Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 33

Few new big injury concerns this week, at least, but the recent hugely long interruption of the Premier League programme is still causing massive uncertainty about form and results. This really doesn't feel like a great week to be hazarding big chips in - but, with the season now so far advanced, we really don't have much choice. Almost everyone is gambling on their Bench Boost this week (or their Triple Captain, or, for a few with somewhat eccentric - um, probably 'bad' - squad selections, even their Free Hit).

These weekly 'summaries' have been getting a bit too involved - and excessively time-consuming for me! - so I've been aiming to keep them briefer recently. I made just about zero progress on that resolution for the first few weeks, but.... now I've hit upon a new 'format', which might help: a tabulation of the major types of 'lucky' incidents. 

I will try to resist any extended commentary (although I probably will still indulge in a few diatribes about any particularly egregious penalty or handball incidents).

Well, at least that was probably the best Sunday we've seen this season. And well up there with the best we've seen in several years....

Red cards awarded: 

Red cards not awarded: Gabriel clearly made a vigorous motion of his head towards Haaland in their second-half contretemps. Yes, a little bit of a 'handbags-at-dawn' incident, no, not really a 'headbutt', but.... it clearly strayed over that line you're not supposed to cross: he should have been sent off for it. (And really, he might well have picked up two yellows over the game anyway for the incessant ripping-the-shirt-off-his-back wrestling he was resorting to with his Viking nemesis.)

Curtis Jones's shove on Dewsbury-Hall looked like a penalty - but he just got away with it because it was a shoulder-to-shoulder kind of contact (though with undue force, and with no chance of reaching the ball...).

Penalties awarded: The late penalty award for Dominic Calvert-Lewin looked very, very soft.

Penalties not awarded: Cole Palmer was barged to the ground by Luke Shaw early on, but Michael Oliver and the VAR team were strangely unimpressed. Chelsea might have had another in the second-half when Casemiro's clumsy, over-extended follow-through caught Cucurella on the instep, just inside the penalty area - playing the ball is not an absolute defence, when you then kick an opponent so unnecessarily. (Chelsea, somehow, just cannot win any penalties??!!)

Gabriel clearly did move his arm deliberately towards a crossed ball early in the first-half at The Etihad - incontrovertible penalty: bizarre that it wasn't at least given a close look-over by VAR. Perhaps they'll say that his arm was 'next to his body'; yes, it was, but that's an argument that's only relevant when the ball is fired at you with little chance to respond; here, he did have a chance to respond - and he responded by leaning towards the ball, and deflecting it with his arm. (And it clearly would have gone in, but for this intervention, because it still hit the inside of the post.)

Tight/dubious offsides: Adam Armstrong produced a neat chipped finish to a breakaway against Leeds, but the SAOT showed him very narrowly offside as he ran through; probably a 'correct' decision, but a very rough one for Wolves. (And one that was hugely consequential for FPL, with so many people now having Darlow and/or one or two Leeds defenders for this Double Gameweek.)

Will Osula was very narrowly 'offside' for the Newcastle's equaliser; but VAR correctly spotted that the ball had been played to him by Evanilson's tackle, rather than a through-ball from Guimaraes.

A great opening goal from Ndiaye against Liverpool was ruled out for a very close offside call against his assister, Jake O'Brien - another one of those where the SAOT picture was still very close, but didn't accord at all to the naked-eye impression that he'd been nowhere near off.

Goals wrongly allowed/disallowed: Haaland did have hold of a big handful of Gabriel's shirt as he scored the winner. It was only briefly, probably not consequential, and the Arsenal defender had been holding his shirt just before that (and for a large percentage of the game), so.... it really wouldn't have seemed fair for the goal to be disallowed for that. But technically it is against the rules, we've seen a lot of goals chalked off for this kind of offence,... and surely VAR should at least have had a look, and told us why it was 'OK'.

Surprise omissions/early substitutions/injuries: Alex Iwobi was withdrawn at half-time. after after apparently developing a hamstring problem. Diego Gomez had to come off in the 20th minute after jarring his knee; at least this allowed Kaoru Mitoma - a rather surprising omission from the start - to get a decent outing. Bissouma, Kolo Muani, and Betancur were all withdrawn by De Zerbi well short of the hour. Jose Sa had a back-muscle problem, so back-up Dan Bentley was a surprise starter in goal for Wolves. Anthony Gordon was a surprise absentee for Newcastle, supposedly the victim of a late training injury. Lewis Hall, who had been struggling in the game, was withdrawn at half-time. Joao Pedro was a surprise late omission for Chelsea, complaining of a sore thigh-muscle (a sorry blow for the slightly over 50% of FPL managers who own him in this gameweek; although Chelsea have been so ineffectual lately, you wonder if he would have contributed any decent points anyway, even across two fixtures). Estevao, after a lively start, had to come off after just 15 minutes, after feeling a problem in his hamstring.

Arteta dropped Gyokeres for Havertz and White for Mosquera - but it didn't do him much good.

Slot dropped Kerkez, Frimpong, and Macallister for the derby game at Everton.

Near misses:  Igor Thiago, despite being held down by Fulham defender, managed to bang a header against the outside of the post. 

