaluation of the various Spurs assets brought in to capitalise on Gameweek 22’s double fixtures.
Kane might well survive that purge, but the chips blown and transfer hits taken to bring him in this week have hurt many now, and could have knock-on effects.
Son shines bright on the night
Across the two teams with double fixtures, no player scored more points than Spurs midfielder Son Heung-min.
His equalising goal against West Ham earned him two bonus for nine points on the night and 12 for the Gameweek.
Andy Carroll, with a brace in Tuesday’s 2-1 win over West Brom, was the only other double Gameweek player to score so many points, but his 0.6% ownership meant the effect of all that was negligible.
Not so Son, who was Gameweek 22’s most bought player, with 498,000 transfers-in.
That took him to 12.6% ownership, and his ever-growing army of managers have certainly reaped the benefits of some excellent home form.
Son has now scored in six of his last seven matches at Wembley and is also enjoying a consistent run in the team, starting in nine of the last ten fixtures.
While the availability of Mousa Dembele and Victor Wanyama gives Mauricio Pochettino the option of shifting to a 3-4-2-1, potentially putting Son’s start at risk, the idea of Spurs lining up without the in-form South Korean seems remote.
Son (8.1) is up to 99 points for the season, which puts him just outside the top ten scoring midfielders and only three points shy of team-mate Dele Alli, who is 0.9 more expensive.
The England international blanked last night, as did Christian Eriksen, but both are in strong enough form – the Dane has produced returns in six of his last eight matches, Alli has two goals and four assists in four – for managers to hold onto them for the next two attractive fixtures at least.
At the back, Spurs have kept back-to-back clean sheets just twice all season, and West Ham’s one shot on target put paid to their chances of that happening again on Thursday.
Those upcoming Everton and Southampton fixtures look like an excellent opportunity to make it third time lucky, but Spurs’ defenders remain relatively expensive for the returns they’re delivering.
The cheapest among them, Kieran Trippier (5.3), is also the most vulnerable to rotation, and so it proved last night as the ex-Burnley man was rewarded for his nine-point showing in Tuesday’s win at Swansea City with a place on the bench against the Hammers as Serge Aurier once again took his place.
Their most owned defender, Ben Davies (13.4%), started consecutive matches for the first time since Gameweek 16, thanks to an injury to Danny Rose.
Fantasy managers will be hoping that situation continues for the next two Gameweeks, if not much further forward than that.
Injury terminates Arnie’s hopes
Spurs players dominated the transfer market for Gameweek 22, with Marko Arnautovic the only West Ham fly in that particular ointment.
The midfielder was third for transfers-in (368,000+) on the back of a consistent spell of form under David Moyes during which he’d scored five times in as many matches.
Arnautovic kept things ticking over with an assist in the win over West Brom, only for a hamstring niggle to rule him out of last night’s match and scupper the double Gameweek plans of 8.8% of FPL managers.
But unless the issue is a serious one, his form and West Ham’s fixtures (hud BOU CRY bha WAT), make the Austrian one to keep for now.
Pre-match, his manager had this to say:
“Marko has got an injury as well. He’s been really important to us, but he’s not fit to play tonight.”
The fact that Carroll was unable to cope with the quick turnaround in matches suggests that the target man’s minutes could be managed by Moyes, with Arnautovic again used as the central striker over at least some of those favourable fixtures. Carroll has played four successive matches just once this season – between Gameweeks 4-7.
Another midfielder who enjoyed a surge in ownership this week was Manuel Lanzini.
Some 68,000+ managers bought into him, more than doubling his ownership, and he produced an assist for Pedro Obiang’s spectacular opener last night.
The Argentine now has five assists from his last six starts and is another well-placed to capitalise on the Hammers’ forthcoming fixtures.
At the back, Angelo Ogbonna and Arthur Masuaku both enjoyed decent Gameweek 22 investment, but produced only four and three points respectively.
It was left to goalkeeper Adrian to bring in slightly better returns, his seven saves at Spurs helping him to six points from the two matches.
He now has three clean sheets and seven save points from his eight appearances since replacing Joe Hart.
At 4.3, he remains a very viable rotation partner for Burnley’s Nick Pope, particularly when the Clarets host both Manchester clubs across Gameweeks 24 and 26.
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