With the fourth of December’s six Gameweeks just hours away, our community has been on hand to offer a wealth of advice on captains, cheap strikers and Liverpool’s conveyor belt of must-have midfielders.
Our community scribes focus on how form and fixture analysis can help with our armband decisions ahead of Gameweek 17, while our hot topic posters have been in poetic mood with some Shakespearean puns around the beautiful game.
Creative defenders get a once-over in our Members tables and finally we catch up on those who have a happy Winter Tale to tell at the summit of our community contests.
The Community Articles
Harry Kane’s blank against Hull City on Wednesday marked a rare flop for YMA’s regular What the Fixtures and Form Say predictions.
The striker grabbed star billing the last time this method was deployed but his failure to find the net against such weak opposition means that Tottenham team-mate Christian Eriksen hogs the limelight in his latest despatch, ahead of Burnley’s visit to White Hart Lane.
This week marks a slight tweak to the method he has being using, with bookies odds jettisoned as a predictor of form and replaced with a closer look at clean sheet potential.
Don’t forget, if you’ve got some analysis, scout reports or features brewing, be sure to visit our community section to submit your article.
The Hottest Topics
Double point hauls for West Brom’s Salomon Rondon and Liverpool’s Divock Origi in Gameweek 16 showed that the third striker market remains competitive. It is the Reds’ young Belgian sensation who has particularly impressed Parm, who believes he may even retain a starting berth when Philippe Coutinho returns from injury early next month.
Musicholic also joined in the discussion with this look at some of the best strikers with a price tag below the 7.0m mark.
As interest in Origi rises, the stock of Roberto Firmino plummets, with the Brazilian looking lost as a Fantasy prospect without his compatriot Coutinho on the pitch.
Dino examines the Firmino firesale that has been taking place across a barren run that will stretch to six league matches should he fail to deliver returns against Everton on Monday. Parm was back again with his thoughts on why the Reds midfielder’s performances have dropped so markedly.
Those that have stuck by the former false 9, now lost left winger, were among those to detail their terrible performance in our Rough with the Smooth round up of Gameweek 16.
There were further tragedies, as well as a fair few comedies, in Jafooli’s request to hear the community’s best Shakespearean football puns.
The acquisition of Manchester City striker Kelechi Iheanacho during Sergio Aguero’s four-match suspension has proved to be another weepie. After being substituted before the hour mark away to Leicester, the youngster was left on the bench against Watford in Gameweek 16.
With this in mind Joe Sherman sparked this discussion on City boss Pep Guardiola’s uneasy relationships with strikers.
There was also a mystery novel in the making behind FPL managers’ decision to transfer out Chelsea’s Eden Hazard after he missed the midweek match at Sunderland. More than 112,000 managers have parted company with the Belgian, much to the befuddlement of Licious Lizard. Hazard has since returned to training ahead of tomorrow’s clash against Palace.
The Chelsea schemer has proved so unpopular this week that he saw a price reduction overnight. Deano is among those concerned that FPL managers are getting too obsessed with team value.
We finish off our summary of the week’s hot topics with a mention to two of the community’s cleverest fellows.
Jarvish has got through to the semi-final of Channel 4’s Countdown’s series playoffs and Gargamel popped in let us know about the launch of a website dedicated to his Gargatron tool, which provides a fascinating insight into just where we are going right, and in my case wrong, this season in FPL.
The Members Tables
After Salomon Rondon leapt off my goals imminent table in style with a midweek hat-trick, there is a new batch of faces vying to find the net to back up their promising underlying statistics.
Meanwhile, Waxfoot has been taking a look at creative defenders who are on the cusp of a points haul from assisting.
If you’re a member and are yet to get to grips with the custom statistics tables, you can view this movie for an explanation of how they work. Also, remember to tag them so that people can find the tables with ease.
The Community Tournaments
This weekend is crunch time in The Fantasy Chili Bowl team competition, according to the latest update from organiser committee member Jarvish. This details the Gameweek 17 ties that will decide who progresses to the next stage.
In TorresMagic‘s Last Man Standing competition the safety score was 35, which saw 138 players depart and 1238 remain.
Elsewhere, Raul Seleccion continues to top Red Lightning’s Top 10k Any Season mini-league.
Red Lightning also tells us that his January to May mini league (1441-820) is now available for entries. This will start scoring from Gameweek 20.
Over in the FFS Moderators and Contributors league, at long last, we’ve seen major developments at the top. Long time leader Facer has been pegged back over the last two Gameweeks, with Torres Magic now level at the summit on 912 points.
In my Millionaires Club, for those who had a Gameweek rank above the one million mark in Gameweek 12, Krak Krak has taken the lead and now sits 148,642 in the overall placings.
If you are running a community tournament and would like the latest scores included in future Community Round Ups please email me a brief summary of the current leaders and a link to your league, spreadsheet or head to head competition, at jonty@fantasyfootballscout.co.uk.
