A point apiece in tonight’s 7pm matches will see Brazil and Switzerland qualify for the knockout stages, but Serbia will progress to the last 16 by beating the Selecao in Moscow. Brazil or Switzerland could even still qualify with a defeat tonight.
All permutations aside, there is considerable Fantasy interest in the double-header of matches this evening.
Marcelo (£6.5m) remains, as he has done for the whole of the tournament, the most-owned player in the McDonald’s FIFA game, with 42.2% of Fantasy managers backing the Real Madrid full-back.
After two goals in as many matches, Philippe Coutinho‘s (£9.0m) ownership has soared to 39.1% and the Barcelona playmaker is now the most-selected midfielder in McDonald’s FIFA. No midfielder attempted more shots (ten) than the former Liverpool player in the first two rounds of group fixtures.
Neymar‘s (£12.0m) ownership has dropped over 10% since Brazil’s opening World Cup match, despite his injury-time strike in the win over Costa Rica. With Cristiano Ronaldo offering a like-for-like swap in that price bracket, the Brazilian forward is now only owned by 22.5% of Fantasy managers.
Gabriel Jesus‘ (£9.0m) stock continues to plummet, despite the Manchester City striker providing an assist in that last-gasp victory over the Costa Ricans: Jesus is now owned by just 8.2% of those playing McDonald’s FIFA.
Major interest in Serbian players from a Fantasy perspective is restricted to Aleksandar Kolarov (£5.5m), Nemanja Matic (£5.5m) and Sergej Milinkovic-Savic (£7.0m), who are owned by 7.4%, 6.4% and 5.1% of Fantasy managers respectively.
Already eliminated from the World Cup, Costa Rica’s Fantasy assets have been sagely dodged by McDonald’s FIFA managers, with goalkeeper Keylor Navas (£5.0m) the only squad member to have an ownership of more than 5%.
Xherdan Shaqiri (£8.5m) could prove a huge differential for the 3.4% of managers who own him: the Swiss midfielder has delivered a goal and an assist in his two appearances thus far.
Forward-thinking full-backs Ricardo Rodriguez and Stephan Lichtsteiner (both £5.5m) have failed to post attacking returns or indeed clean sheets so far, but Fantasy managers may want to persevere with the former in particular: Rodriguez is Switzerland’s designated penalty-taker and a record-breaking 23 spot-kicks have been awarded in the World Cup to date, ten of which were courtesy of VAR intervention.
World Cup Data
We’re delighted to offer World Cup data as an early addition to our regular season offering to help those playing Fantasy games over the summer.
We’ve secured Opta data, not only for the tournament itself, which begins on June 14 but also from the Qualifying Rounds for Europe and South America and for international friendlies involving the participating nations. This includes all the matches played right up to the tournament kick-off.
Just to stress, this World Cup offering comes packaged with the regular Fantasy Football Scout membership.
Check out this new trailer previewing the World Cup content below…
McDonald’s FIFA World Cup Fantasy
Join our McDonald’s FIFA World Cup Fantasy league ‘FantasyFootballScout’ using the code: HEWJPVYR
Fantasy iTeam
Fantasy Football Scout is supporting Fantasy iTeam, a free World Cup game available on a number of mobile devices, including iPhone, iPad, iPodTouch and Android. We have an official Fantasy Football Scout League open to UK users only, with a £1000 of Amazon vouchers to give out, split between the top three performers. There’s also the small matter of £10k worth of prizes available in the main competitions: Overall World Championship and Manager of the Gameround.
Click here for details and here to sign up.
Our League name is Fantasy Football Scout and the pin is 1887.
Please note, users must be over 18 and based in the UK to join our league.
