The Knee Jerk – Saturday

Another Anfield rout brings has a certain Uruguayan hogging the headlines again, whilst Brendan Rodgers teamsheet gives cause for a re-think when assessing his defensive assets. Meanwhile, at St Mary’s, Southampton’s blossoming form continues as they move to third, inspired by skipper Adam Lallana and a striker scrapping for World Cup recognition.

The Game Changer

The march of Luis Suarez seems unrelenting. Following the blank at Arsenal last time out, the Uruguayan returned to the scoresheet, notching a brace as Liverpool scored four for the second home match in succession.

The overwhelming favourite in our Captain Poll going into the Gameweek, Suarez repaid his Fantasy owners with another double figure haul and, with maximum bonus surely to follow, he will have registered 64 points in his six appearances since returning from suspension.

The Emirates blank has been the only blot in the copybook for Suarez, who has either scored or assisted in every other outing this season. Once again, he left Daniel Sturridge in his wake to well and truly banish any suggestion that the England striker can keep pace. The 1.8 gap between the two players is substantial but, given the consistency being shown by Suarez, his value as a recipient of the armband seems to justify the outlay.

Suarez now departs for Uruguay’s World Cup play-off with Jordan to return to league action for the Merseyside derby in a fortnight. While injury and fatigue could well be factors between now and that testing fixture, it seems unlikely to perturb would-be investors who will be drawn to Suarez in their droves, attracted by yet another bumper return.

The Underused

Rickie Lambert’s goal and brace of assists not only made a significant contribution to Southampton’s fine 4-1 win over Hull City, it meant that the World Cup hopeful has now notched in three of his last four home matches.

From nowhere, Lambert has edged his way back onto the Fantasy radar having recorded a second double figure return in the space of three Gameweeks.

Four goals and three assists are moderate season returns in the current climate where the top Fantasy strikers are promising goal-a-game returns. Even so, Lambert is priced at just 7.2 in the Fantasy Premier League (FPL) and appears to be finding the form that will give him every chance of earning a spot on the plane to Rio, whilst perhaps even offering Fantasy managers a potential differential as we search for methods to break the current template.

With Romelu Lukaku recording a third blank in five league outings, we could yet see some traffic heading Lambert’s way following today’s returns.

The Selection Poser

The re-introduction of Philippe Coutinho to the Liverpool starting XI proved the catalyst for Brendan Rodgers to change his formation. A standard 4-4-2 was deployed, with Coutinho taking up a role on the left but given license to tuck inside. In defence, we saw Glen Johnson return at right-back after his absence at the Emirates but, more significantly, Dan Agger was reinstated in the centre, alongside Martin Skrtel. That meant no place for either Mamadou Sakho or Kolo Toure – the latter was missing from the matchday squad.

Toure is owned by almost 8% of Fantasy Premier League managers and, at just 5.0, was designated as the most favoured route into the Liverpool defence after keeper Simon Mignolet. The Ivorian now appears to face a major task to earn a recall to displace the Skrtel/Agger partnership, particularly with Sakho in the reckoning.

While most Fantasy managers will be focused on Liverpool’s attacking returns, today’s clean sheet could well be the sign of things to come. Although they conceded in their last home match, that was down to a dubious penalty against West Brom and with Norwich, West Ham and Cardiff the next three teams to visit Merseyside, the Liverpool back four could yet prove profitable for investors.