Much fancied Danny Welbeck (my best mate is - bizarrely - chancing the Triple Captaincy on him!) appeared to have hit the ball against the post from only a yard out; even more strangely, the linesman then flagged for an offside - even though no Brighton player had been within two yards of being offside at any point in the move! An insanely terrible decision!! Of course, it wouldn't have mattered if a goal had been scored, as VAR should have been easily able to overrule the insanity; but it presumably would have stopped Welbeck from being penalised for a miss under the BPS...  All these small officiating cock-ups can have some FPL consequence.... (To be fair to Danny, it was actually a last-ditch clearance from Van de Ven that cannoned off the post in that incident. So, he will presumably have been denied BPS and 'defcon' credit for that, because of the errant offside flag.) Later, Welbeck stole in behind from a Pascal Gross freekick, but headed tamely straight at the keeper. Just before half-time, Xavi Simons passed the ball against the inside of the far post; if that had gone in, to put the home side 2-0 up, Spurs might have hung on for the win they so desperately needed.

A neat first-half curler from Estevao shaved the outside of the post. Enzo Fernandez also fizzed an effort narrowly wide. Late on, Moises Caicedo mashed a 25-yard drive only an inch or so wide!

Ebere Eze's crisp left-foot shot from 20 yards slamming against the inside of the foot of the post and fizzing across the goal-line will no doubt haunt Arsenal fans for years. It was a fantastic effort; and, if it had gone in, to give the visitors a 2-1 lead,.... probably they would have gone on to win the match and the league title. Not many people are betting on them to pull that off now. Haaland slapped one against the top of the near-post before Eze's scare. And then there was that Arsenal break where Havertz was in alone on Donnarumma but couldn't get past him. We also saw a Gabriel header deflect off Nico O'Reilly's back against the post... And then, late on, Havertz headed just over the bar from a lovely Trossard cross (although I think Donnarumma had it covered). Such a ding-dong of a game! (And, credit where it's due, I had been afraid that the Gunners would just dig in for a draw; but they did go after this game. They were still looking well out-of-sorts in 'competitive edge', though; it seemed that every time City got tackled or misplaced a pass, they were able to win the ball back within seconds....)

Onana had a header hit the middle of the crossbar against Sunderland.

Big misses/big saves: Mikkel Damsgaard stole in behind unmarked against Fulham, but couldn't find the target with his hooked volley. Bernd Leno made a great reaction save from a Dango Ouattara snap-shot in the final minute.

Emi Martinez presumably got credit for his 'big save' in the one-on-one with Diarra - but the Sunderland man had looked miles offside when he began the break, and a flag was never raised?

Dean Henderson had a few uncharacterstically flappy moments on Monday night; but he did pull off one excellent reaction save from a Mavropanos header. And early on, Brennan Johnson had headed over the top when he had the whole goal to aim at.

Outstanding goals: Kaoru Mitoma's exquisite left-foot volley at the far post may well come to be seen as the goal that sent Spurs down (OK, Georginho Rutter's stunning strike in the dying seconds was actually decisive of the result here; but it felt like pyschologically Spurs were always on the back-foot, having conceded the lead to such an astonishing goal just before half-time). Xavi Simons's curler from the edge of the box was pretty special too - but perhaps Spurs's celebrations of that goal were excessive, premature, as they still couldn't hang on for the win. And James Justin's bicycle-kick against Wolves was probably the most improbable goal/goalscorer of this - or any - week! But perhaps Rayan Cherki's impetuous dribble through the Arsenal defence will be remembered as the most significant goal of the season, because it was the one that unseated Arsenal's title dreams.

Outstanding performances: 

Big mistakes: There will be few huger mistakes all season than Donnarumma's gifting Arsenal an equaliser within seconds of Cherki having secured the crucial advantage in the potentially 'title-deciding' match. His first touch was heavy, and even then he didn't appreciate how closely Havertz was pressing him and was slow to get rid of the ball,.... and even then, he was a bit unlucky that his attempted clearance pinged off the German's lunging toe and went just inside the far post. One might really lay the blame here on a bad back-pass from Matheus Nunes, or on Pep for insisting on this playing out from the back even with a keeper who's not very good at it. As it turned out, this blunder was ultimately not all that consequential (apart from all those lost 'clean sheet' points in FPL!!), since Arsenal never really looked in this game even when they had so fortuitously drawn level again.

Bad luck/good luck: 

FPL weirdness: Bruno Fernandes, for once, missed out on bonus points - in fact, didn't come anywhere near getting any - despite providing the assist for the only goal of the game. Something going wrong around here....

Unexpected results: Brentford were well on top against Fulham, but just couldn't put any of their chances away. A much-improved Spurs may feel a little hard done-by that they didn't manage to take all 3 points off Brighton. Chelsea largely dominated against Manchester United, but couldn't take any points from the game. And, yeah, nobody expected Villa v Sunderland to be a 4-3 (and, frankly, Villa didn't really deserve to win it). Liverpool weren't really the better side in the Merseyside derby, but somehow nicked the win. Great hattrick from Morgan Gibbs-White, but... that result flattered Forest.

The FPL 'Team of the Week', which, this season, has rarely included many of the most popular FPL picks,... after Saturday had absolutely none. And it didn't get much better on Sunday (Cherki, Salah, Gibbs-White, Watkins??).

The global average rose from a pitiful 15 points on Saturday (allegedly; that barely seems credible) to a still fairly dismal 39 points by Monday, after the 10 games of the basic gameweek (and that's with a lot of Bench Boosts in play: over 835,000, according to LiveFPL). Not too many outrageously bad decisions so far - well, except that Chelsea should probably have had at least 1, possibly 2 penalties; City too, and maybe Everton. And there have been a fair few line-up surprises, desperately near misses, and slightly surprising results; so, this one is probably looking set to be at least a 5 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'. (And there's still a long way to go, with three extra matches in the Gameweek.)

