With the final international break of 2019 out of the way, Fantasy Premier League managers must once again make big decisions.
The most important one ahead of Gameweek 13 is, naturally, the captaincy.
In a season characterised by difficult debates for the armband, the latest one has followed suit.
As per usual, the Captain Sensible article is here to help you out by analysing the form of the candidates and the defensive capabilities of their upcoming opponents.
Captain Poll
For the second Gameweek in a row, Jamie Vardy (£9.6m) sits at the top of the captain poll results.
That should be no surprise to Fantasy managers, considering that Leicester’s number one centre-forward is in the form of his life.
Over the last four Gameweeks, Vardy has found the net six times and has not blanked since the Gameweek 8 trip to Liverpool.
He is fast becoming a very reliable option for the captaincy as his ownership (36%) continues to rise. 32.9% of our voters have backed him for the Gameweek 13 captaincy too.
This weekend pits him against a Brighton defence that has kept two clean sheets in their last four at the Amex Stadium, although captain Lewis Dunk (£4.6m) will be missing through suspension.
Adam Webster (£4.4m) is also touch and go to start for the Seagulls.
It looks as if the 14.7% who have voted for Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (£11.0m) this weekend are relying on the fixture rather than the player.
Southampton’s 9-0 to defeat at home to Leicester in Gameweek 10 has very much cemented their place amongst the ‘captain against’ category.
However, Aubameyang himself has registered just one attacking return in his last five Premier League matches, scoring against Wolves in Gameweek 11.
Furthermore, Southampton have tended to struggle more in front of their own fans than any way from home recently.
They held Manchester City to just two goals in Gameweek 11 and even managed to earn a 1-1 draw at Wolves in Gameweek 9.
So it will be interesting to see whether they can prove to be frustrating on the road once again when they travel to Arsenal on Saturday afternoon.
Not far behind Aubameyang in the captain poll standings is Sadio Mané (£12.1m), who has the backing of 12.9% as of Thursday lunch-time.
The Liverpool man remains the top-scoring midfielder heading into Gameweek 13 after finding the net late-on against Manchester City last time out.
No Liverpool player has more attacking returns away from home than Mané this season (four) which arguably makes him the most likely to secure a breakthrough against Crystal Palace.
Furthermore, as things stand, he is much more likely to start at Selhurst Park than Mohamed Salah (£12.3m) who comes into Gameweek 13 as an injury doubt and backed by just 2.6% for the captaincy.
Despite a swathe of sales over the international break, a portion of Fantasy managers are keeping faith in Raheem Sterling (£12.0m).
He may have just one attacking return in his last four league starts at home but Chelsea come to the Etihad Stadium still without a clean sheet away from home this season.
That is enough to convince 10.3% of our voters to back Sterling for the captaincy in Gameweek 13.
Heading up what Joe and David would describe as ‘barrel scrapers’, is Harry Kane (£10.8m) who prepares to face West Ham on Saturday lunch-time.
Just 4.5% of you have decided he is the best captain this weekend but interest in his services has certainly increased somewhat with the arrival of Jose Mourinho at Spurs.
Kane does only have one attacking return in the last five Premier League matches but West Ham’s defensive form has been particularly poor of late.
Kevin de Bruyne (£10.2m), Son Heung-min (£9.6m), Richarlison (£7.9m), Raúl Jiménez (£7.3m), Sergio Aguero (£12.0m), Sébastien Haller (£7.2m), Alexandre Lacazette (£9.3m) and Trent Alexander-Arnold (£7.2m) are the only other options selected by more than 1% of voters.
Player statistics – Last four Gameweeks
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4 years, 11 months agoErm, I've got one spot for a cheeky punt for the next few weeks and can't decide between Traore and Mousset. The rest of the team is boilerplate.
A) Traore in a 3-5-2 ( Connolly benched)
B) Mousset in a 3-4-3 (cantwell benched)
All opinions welcome. Thankyou.