The first double Gameweek of the Premier League season, involving Manchester City and Stoke, starts this weekend and understandably dominated the community’s thoughts throughout the week.
For our community scribes, the best candidates to trust with the armband or Triple Captain chip were the key issues to consider.
However, many of our hot topic posters were in more cautious mood, with rotation fears and impending blank fixtures coming under discussion.
The statistics of City’s midfield stars take centre stage in our look at the latest Members Table.
We finish off with a look at those who will be looking to extend their lead at the top of our community leagues by ensuring they take advantage of Gameweek 27’s extra matches.
The Community Articles
To mark the first double Gameweek of the season, YMA has tweaked his regular look at what the form and fixture data says about the captaincy, to only focus on players that have two matches.
For those looking to use their Triple Captain chip on a Manchester City assets Bash Villa has been taking a look ahead to the future double Gameweeks to see if this source of extra points could be better exploited later in the campaign.
Elsewhere, TopMarx‘s latest assessement of the Hall of Fame top 5 reveals that double Gameweek fever has gripped this elite group, with even their most hit-shy member keen to spend points.
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
With two goals against Huddersfield Town in the FA Cup on Wednesday night, a brace against Monaco in the Champions League last week and matches against Sunderland and Stoke, Sergio Aguero certainly has form and fixtures on his side heading into the double Gameweek.
For Sharp Shuffle, drafting in the Argentine is not in doubt, instead the real issue is which heavy-hitting striker makes way in our squads.
But as our hot topic on the City striker’s triple captaincy credentials showed, there are still some lingering concerns surrounding his reliability as an armband option, given Pep Guardiola’s penchant for teamsheet tinkering.
This threat of rotation among the City ranks was also something that KTK Interista discussed in his chatter on Aguero.
Following on from a request from Viperstripes for further discussion of Manchester City midfielders, Mark duly obliged: his hot topic focused on which of their wingers, Raheem Sterling or Leroy Sane, provides the most potential, and also asked whether we should go all out and pair them up.
To round off our look at Guardiola’s troops, we also conducted a roll call of which of their players you intend to own in Gameweek 27 and whether you’re throwing the Triple Captain chip the way of their star striker.
There is a sting in the tail for those stocking up on City and Stoke assets, as a week later they and tne other teams miss out due to FA Cup Quarter Final commitments.
Our discussion on double and blank Gameweeks considered how best to tackle these changes to the fixture schedule.
Liverpool are among just eight teams with a match in Gameweek 28, but a 3-1 defeat to relegation battling Leicester City on Monday has left many wondering if the Reds can recapture early season form.
Finally, judging by some of the downbeat responses to our Rough with the Smooth round-up, the double Gameweek can’t come soon enough: there are certainly a number managers in need of a stellar score to revitalise their season.
The Members Tables
To offer further analysis on Manchester City, Watp73 has created this table looking at the best midfielders to target based on data from the last six weeks.
Elsewhere, Twisted Saltergater has honed in specifically on Sane and Sterling, to reveal which has the most impressive statistics over the last four.
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
Red Lightning’s Top 10K Any Season league has a new leader after a Harry Kane armband helped James Bird earn a score of 87 in Gameweek 26.
But there’s no change at the top of Red Lightning’s January to May league, which Dan Clapson continues to dominate.
Ogie Nolan has regained the lead in the FFScout Members league from Billy Ketsu, while Arutla Jatin retains first place in our main league.
Arutla is still second in the overall standings but is now 47 points behind leader Knut Hebaek, who was another to captain Kane.
In TorresMagic‘s Last Man Standing competition, Ephurion hit the top score in Gameweek 24 with 96. There are now 427 teams left after 61 were eliminated when the safety score was set at 47.
TorresMagic has regained the lead in the FFScout Moderators and Contributors league, with a six point gap over second placed Mark.
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.