Dilemmas of the Week - GW 33 (25/26)

A couple of major injuries this week (unfortunate for the players and their clubs, anyway, though probably not hugely consequential for FPL), but overall we seem to have been spared too much further disruption on that front. So,... it could be quite a brief review of the availability picture this week.

Of course, with GW33 being the biggest Double Gameweek of the season, many people are targeting their Bench Boost for this week (or some, alternatively, their Triple Captain, or even their Free Hit), while a large number deployed their 2nd Wildcard last week to 'set up' optimally for this set of fixtures. So, there's a lot at stake this week (not just for City and Arsenal!), and we're likely to see the global average significantly inflated by the number of chips in play, as well as by the exra fixtures.

I am trying to streamline these weekly round-ups a bit from last year, restricting myself for the most part to just the injuries etc. affecting players that are likely to have a major significance in FPL; and also, of course, only to new injuries - I figure everyone should be aware of players who've already been ruled out for some time!  

[For some years, I have found the 'Injuries & Bans' summary on Fantasy Football Scout the most reliable resource for this kind of information; although this site, Premier League Injuries, is a very good alternative (often a little quicker to update, I think - though it did go through a bit of a glitchy period for a while last year).  Go check these out for more comprehensive coverage. 

I see the Fantasy Premier League site has added an improved 'Player Availability' page this year (though hidden under 'The Scout' tab?!). That also seems to be reasonably comprehensive and up-to-date, but god knows how it's supposed to be 'organised' - maybe by 'date of injury'? Obviously, arranging it by club and alphabetical order would be more sensible; but the denizens of FPL Towers seem to have a deep aversion to the sensible.]

I've recently discovered this additional resource, the weekly Predicted Lineups from Fantasy Football Edits. My longtime standby for this sort of news, Fantasy Footall Scout, does usually provide some explanatory commentary on its predictions, even including reminders of the key injury concerns, and sometimes also some discussion of possible alternate selections; so, if you like a bit more detail with your 'probable lineups' for the week, that could still be the preferable roundup to look at. But because FPL Edits is so stripped-down, it's rather more straightforwardly accessible, easier to scan through quickly; and I think it's also perhaps a tad more reliable with its expected formations and lineups, and a little quicker to update.

So, what are the conundrums we face ahead of Gameweek 33?

Does anybody need to be moved out because of injury?

Riccardo Calafiori was a late omission against Bournemouth last week, after developing an unspecified problem during training; he seems likely to remain out. Noni Madueke had to come off against Sporting in midweek with a knee problem, though Arteta is bullish about his prospects of being OK again for this weekend. Arsenal are stretched a bit thin for their possible 'title decider' against City on Sunday, though, with Bukayo Saka now revealed to be suffering with an Achilles issue which will keep him out some time further, and Odegaard and Timber apparently still unavailable too.

Mikkel Damsgaard came off at half-time against Everton last week, struggling with an illness; but he is thought to be over that now, so should hopefully be able to start and last most of the game. Brentford are still going well, but injuries have left their squad stretched a bit thin.

Hugo Ekitike ruptured his right Achilles in the game against PSG on Wednesday, and will miss the rest of the season, and the World Cup. With Alexander Isak only just back after a long absence, Cody Gakpo seems likely to lead the line for a while.

Bad news for Palace too, with both Adam Wharton (groin strain) and Maxence Lacroix (knee), arguably their two best players of the season, having to come off in Thursday night's game against Fiorentina. Newly-returned Jean-Philippe Mateta was withdrawn at half-time in that tie for 'minutes management'.

Good news, perhaps, for the recently outstanding Nico O'Reilly (still 13% owned in FPL, although some tens of thousands of managers have baled on him this week), who limped off in the Chelsea game last Sunday holding the back of his thigh. In Friday's press conference, Pep insisted that he was going to be fine for this weekend; but Pep, as we know, is not above fibbing occasionally....

Kobbie Mainoo missed Monday night's game against Leeds with a training knock (and Ugarte was a disaster in his stead, largely responsible for the defeat), but might be OK again for Saturday's. Leny Yoro has apparently developed an unspecified injury problem this week. Disturbing news for United, as Maguire and Martinez are both banned, and De Ligt is apparently still unavailable; they'll probably have to fall back on youngster Ayden Heaven and Luke Shaw or Mazraoui in a makeshift centre-back pairing.

Forest have been hit by multiple problems following their Europa League quarter-final against Porto, as both Murillo and Chris Wood had to come off after suffering bad knocks, and Callum Hudson-Odoi developed a leg-muscle problem. Wood was very lucky to escape serious injury, as his lower right leg visibly bent under a high challenge from Jan Bednarek; but Vitor Pereira is optimistic that he and Murillo might available this weekend. Elliot Anderson missed the Porto game after the death of his mother, and his involvement this weekend is in doubt.

Cristian Romero has a partial MCL tear in his right knee after colliding with his goalkeeper Kinsky last week; this will inevitably keep him out for the rest of the season - though there is a slim chance that he might still be able to get fit again for the World Cup.

Wolves's Matt Doherty has apparently been struggling with a 'niggle', but was back in training by the end of the week.

Do we have any players who are dropped, or not looking likely to get the starts we hoped for?

