Fulham have been an entertainingly unpredictable outfit under Martin Jol; cheerfully disposed to inflict or endure a spanking, then tight and combative when one least expects it. Feast, famine and light lunch have jostled inconclusively for supremacy for much of the season, but with three wins and a draw from their last four, the Cottagers’ Fantasy assets are currently filling their boots.
The Prospects
With trips to Anfield and Goodison Park on the agenda, Fulham haven’t been blessed with the most appetising double Gameweek menu, but a visit from goal-shy Sunderland in Gameweek 37 promises a decent dessert. The Cottagers’ defence has outperformed its reputation on the road this season: a haul of just two away clean sheets is an uncharitable reflection on the fourth best away defence in the Premier League. With Everton and Liverpool lying 14th and 16th respectively when it comes to goals scored at home, Martin Jol’s men may yet set the record straight.
In terms of offensive output, a two goal per game average over the last four gives Fantasy managers plenty to work with when the returns are concentrated in the hands of a narrow attacking aristocracy. No clean sheets in six for Liverpool suggests potential for points at Anfield, though Goodison Park may prove a tougher test of the Fulham vanguard.
THE LIKELY LADS
It’s been a tidy, business-as-usual season for Mark Schwarzer. The Australian is already perched above the 100 point mark for a sixth consecutive season, despite an eight gameweek layoff over Christmas, and, at 4.8, it is perhaps only Fulham’s haphazard away record that has robbed him of a respectable following this year.
Powering ahead of his defensive contemporaries on 104 points is everyone’s favourite Norwegian left-back, John Arne Riise. Yet to score this season despite enjoying a fair slice of the set piece pie, two assists and two bonus points in his last three appearances demonstrate a healthy breadth to his attacking appeal. At 5.7 he isn’t cheap, but he offers the Fantasy manager a bit of everything, and with a left foot that could kick start the Large Hadron Collider, goalless seasons are rare for Riise.
Our other mid-priced offering from the Fulham defence is the redoubtable Brede Hangelaand. A prolific threat last season with six Premier League goals, the centre half is enduring an unaccountably impoverished campaign. Initially priced at 6.5 on the back last season’s six-goal scoring spree, his now reduced tag of 6.0 may yet feel a bit steep, but if he can mimic the goalscoring resurgence of his chart topping contemporary from last season, Robert Huth, he would represent good value at that price.
Philippe Senderos (4.1) and Stephen Kelly (4.0) are your budget backline options. Senderos offered us a timely reminder of his goal threat with a well taken header on his return from injury last week, but if the the comparatively innocuous Kelly can shake off a wrist injury, the Irishman might be the safer bet in terms of pitch time.
From humble budget beginnings, Clint Dempsey has slowly but surely clawed his way to the very top. Once a cheap differential punt, Fulham’s American import is now a bona-fide, handprint on FPL boulevarde, A-lister. Twenty points clear at the top of the midfield charts, and behind only Robin Van Persie and Wayne Rooney in the overall rankings, Dempsey is having the season of his career. Averaging more than 10 points-per-game over his last four appearances, and with 16 goals and seven assists already to his name, a double digit valuation next term seems on the cards for a player currently at 9.5 and climbing. Accruing the majority of his horde at home, 15 points away at Bolton three weeks ago served as a concise demolition of suggestions that his heroics are confined to Craven Cottage.
Out of the side at times this season, Damien Duff now seems to have nailed down his spot out wide, returning a very respectable one goal, two assists and five bonus points in the last four gameweeks. With Clint Dempsey holding down the headlines, the quiet productivity of Duff has been bathed in comparative anonymity, which for Fantasy managers can be useful. Averaging more than eight points-per-game over his last four at a price of just 6.1, Duff offers a whopping discount of 3.4 over Dempsey, and, at just 1.2% ownership, he has all the makings of a cracking late-season differential if he can maintain his current form.
Pavel Pogrebnyak‘s fifteen minutes of FPL fame was a white knuckle rollercoaster ride. Initially priced at 6.0 following his January move from VfB Stuttgart, he shot up to 6.4 on the back of five goals in three games, only to slip all the way back to 5.2 before Mark and Paul Merson had worked out how to pronounce his name. Scoring on his return to the side last week after an ankle problem, Pogrebnyak should retain his place for the double Gameweek, and looks good value for those Fantasy managers prepared to play fast and loose and with their valuable striker spots.
CHEEKY PUNT
His penalties are paragons of poetic perfection, his distribution a symphony of sensible sobriety, so why is Danny Murphy, The Putney Pele, no longer guaranteed a starting role at Fulham? Has Martin Jol signed Messi? Murphy’s masterly midfield play has long served as the beating heart of the Fulham family, but the rise in Jol’s estimation of the combative Mahamadou Diarra has, astonishingly, rendered their club captain surplus to requirements on occasion in recent months. Although he has started three out of the last four games, he hasn’t completed 90 minutes since February, but with spot-kicks and a share of set-pieces in the bag, at a price of 6.0, The Craven Cruyff may yet be the man to sound the starting klaxon to a late mini-league surge.
