Brighton’s Double Gameweek 34 opens up new Fantasy options

Our regular analysis of a player, team and discussion point that attracted our interest in the previous weekend’s matches (aka The Digest) returns.

As one of only two sides who had a Premier League fixture in Blank Gameweek 31 and who have a double-header in Gameweek 32, we turn our attention to Chelsea for our player and team analysis.

We also cast our eyes a little further forward following Tuesday’s announcement that Brighton and Cardiff will have a Double Gameweek 34 and ponder a slightly different chip strategy.

The Player – Eden Hazard

While much attention has been directed towards the failings of Mohamed Salah (£13.3m) as a Fantasy asset over the last few months, Eden Hazard (£10.9m) has been arguably more underwhelming for a more sustained period of time.

Whisper it quietly but the Belgian winger has only three goals (one of which came from the penalty spot) and two assists in his last 11 Premier League starts, averaging 4.64 FPL points per match over that time and blanking in seven of those fixtures.

The influence of Alvaro Morata and Olivier Giroud (£7.7m) on Hazard was a much-discussed topic earlier in the season but the arrival of Gonzalo Higuain (£9.6m) in January was initially seen as a positive, with those two players seemingly striking up a good understanding from the off.

The Argentinean’s signing has done little to stop the rot in Hazard’s underlying stats, however.

From Gameweek 20 onwards, Hazard’s rate of expected goals is half of what it was in the first 19 matches of the season.

While Hazard’s rate of penalty box touches and shots in the opposition area have remained around the same before and after Gameweek 19, the Belgian’s average number of big chances has plummeted from 0.7 to 0.2 per match in the second half of the season.

There is even more of a drop-off in Hazard’s big chance creation.

Having been the supplier of 13 clear-cut opportunities in the first 17 Gameweeks of the season, the Belgium international hasn’t carved out a single big chance in his subsequent 13 appearances.

Sarri’s inflexibility when it comes to his team’s shape and system has perhaps made it easier for other clubs to negate Hazard’s influence if they know exactly how Chelsea will line up.

There remains the question over just how committed to the Chelsea cause Hazard is, too, with a summer move to Real Madrid potentially in the offing.

The quality of Chelsea’s next three opponents perhaps makes it more difficult to overlook Hazard over the next two Gameweeks: the Belgian racked up double-digit hauls against Brighton and Cardiff earlier this season.

The limitations of those two clubs and West Ham (more of which in the section below) means that, even in third gear, Hazard could still rack up a tidy score despite our misgivings.

Unless he seriously bucks his downward trend in the next three matches, however, Hazard looks like a dispensable premium asset from Gameweek 34 onwards.

The Team – Chelsea

With Chelsea having a Double Gameweek 32 as well as a fixture in Blank Gameweek 33, many Fantasy managers will be pondering on which players in Maurizio Sarri’s side are worthy of consideration over the coming month.

The Blues’ Jekyll-and-Hyde display at Goodison Park was the chief focus of our Scout Notes article earlier this week and it is this unreliability that is so off-putting, especially when many of their assets cost a lot of money to buy.

Of particular concern is their attack.

When clubs are filtered by their last six matches, Chelsea rank a respectable third for overall attempts and shots in the box and joint-fifth for efforts on target.

However, it’s the quality of the Blues’ opportunities that is worrisome: only Everton have registered fewer “big chances” than Sarri’s troops over their last six Premier League games.

Whilst “big chances” are a somewhat arbitrary yardstick, the fact that Manchester City have recorded more than three times as many gilt-edged opportunities as Chelsea in that time says a lot.

Hazard’s own personal drop-off in numbers (see above) are, of course, intrinsically linked to the Blues’ overall woes as a team.

It is away from home that Chelsea have really struggled.

Sarri’s troops are actually unbeaten in the league at Stamford Bridge in 2019 but have lost four of their last five matches on the road.

Again, big chances are the issue as the Blues fare well for other attacking KPIs (such as shots in the box) over their last six away games.

Not that Chelsea have been turning on the style at home, either: they rank only joint-tenth for big chances and shots in the box over the last six at Stamford Bridge.

There is more of a home/away divide when it comes to defensive statistics.

So secure on their own patch, Chelsea rank first for fewest shots in the box, efforts on target and big chances conceded over their last six home fixtures.

Only three teams have allowed more big chances than Sarri’s side over their last half-dozen league matches on the road, however.

The Blues haven’t kept an away clean sheet in 2019.

Looking ahead to Gameweeks 32 and 33, it is Chelsea’s opposition – rather than the west London side themselves – that fills us with optimism.