Lisandro Martinez has got himself a three-match 'violent conduct' ban for impetuously tugging on Dominic Calvert-Lewin's ponytail on Monday night, while Harry Maguire has been handed an additional one-match ban for 'improper conduct' in last month's Bournemouth game (sounding off at the fourth official after his sending-off). Joelinton is beginning a two-match ban for picking up his 10th booking of the season last week. Lewis Dunk will serve the second part of his two-match ban against Spurs, but can return for his team's second fixture of the week, against Chelsea on Tuesday; Wolves's Yerson Mosquera is also serving the second game of a two-match ban.

Did anyone give other cause to consider dropping them?

Newcastle have been pretty ropey of late, and now Eddie Howe has threatened to drop any players who do not seem committed to staying at the club - which, according to reports, could be about half of the squad. Avoid.

Did anyone play so well, you have to consider bringing them in immediately?

Chelsea overall are still severely unconvincing, but Cole Palmer, at least, looks back to something like his best. Marc Cucurella also had an outstanding game against City, and might have scored a hattrick! Alex Jimenez was superb in Bournemouth's title-upset win over Arsenal - but, thanks to the cruel caprices of FPL, somehow didn't earn any extra points for a 'Man of the Match' display.

I think it's likely to be unprofitable to bring in additional doubling players from clubs as weak as Brighton and Leeds, let alone Burnley!! And Bournemouth, let's not forget, prior to last week's cat-among-the-pigeons victory over leaders Arsenal, hadn't managed to win a game in two months. And Chelsea have been fairly awful over the past month or so. Everyone probably already has 3 players from City,... and maybe half a dozen or so from the other 5 doubling teams; that's plenty - there is no need to be stacking the squad with 10, 12, 15 doublers on a set of fixtures like this.

BEST OF LUCK, EVERYONE!

Sheep Picks (21)

I quite often snipe at 'The Sheep' element among Fantasy Premier League managers - by which I mean the substantial numbers (possibly, alas, an overall majority) who don't really understand FPL that well, or even follow the EPL that closely, and so make most of their decisions based on an impulsive reaction to last week's results... and/or at the promptings of FPL's own vapid pundit 'The Scout' or the many similarly unimaginative 'influencers' out here on the Internet.... or indeed just following whatever seems to be a popular pick being mentioned a lot in online discussion forums. This often coalesces into a kind of collective hysteria - where the HUGE numbers of managers rushing in to buy a certain player bears no relation to his true worth, his likely points potential over the next handful of games. The player in question might not be at all bad (though often he is); but he is not the irresistible bargain, the must-have asset that so many people seem to think

Hence, I created this occasional series of posts highlighting players I think are dangerously over-owned, are the subject of a sudden and misguided enthusiasm.

Just a quick one this week, as I see so many rather bizarrely over-optimistic selections finding their way into people's squads for Double Gameweek 33.

Dominic Calvert-Lewin is the third most transferred-in player this week, with nearly 200,000 FPL managers piling in for him already (and still 24 hours or so to go before the deadline). Admittedly, Leeds have perhaps the most attractive pair of fixtures of any of the doubling teams - though neither game is likely to be straightforward, especially as Leeds's form has faltered somewhat over the last couple of months, falling back a long way from their rousing rally in December and January. Calvert-Lewin has been woefully inconsistent throughout his career; and although he's arguably been having his best season ever, he hasn't looked like a really consistent threat - especially recently. In fact, he hasn't scored a league goal in 10 weeks now; and hasn't really looked likely to; he missed a penalty against Palace last month! Indeed, you wonder if he might not be in danger of being dropped for, at least rotated a bit more with Lukas Nmecha. I think you could bet your house on this guy getting a double-blank this week. Absolutely not a player worth dropping one of your regular starters for.

Dominic's teammate, Noah Okafor, is also a rather dubious pick. This looks like a classic case of chasing last week's points; people are enamoured of him just because he scored a brace against a very sub-par Manchester United on Monday night. Sure, after that performance, he might keep the start this weekend. But he has been fairly rarely used by the club so far this season. And Brenden Aaronson and Ethan Ampadu are surely much stronger options from the Leeds midfield.

The same phenomenon of being blinded by a recent - untypical, and almost certainly one-off! - success is luring many people towards Mats Wieffer. He's a great player. But he's currently playing out of position as a makeshift right-back. He's not a prolific goalscorer, and Pascal Gross or Jack Hinselwood are surely better prospects from the Brighton midfield - if you insist on overloading on doubling players. And although Brighton have been showing some good form in the past couple of months, it's very difficult to know what they might get out of games against Spurs and Chelsea (potentially strong teams.... currently in awful form).

I don't think I'd be going in for any additional Brighton or Leeds players just for this Gameweek. If you already have Van Hecke or Kadioglu or Verbruggen, or Struijk or Bogle or Aaronson.... fine; stick with solid players like that, who should be worthwhile assets through the remainder of the season. But bringing in extra players from clubs like this, with fixtures like this - it's not worth it.

A little bit of Zen (90)

 

“A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence.”

David Hume

"A foolish man magnifies - or invents - the evidence according to his belief."

GW

ANOTHER glitch!

I mentioned yesterday how unreliable the FPL website was. I have been spared such exasperations this year through the early-but-ultimate exasperation of being locked out of my account at the beginning of the year. But this morning, I happened to have a chance to be reminded of just how bad things can be - by looking over a friend's shoulder as he tried to make his weekly FPL tweaks.

My mate wanted to bring in Jan-Paul Van Hecke for the still-injury-flagged Jurrien Timber (fair enough, what with the double gameweek and all). He made that transfer. It was confirmed, and he was punted on to the 'Pick Team' page to select his lineup for the week.

