There was panic among the Fantasy Football Scout community this week, as pre-season bandwagons de-railed and the Fantasy Premier League (FPL) price changes became even more difficult to predict. We look back on the reaction to these events, along with some of the week’s top contributions, including some further number-crunching from our community contributors. Elsewhere, we catch up on the latest custom statistics tables created by our members and the runners and riders in the various community tournaments.

The Community Articles

With two weeks’ worth of statistics at their disposal, our community writers felt confident enough to wave goodbye to some early-season punts and follow some new leads.

Stoke City’s mercurial forward Bojan Krkic started the season surrounded by plenty of hype following an impressive pre-season, earning him a handsome ownership level. Sadly, he’s struggled to come to terms with expectations and has failed to make an impression for Mark Hughes’ men, disappointing an army of Fantasy managers. Aussie Pundit was amongst them, leading him to create this article offering an in-depth analysis of the Spaniard and the Fantasy conundrum he’s posed.

The Puntmaster was on hand to offer an immediate solution to Bojan issue – he urged us to take a closer look at West Ham’s Mauro Zarate as a tailor-made replacement as part of three punts going into Gameweek 3 – the latest instalment of his excellent regular article.

Elsewhere, Arvination was another to highlight the talents of Zarate, although the focus of his his round-up of the weekend’s best punts was most definitely Manchester City’s Sergio Aguero.

As ever, our number-crunching experts have been busily generating new theories with the data at their disposal. Red Lightning has been looking in detail at the measurement of points per 90 minutes, while Rab Mac brought us news of a team and player spreadsheet he’s developed to help Fantasy managers get to grips with the latest statistics.

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

There was widespread panic amongst Fantasy managers this week with the realisation that the Fantasy Premier League (FPL) seemed to have tweaked the values that govern the player price changes – leading to some expected results. With less information available and seemingly fewer price falls taking place, Dr Funk wondered whether casual managers will benefit at the expense of veteran managers who have based their strategies on monitoring movement in the market.

That unwelcome development has compounded an uncertain opening to the campaign, with a wide array of options and no cast-iron captaincy contender on offer. AA7’s Hot Topic captured the issue perfectly, as he underlined the bewildering amount choice available, particularly in the key attacking roles.

With panic setting in, it’s far too easy to make rash decisions and, with that in mind, Harrysponge invited the community to look back at the best and worst 11th-hour alterations from the opening weekend of the season.

Talking of rash decisions, last week we witnessed Berbinho’s Forehead and Rayne Wooney’s foolhardy and unpleasant pair of pledges should Liverpool complete the signing of a certain Mario Balotelli. This week it was John Barnes’ turn to make a promise he’d regret: he was so keen to see Stevan Jovetic score a brace last week that he swore to captain the Manchester City striker every week for the rest of the season if he could achieve that feat. The Montenegrin duly delivered against Liverpool, leaving John Barnes banking on a few more braces as the season progresses.

There’s nothing like a trip down memory lane to calm the nerves and anxiety and, fortunately, Leicester’s unlikely signing of Esteban Cambiasso offered us the opportunity for nostalgia as we looked back on other legends who have arrived in the Premier League in their twilight years.

There was further serenity among UFPL managers who are busily completing their Transfer Window selection. A timely contribution from Goonerbyron provided an invaluable list of the teams playing on Matchdays 2 and 3 for those still tinkering those long-term plans.

The Members Tables

Over in the members area, Jesus Navas My Lord has been taking an in-depth look at the underlying stats of attacking full-backs, a group that is thought to be favoured by a change in the Fantasy Premier League bonus calculations this summer. His Bertrand v Clyne table focuses on final third touches among this group, while he has also cast his gaze on the attacking threat of Chelsea’s defenders.

Arvin-ation has been another prolific table builder this week, looking at a comparison between Dzeko and Jovetic, Bojan Krkic replacements and Gameweek 2’s most attacking players in defence and higher up the pitch.

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 these work.

The Community Tournaments

In TorresMagic‘s”Last Man Standing” competition, Chrissy Waddle’s 85 was the top score in Gameweek 2, where 102 teams were eliminated, leaving 1502 to progress.

”The Dead Team Challenge”, in which managers selected a team and captaincy in Gameweek 1 that has to remain in place until the end of the season, saw Medo_Je climb to the top of the leaderboard after Gameweek 2’s matches. He scored 142 points in the first two Gameweeks of the competition that has been organised by Zep.

Elsewhere, Kalmoffit won the Gameweek 2 “Scout Picks Challenge”, the competition organised by @ofcprodigy that is loosely based on our Scout Picks. Overall in the competition Lionel’s Messy Boxers and IniestaFiesta are joint top.

In AZ’s “Early Bird FFS Cup” the group leaders ahead of Gameweek 3 were Doosra, Pundit of Punts, Baines on Toast, AZ, Acquafresca, Costa – The Chosen One, cmonster and NTFM.

With the international break, our search for a Gameweek 4 community champion will start on Monday 8 September. Watch out for a hot topic that day when we will be asking for nominations and votes for those wishing to follow Tom Fenley, HVT and Innsie as your champion.