Evidently the collective mix of the home football clubs, the local constabulary and Mother Nature didn’t feel particularly Christmassy this Boxing day as yet again Premier League games succumbed to the weather. At least this Game Week festive cheers and merriments were quashed with (some) time on players side to make required team changes.
An hour and a half before the 11:30 am (GMT) deadline it was announced that both the Blackpool versus Liverpool game, a game which was widely tipped to be postponed, and more surprisingly the Everton versus Birmingham game would have to be called off. The former due to a frozen pitch, a legacy of the lack of undersoil heating, and the later due to frozen pipes. Maybe these clubs were on the naughty list this Christmas. Actually maybe if they had of been they’d got a lump of coal they could have used it to heat up their damn stadiums!
Needless to say the late announcements meant last minute reschedules of Fantasy Football teams. Tim Cahill was dumped earlier than planned by many in light of his forthcoming Asia Cup dalliance, Leighton Baines was knee-jerkingly disposed of in order to field 11 players and the reserve goalkeeping situation was amended with the Ben Foster shaped hole meaning the none-playing Stockdale or Mignolet provided inadequate support.
What made it worse was that Captain poll favourite Nani, with 35% of the vote, was no where to be seen – not even on the bench. Chat of flu during the week may go some way to account for his absence but the explanations that he was either receiving a rest in light of the hectic Christmas schedule or attending a Michael Jackson (Thriller era) lookalike convention may also have held true. With Manchester United’s next game coming this Tuesday, Nani owners will be sweating on his fitness and inclusion. Check back to Team News and the Twitter feed on the site to keep up to date with all information.
The key Knee Jerk today was surely the returning Rafael Van Der Vaart. There was a concern this week that the Dutchman may not be risked given his recent spate of injury problems, however, owners will be thankful he did with a two goal contribution seeing to Tottenham Hotspur’s 2-1 away victory over Aston Villa. Once again “Rafa” outshone Fantasy Football rival, but Spurs teammate, Gareth Bale.
The Welshman is owned by a staggering 55.6% of players- surely the single largest act of collective blind faith in Fantasy Football history. Van Der Vaart has only 18.8% ownership in comparison but even with his injury problems has contributed a significantly larger amount of points per game this season. Continual frustration for owners of the Welshman lies in the fact that he always seems to “assist” the player who assists Van Der Vaart. Surely more and more owners will be looking to switch to the Dutchman, either from Bale or as a replacement for the departing Tim Cahill. Given his recent injuries however, whether Rafa can play three to four games on the spin would have to be questioned.