Immediately, the page crashed,.... and he was asked to re-log in. OK, but.... the transfer was confirmed; we had seen his 'Pick Team' page for the week where Van Hecke was now installed in the defence in place of Timber. Yet, when he logged in again, what do you know, everything had reverted to as it was before - the transfer had been 'forgotten'.

I have seen this kind of thing happen to me many, many, many times before. And I suspect that the weirdly-coincidental 'timeout' for my friend, suddenly requiring a new log-in, was not really the problem. His change had been accepted and acknowledged; but then it was undone. The fact that the site had been on the cusp of demanding a new authentication should not have affected that; if the change is 'good', before the demand for a new sign-in, then... it's good. But really quite often - worryingly often - we experience the FPL website acknowledging changes we've made to our team,.... and then 'losing' them the next time we check in on the site.

I was advising someone on an online forum the other day not to take any chances with not bothering to make a team selection when playing the Bench Boost... because there is a non-zero possibility that the FPL site will randomly 'forget' your Bench Boost and leave you with a basic team entry; and if you've left all your best players on the bench, or haven't chosen your bench order very carefully, you could well be thoroughly screwed by that (on top of the not getting your Bench Boost screw-over!).

I've never actually experienced that particular cruelty from the FPL website. But I have several times had transfers 'lost', and a few times a captaincy pick 'lost' (once, even a Triple Captaincy - that hurt hard). And I have seen many people over the years complain of having a Wildcard or a Free Hit mysteriously 'unprocessed' - either leaving them with no changes for the week, or a huge points hit for the multiple changes they'd expected to be free of charge. (In some, perhaps many, perhaps most of these cases, folks have just done something wrong - omitted to hit the final 'Save your team' button, perhaps. But I have come across this so often now, including from friends of mine that I trust to be savvy enough not to miss steps in the process [however perversely concealed they may sometimes be!], that I really do think it happens sometimes. Probably quite a lot, in fact.)

You need to be very, very careful with your weekly selections - transfers, starting eleven, bench order, chip activation. And - even if everything appears to have been acknowedged and saved successfully - you really need to doublecheck again a little later. 

This is another reason why you shouldn't leave your team tweaks until just before the deadline. Though the main one is that the site is just likely to crash during extreme peaks in traffic, and not let you register any changes at all - that will screw you over pretty often if you leave it late in the day to make your changes. 

But you really need to make your changes,.... pause, take a breath, leave at least a 5 or 10 minute gap,... and then re-log in to the FPL website to make sure that your changes have actually stuck.

The FPL website is not stable or reliable. You need to be very, very careful in using it.

The Double Gameweek Delusion (again)

 

Gameweek 33 is our only substantial Double Gameweek this season - and not as substantial as it might have been, with Arsenal unexpectedly crashing out of the FA Cup at the hands of second-tier Southampton the other week, meaning that Arsenal and Newcastle are now omitted from the list of doubling teams.

But it's just not a great set of fixtures. City have Burnley (away) in midweek, but Sunday's crunch match in the title race against Arsenal before that (likely to be a very dour game in which Arsenal play for the draw...). Bournemouth have Newcastle (away) and Leeds (home) - neither of them a pushover. Brighton have Spurs (away) and Chelsea (home); really tough to predict those - strong teams, but in dreadful form recently. Burnley might fancy their chances against Forest on Sunday (although that is away), but must be expecting a drubbing when they face City. Only Leeds, with a home game against Wolves and an away match at Bournemouth, may have a decent prospect of two wins - although it's a hell of a long trip down to the south coast,... and Bournemouth are starting to look very dangerous again.

So.... NO-ONE - not even Manchester City - has a good Double.

And, unless a player has at least one really inviting fixture - ideally, two - it's rarely worth betting on them in a Double Gameweek, in preference to dependable high points-returners who stand a strong chance of giving you a good haul from their single fixture.

Every time there's a Double Gameweek, we see people burning through transfers, even spending 'hits' or using their Wildcard or Free Hit, to load up on 8, 10, 12, even 15 doubling players, in the fond hope that this will inevitably net them a massive points total for the week.

The foundational assumptions prompting this mania are: 1) that you are guaranteed a minimum of 4 points from a doubling player; and 2) that a doubling player will - or at least can - give you twice as many points as a single-fixture player.

Both of these assumptions are simply WRONG.

1)  Nothing is ever 'guaranteed' in this game. Players might get injured or suspended in the first of the two games, or just be deemed in need of a rest for the second; or get restricted minutes across both of them (particularly if their team is still involved in Europe). And defenders can easily get fewer than 2 points in a game; indeed, it's quite possible for a player to rack up negative points once in a while. The 'baseline' expectation from a Double Gameweek player is considerably less than 4 points.

2)  Even if a player plays all of both games, almost no-one ever manages to perform at their maximum level twice in quick succession. Even with two 'easy' fixtures, it's vanishingly rare for a player to produce two good FPL returns in a Double Gameweek. With the significant risk of limited minutes, or only appearing in one of the two games, the reasonable expected median return for a double-fixture player is far less than twice what it would be for a single-fixture player - but no-one in FPL seems to be able to grasp that.

In almost every Double Gameweek, around half of the top returning players are usually single-fixture players. At least some of the top returners in this Gameweek 33 are likely to be the same players who would have been the strongest prospects in any other week - even though they only played once: players who are being widely jettisoned in the Double Gameweek mania - such as Bruno Fernandes, Igor Thiago, Harry Wilson, Gabriel, James Tarkowski, Jordan Pickford, Caoimhin Kelleher, etc.