Home matches against Brighton and West Ham are obvious sources of attraction for those considering Chelsea defenders, while the Hammers are even more woeful than Sarri’s side on their travels: Manuel Pellegrini’s outfit have allowed the highest number of big chances of any top-flight club over their last six away matches.

The trip to Cardiff gives the Blues the perfect chance to remedy their recent away record, too: Warnock’s side have lost all eight of their meetings with “big six” clubs this season (including the reverse fixture at Stamford Bridge, 4-1), conceding 27 goals in the process.

The calibre of Chelsea’s opposition is probably reason alone to invest in their Fantasy assets over the next two Gameweeks – which is a good job, as the Blues’ hit-and-miss players are not making a convincing case of their own.

The Talking Point – Double Gameweek 34

The Premier League’s much-anticipated fixture announcement on Tuesday brought us confirmation of the largely expected line-up for Double Gameweeks 32 and 35.

We also knew that Brighton and Hove Albion would have a third Double Gameweek thrown in there too but, until a few “in the know” accounts leaked the news shortly beforehand, we didn’t really have many clues as to which Gameweek the Seagulls’ match against Cardiff City would be tagged on to.

The revelation that Brighton (and Neil Warnock’s side) will now have a Double Gameweek 34 prompted discussion about a possible new chip strategy on both this site and beyond:

As mentioned in the comments above, this “new” strategy would be particularly of interest to those who still have their Triple Captain chip available and especially to those who have their other chips still left to go with it.

Gauging by the comments on Fantasy Football Scout and on social media, the following strategies have become popular as we approach the blank and doubles ahead:

FH32, WC34, BB35
WC32, FH33, BB35

What those strategies had in common was that a Triple Captain chip could then be used on a player in a single Gameweek (Mohamed Salah at home to Huddersfield in Gameweek 36, for example) or on a Brighton player if their match against Cardiff was rearranged between Gameweeks 36 and 38.

Now that the Seagulls and Bluebirds are scheduled to meet in Double Gameweek 34, only the second of the two above strategies allows for a triple captaincy of a Brighton player.

First, the advantages.

The most obvious upside to deploying the Triple Captain chip on, say, Glenn Murray (£6.3m) or Shane Duffy (£4.7m) is that Fantasy managers get two bites of the cherry in Gameweek 34. Should our Brighton assets fail in their first fixture, they then go again three days later.

Another positive is that Brighton are at home in both fixtures and the Seagulls have traditionally been a stronger proposition on home turf than they have on the road.

Chris Hughton’s side have registered twice as many points at the Amex as they have on their travels in 2018/19 and conceded 12 fewer goals.

Five of their six clean sheets this season have been at home.

Goalscoring-wise, they don’t particularly impress: only Crystal Palace and Huddersfield Town have hit the back of the net on fewer occasions on their own turf in 2018/19.

It’s not just the fact that Hughton’s troops are on home soil, it’s that they face Cardiff and Bournemouth – two of the five leakiest defences in the top flight this season – at the Amex.

The Bluebirds have scored fewer away goals than all other Premier League teams and both they and Eddie Howe’s side sit in the bottom five for their overall record on the road.

Pooodle outlines some of the wider advantages for venturing down the “Wildcard in 32” approach, from price rises to possible benefits in Gameweek 33, too.

And now, the disadvantages.

Quite simply, which Brighton asset would you use this chip on?

It remains to be seen if Pascal Gross (£6.7m) can recover from a hamstring problem over the next three weeks or so, while Hughton has five fit players who have been used in the wide midfield areas this season – so rotation is a distinct possibility on the flanks.

While Murray has started every league match in 2019, Florin Andone (£5.0m) was meant to line up at Palace in Gameweek 30 before a groin injury struck in the warm-up and the Romanian striker had been suspended in Gameweeks 26 and 28.

When Brighton last encountered fixture congestion in December, Murray and Andone alternated their starts from Gameweeks 15-21.

Duffy, Lewis Dunk (£4.4m) and Mathew Ryan (£4.4m) offer security of starts, at least, and in Dunk and (especially) Duffy’s case their attacking threat is very appealing.

Using a Triple Captain chip on a defender, and a Brighton one at that, is bound not to sit well with many Fantasy managers, though.

The “swords and shields” analogy is one way of looking at it: for those Fantasy managers looking for a fairly high-risk differential strategy to climb the ranks, a Brighton Triple Captain would seem very much a “sword”.

For the rest of us dullards, pragmatists and shield-wielders, it could well be a maverick move too far.

Palace Ash and Forza, meanwhile, outline some of the other pitfalls of using a Wildcard in Gameweek 32 in the images above.