The UEFA Champions League Fantasy game allows managers to change their starting XIs and captains – with certain restrictions – following the culmination of the Tuesday matches and before the start of Wednesday’s games.
In this article, we’ll recap last night’s fixtures and summarise the captaincy and substitution options available to UCL Fantasy bosses before this evening’s 17:55 GMT deadline.
The three players we backed for captaincy in yesterday’s article scored five goals between them.
Tuesday’s fixtures saw Chelsea, Sevilla, Barcelona and Juventus through to the knockout stage of the competition and tonight could see Manchester City and Bayern Munich join them.
MAKE CHANGES TO YOUR UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE FANTASY TEAM AHEAD OF WEDNESDAY’S GAMES HERE
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Last Night’s Review
Starting in the early kick-offs, Sevilla and Chelsea both won their games on the road but more importantly, both conceded.
Edouard Mendy (€5.2m) shipped his first goal for Chelsea in the Champions League and Timo Werner (€10.6m) continued his poor form in front of goal, although he did set up Oliver Giroud’s (€7.3m) winning strike.
For Sevilla, former Barcelona starlet Munir El-Haddadi (€7m) scored his third goal off the bench in the double-header against Krasnodar and may have done enough to earn himself a starting berth in future games for the Andalusian side.
In the 8pm kick-offs, Manchester United’s 4-1 win saw them keep their place at the top of their tough Group H, with Bruno Fernandes (€9.5m) taking the headlines with his stunning brace. United assets are perhaps not the best for future investment, as they now set up to face two top-class sides in need of a win and could have a dead rubber in the final round of matches.
In the other game in their group, PSG continued their poor form in front of goal in Europe as only a Neymar penalty saw them beat an injury-ravaged RB Leipzig side.
In Group G, a second-string Barcelona team led by Martin Braithwaite (€5.8m) hammered a COVID-riddled Dynamo Kyiv side to stay three points clear at the top of their group. Expect Braithwaite to start again in Hungary next week and potentially find himself on the scoresheet once again.
A star-studded but poor Juventus team scraped past Ferencvaros, as Cristiano Ronaldo (€12m) was once again limited to just six points. Andrea Pirlo can’t seem to get his side ticking just yet but Alvaro Morata (€9m) has been their star man in this competition from start to finish.
In Group E, Erling Haaland (€11m) and Ciro Immobile (€10.5m) both scored braces at home to once again live up to their price tags. Haaland has six goals in his first four games in the Champions League this season and with Lazio and Zenit still to come, will likely add to his tally. Dortmund’s defence made it three Champions League clean sheets in a row, with full-backs Raphael Guerreiro (€6m) and Thomas Meunier (€5m) threatening as always.
Substitutions and Captaincy
As always, four points or less is definitely worth the risk with substitutions.
Wilmar Barrios (€4.5m) is in 45% of teams and having conceded a penalty and picked up a yellow card, received just one point last night – so he is an obvious candidate to make way.
Liverpool, Ajax and Bayern players sat on your bench have to take priority with their plum home fixtures. But be wary of rotation all round, especially from Manchester City and Liverpool, with news potentially filtering in throughout the day. Kevin De Bruyne (€11.5m) and Kyle Walker have not travelled with the City squad, but Alassane Plea (€8.2m) and Antony (€5.9m) have both been declared fit for their respective games.
Onto changing captaincy.
With Robert Lewandowski (€12m) facing a plum home fixture, sticking with players on six points or less will likely be punished. A returning Mohamed Salah (€11.5m) and in-form Joao Felix (€9m) both also have great fixtures and seem ready to put up big scores.