A second set of appearance points is a nice lift if your doubling player has a strong chance of some sort of decent return in at least one of the two fixtures (especially for a defender or keeper, who you wouldn't generally expect to have a high chance of a big haul; this is why having some doubling players on the bench can help a Bench Boost). But you need that assurance of at least one good fixture, plus the near certainty of starting in the other game as well. Otherwise, it's a huge gamble to bring in players from mid- or lower-table clubs that you usually wouldn't bother with - and it rarely pays off.

In the grip of this Double Gameweek frenzy, people also seem to overlook the cost of transfers (even if you don't have to use 'hits' now, all transfers are valuable, and it makes sense to regard them all as effectively 'costing' 4 points; consider, if you use up a Free Transfer now, an injury crisis in a week or two's time might necessitate you taking a 'hit' that you could have avoided if you'd still had that earlier Free Transfer in hand). If you're using up a lot of transfers to bring in these doubling players, and are probably going to use more to get rid of most of them again as soon as possible - that is almost certainly going to wipe out whatever advantage you might gain from their playing twice this week. But, of course, this is an 'invisible cost'; many FPL managers don't even notice it,... or can easily persuade themselves to ignore it. They will feel terribly smug if they get a big gameweek return with their many-doublers ploy - not taking into account the cost of the transfers it consumed,... or the possible negative impact of being stuck with some sub-optimal players in their squad in subsequent gameweeks,... or the fact that many managers who made few or no changes to their regular squad did just as well, or better.

It's perfectly fine, indeed a good and necessary thing to 'load up' with doublers to an extent: good players from good teams with at least one good fixture. But a lot of DGW Delusionals are going for Burnley players, who are likely to get battered twice, or Leeds players just because they're cheap, or players from currently awful Chelsea just because they used to be good last summer, or geriatric Danny Welbeck who's extremely unlikely to start in both games....

Be very careful about which doubling players you pick for a Double Gameweek. Don't use too many transfers on them (and be mindful of how you're going to offload these 'temporary assets' again). And don't ditch your best single-gameweek players for them!

An awkward glitch

It seems to have been happening rather often this season that individual player stats will disappear for a while, become inaccessible on the FPL website (usually with the bizarre message appearing that information "will become available after the season starts" - as if the system has somehow reset to last August?!). And it's a maddeningly arbitrary, inconsistent error: sometimes it will only affect certain routes of access - perhaps you are denied player info off your Team page or the Transfers page, but not off the Stats page....

However, for the last few days, all player information, whichever page you try to click through to it from, has been inaccessible on the site.

And this is a particularly bad time for something like this to happen... when we're approaching the season's biggest Double Gameweek, and many people are thus contemplating multiple team changes,... and a possible chip play.

I hope the FPL Gnomes can get this sorted out soon. But, really, it shouldn't be happening at all. The FPL website is a nightmare - clunky as all hell, and dangerously unreliable.

 

An inspiration

 

In my meanderings around Youtube the other day, I stumbled upon this - an engaging profile of self-taught wood-carver Ray Kinman, who became one of the leading practitioners in his field and landed a prestigious job sculpting many of the signs for attractions at the Disney theme parks. Still active at 70, he is now a beloved teacher of his craft.

A little nugget of peace and beauty in a turbulent world...

And he has a few inspiring lessons we all might seek to use:

Be passionate about everything you do.

Your greatest asset is persistence.

Cultivate mastery through repetition.

Mistakes are where the great learning and growth comes.

Always try to push yourself a little bit harder.

Lose yourself in the process.

These, at any rate, are principles that I have tried to follow in my life, and which I try to promote in my online writings. They can even have some useful application in our FPL endeavours, I believe.

More 'new beginnings'

 

Today is the eve of the Buddhist New Year across the countries of South-East Asia, where I have been enjoying an idyllic 'semi-retirement' for the most of the last dozen years.

A few years ago, the Lao Brewery Company produced commemorative cans for its flagship Beer Lao brand reminding us all of the number of the new year in the Buddhist chronology; but they haven't repeated that useful notice again since. If Google is to be believed (which it generally isn't these days, on almost anything; just a few days ago, it was trying to persuade me that Arsenal were knocked out of the FA Cup in the 4th Round this year [by Wigan??!!] - and that was just the good old fashioned regular search function, not the demented new 'AI' version....), we are about to enter the year 2,570.

I'm in the Lao capital of Vientiane at the moment. I'm hoping it will be the quietest place to ride out the festivities. The water-fighting in the streets, a custom, I gather, only fairly recently exported from Thailand to neighbouring Lao and Cambodia, gets more protracted and boisterous each year, and quickly gets a bit tiresome if you're any older than 25; but the major hazard of this period - especially in this country - is the maudlin all-night drinking parties, usually with interludes of caterwauling karaoke at ear-shredding volumes, that break out everywhere over the next few days, and can make sleep (at least at regular hours) all but impossible. The good thing about the bigger cities in this part of the world is that almost no-one's really from there, they've just migrated from other parts of the country for work or study; and for big holidays like this, they all return to their original home for a few days or a week Thus, the big cities empty out, and can often be relatively tranquil at such times - at least, compared to most of the rest of the country during this frenzy of batshit-crazy celebration. I'm hoping that will be the case again. (Although the last time I spent the holiday here, we were still under the shadow of Covid, so that may not have been fully representative. The festival does seem to have become hugely more raucous across the region in the last two or three years!)

