“Of course I wish it was three months ago, with the players we have coming back”.
David Moyes could not mask his frustration when reflecting on the form of his record-breaking Everton team, following a seventh straight home league win in the Premier League last weekend. Whilst the recent return of their talismanic playmaker Mikel Arteta has lit up the Premiership, there is an air of regret about Everton’s season, a sense of “what could have been” had the Spaniard been available from the outset.
In essence, the same could be said for Fantasy Premier League (FPL) teams around the globe. There’s no doubt if Arteta had been fit and raring to go for the August opener with Arsenal, many a team’s ranks would have been boosted by his presence. A series of eye-catching performances have already seen him rise to third highest scoring midfielder in terms of point per game, and there’s every indication he’ll continue to rack up some huge scores in the remaining fixtures of the Fantasy season…
Favourable Fixtures
In their final seven gameweeks, Everton have yet to play three of the current bottom five. Indeed, only two of their upcoming opponents -Fulham and Aston Villa- are in the top half of the table, and with both Martin O’Neill and Roy Hodgson promising rotation in light of both club’s respective cup runs, the run-in could hardly be kinder to Moyes’ men.
With European qualification being previously written off for Everton this season, results this weekend -a draw for Villa and a Liverpool loss- means they now find themselves just six points behind their Merseyside neighbours with a game in hand. Following this weekend’s defeat of a dogged Bolton side, Arteta declared:
“You can’t always be really pretty and do everything nicely – the most important thing was to get the points and another win at home. I think we are right in the mix at the moment and we are showing that desire. We are really pleased. But I think we need to win another six games. That is really tough but we want to get into the mix.”
Everton’s remaining matches read: wlv, WHM, avl, bla, FUL, stk, POR.
Passing Performances
A look at these chalkboards from Everton’s last two league games show how much of the ball Arteta sees in each match. Moyes’ version of Cesc, he’s the very heartbeat of this Everton side, and with so much of his team’s play running through him, his talent never fails to shine, as the Bonus Point judges watch on.
Arteta and Pienaar
Although Arteta’s presence has undoubtedly lifted the Everton team’s play up a notch or two, one player in particular has been the main benefactor (both on-pitch and in FPL) and that is Steven Pienaar. This Saturday’s game against Bolton saw a continuation of both scoring heavily again in the fantasy game since Arteta achieved full match fitness five games ago.
In those games:
Pienaar has scored: 1 goal, 3 assists, 4 Bonus Points, a total of 27 FPL pts.
Arteta has scored: 3 goals, 2 assists, 9 Bonus Points, a total of 39 FPL pts.
Given that Pienaar took 18 games previously to score 66 points (an average of just under 3.7 per game), the subsequent 5.4 points per game he has scored on Arteta’s return is a decent gauge of the Spaniard’s effect on his team mate’s returns, making Pienaar, and not just Everton, a different prospect entirely whilst Arteta is on the pitch.