Anyhow, Sabaidee Pi Mai - as they say around here.

Or, in the local script,....  ສະບາຍດີປີໃໝ່

Or in Thai,  Sawasdee Pi Him  -  สวัสดีปีใหม่

And in Khmer,  Rikreay Chhnam Thmei  -  រីករាយឆ្នាំថ្មី

Now,.... I must sort out my earplugs and my rain poncho before braving the 150-metre dash to the nearest convenience store to pick up a couple of beers... It might be the last time I dare to go outside for the next three or four days.

Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 32

The hugely long lay-off from regular Premier League football that we've just endured rather throws everything up in the air now. Although we've seen some of the teams in action during the past week in the FA Cup and/or in Europe, we really have no idea what anyone's league form is going to be this week. Arsenal and City haven't played a league game in nearly a month!

These weekly 'summaries' have been getting a bit too involved - and excessively time-consuming for me! - so I've been aiming to keep them briefer recently. I made just about zero progress on that resolution for the first few weeks, but.... now I've hit upon a new 'format', which might help: a tabulation of the major types of 'lucky' incidents. 

I will try to resist any extended commentary (although I probably will still indulge in a few diatribes about any particularly egregious penalty or handball incidents).

Red cards awarded: 

Red cards not awarded: Brian Brobbey clearly should have received a second yellow for his cheeky shove in the back on Cristian Romero, which sent him stumbling into a dangerous collision with his out-rushing keeper; but, of course, VAR cannot currently comment on decisions about yellow cards, even when they would be de facto reds. This may have been an especially consequential moment in the match, because Romero was hurt in the incident and had to go off (and Kinsky probably should have done, if 'concussion protocols' were being properly applied - as he had taken a very violent knee in the side of the head from his defender).

Penalties awarded: Arsenal's penalty was - under the current ludicrous rules - perhaps 'correctly' awarded, but it was soft, and, in commonsense terms, very, very unjust (and resulted in points for Gabriel for the 'assist', and Gyokeres for the conversion - neither of whom did much else in the game, and did not really deserve any FPL return). Cook's hand may have been 'raised', but often that is a perfectly 'natural position' (you have to move your arms away from your sides and upward in order to twist your torso); and Gabriel fired the ball at him from such close range that he could do absolutely nothing about it. Clearly, the contact was not in any way 'deliberate'; in fact, he was making every effort to get his arm out of the way. I hate to see penalties like this given.

On the initial coverage, we couldn't see any clear foul by Sven Botman for the crucial penalty award in the dying moments at Palace. A behind-the-goal view did eventually reveal a very slight tug of the opponent's shirt; but the referee couldn't see that, and was simply being conned by Lerma's exaggerated dive. This is a curious case where VAR, if only considering the view the referee had had of the incident, or only using a similar TV camera angle, might reasonably have overruled the initial decision; but they were in a position to judge that the ref had in fact made the right call - if for the wrong reason. And actually, I'm still not convinced that there was quite enough in it to justify the award of the spot-kick; that was very rough luck for Newcastle.

Penalties not awarded: Cole Palmer (of all people!) stuck out a leg to block Jeremy Doku and quite clearly made contact with the Belgian's leg, to send him sprawling: an absolutely clearcut penalty - that didn't even seem to get reviewed by VAR?!

Referee Rob Jones initially awarded a penalty to Pape Sarr, after he collided with two Sunderland defenders - but VAR told him to take a second look. The Spurs man did indeed appear to have been already going down before there was any contact; and the contacts, when they came, didn't look culpable to me. So - for once - the general feeling is that VAR made a justified intervention on this occasion. However, it was a tricky incident to unravel; and you can feel a certain sympathy for Spurs fans who feel that they just can't catch a break at the moment.

Tight/dubious offsides: Jaidon Anthony appeared to have grabbed the opening goal for Burnley, but was denied by an SAOT offside call - one of those that was so ridiculously tight, it gave us no confidence in its being correct: as so often recently, Anthony appeared slightly further forward in the computer graphic than he had to the naked eye, but still only his leading arm was 'offside', and so the decision rested entirely on where on the upper arm the decisive line was drawn.... to within a matter of fractions of an inch. In the second-half, Burnley were cruelly denied again, when Bashir Humphreys got in behind to lash home a free-kick floated in from wide on the left; this time, the justificatory SAOT graphic purported to show that half an inch of the edge of the defender's knee was offside (if you were very generous about where you drew the decisive line on the upper arm of the rearmost Brighton defender!!) - but that was just wildly, impossibly wrong: to the naked eye he had looked miles onside, comfortably played on by three or four Brighton defenders. WTF???

Goals wrongly allowed/disallowed: 

Surprise omissions/early substitutions/injuries:  Rob Edwards left Mateus Mané out, in favour of Angel Gomes - a strange decision, which might have contributed to Wolves's lack of threat. Timber still hadn't recovered from the knock that's been troubling him for the past month, and Calafiori was a late - unannounced - addition to the injury roster, so Ben White and Myles Lewis-Skelly (only his second start this season!) were unexpectedly the starting full-backs for Arsenal. Saka and Odegaard were also unfit to take part; and Eze wasn't trusted with a start. Havertz, Madueke, and Martinelli were pulled off barely 8 minutes into the second-half. Emi Martinez felt a calf-strain in the warm-up, so Marco Bizot made an unexpected appearance in the Villa goal on Sunday. Kobbie Mainoo was a surprise omission for United on Monday evening, having apparently suffered a training-ground knock. (The inclusion of the hopelessly out-of-his-depth Ugarte instead may have been decisive in the woeful performance that followed.) Mbeumo and Dalot were also unexpectedly 'rested', in favour of Sesko and Mazraoui.

Near misses:  On Friday night, Angel Gomes cracked a ferocious free-kick against the corner of crossbar and upright, with Hermansen beaten. West Ham immediately broke quickly, and Summerville attempted to shoot past Jose Sa, stranded outside his area, from nearly 40 yards out, but put the effort just wide. Jarrod Bowen also crashed a superb left-foot shot against a post, in a game packed with incident.

Nathan Collins crashed a thunderous header from Schade's cross on to the top of the crossbar - a chance that could have given Brentford a probably narrowly deserved win.

Harry Wilson, breaking forward powerfully in the first-half, went for one of his trademark curlers - had Mamardashvili beaten, but looped the effort on to the roof of the net. That was when the game was still goalless; if he'd managed to get that shot 6" lower, it might have turned the result of the match.

Morgan Rogers's neat shot on the half-turn glanced off the top of the bar, with Sels well beaten.

Jefferson Lerma's running header from Pino's cross hit the bar so hard, it nearly broke it!!

Big misses/big saves: Kelleher made a great double-save in the first-half; but the second one was discounted (presumably) because Beto was flagged as offside. That call looked wrong on the TV playback, but since no goal was scored, the decision would not be reviewed. Yet another example of the ways in which mistakes in the onfield decision-making can impact FPL outcomes - it's not just the big calls like penalties, but often offsides, corners, etc. as well that may turn match results and points returns. Both Pickford and Kelleher had outstanding games in this entertaining mid-table clash - yet both were accorded shockingly low numbers of 'saves' in the official game stats, 3 or 4 lower than I would have expected. Like the 'bonus points' and the new 'defensive points', 'saves' points often seem to produce very erratic, unfair, and baffling results because of the perverse lack of transparency in their calculation. There was a further example on Sunday when Matz Sels made a great block from Ollie Watkins - which was presumably not credited as a 'save' (which would have earned him his 2nd point for 'saves' in the game) because Watkins was bizarrely flagged offside.... although he'd be onside by about a yard!

Alex Jimenez, excellent throughout, saved the match for Bournemouth with a superb last-ditch challenge on Gabriel (of all people!) when he was suddenly put through clear through in the middle of the box with only the keeper to beat in the dying minutes of the game.

Bart Verbruggen made an outstanding block with his legs from Zian Flemming's low cross-shot. Moments later, he fingertipped a similar effort - from rather further out - beyond his far post.

Emile Smith Rowe had an excellent late chance to put Fulham back in the game at Anfield, or at least give them a deserved consolation; but with two-thirds of the goal to aim at, he prodded his effort just wide of the far post.

The great Erling Haaland was found in the box by Doku, in a little bit of space; when he's bang on it, you would have bet on him to convert 9 times out of 10; but this time, he miscontrolled the ball and eventually lashed his effort well off target.

Both Morgan Rogers and Ollie Watkins blazed good chances over the bar in the closing minutes against Forest.

The just-returned Robin Roefs got vital fingertips to a thunderous drive from Pedro Porro, to tip it just over the bar in the closing minutes.

Tanaka almost managed to dribble the ball all the way into the United net, but was denied by a superb sliding challenge from Lisandro Martinez barely a yard out! (Most unfortunate that the Argentinian shortly afterwards got himself - rightly - sent off for having a cheeky tug on Calvert-Lewin's ponytail; though this wasn't really a consequential setback for the home team, since Leeds were already comfortably on top of the game.)

Outstanding goals: Rio Ngumoha's perfect curler from 16 yards out is an early frontrunner for April's 'Goal of the Month'. And it gave Liverpool some momentum in a match where they'd been failing to make much of an impact for the first 35 minutes. Neco Williams's fierce low drive from the edge of the box, flashing just inside the foot of the post, will also be a contender - and was an untypical, unexpected contribution from that player.

Outstanding performances: 

Big mistakes: Moises Caicedo (of all people!) got caught in possession, and gave away the ball cheaply just outside his own box - to gift Doku City's third goal (though it was, of course, a 'hospital pass' from the disaster-on-a-stick Robert Sanchez that put him in an impossible position).

Bad luck/good luck: David Raya (of all people!) nearly gave away an embarassing goal; receiving a hasty back-pass from Gabriel, he sliced his panicked clearance straight at the nearby Evanilson - but it came to the Bournemouth striker just too quickly for him to react, and deflected harmlessly away off the outside of his ankle. But that very nearly made a bad day for Arsenal into an absolutely terrible one.

Igor Thiago was a little lucky with his second goal, happening to get just the lightest of glancing touches off his hip (and only just barely onside??) as he ran across the line Michael Kayode's already goal-bound shot.

Will Osula mistimed his slide to reach Lewis Miley's deft low ball into the six-yard box and ended up with the ball stuck between his thighs as he lay full length on the ground. He did well to recover - letting the ball run clear so that he could awakwardly prod it home with his left foot; but was a very messy goal.

Nordi Mukiele's shot from outside the box needed a massive deflection to get past Kinsky; and indeed, he looked fortunate even to be credited with the goal, as the initial line of the shot was probably off target.

FPL weirdness: The counting of 'saves' for a number of keepers seems to have been massively off this week! (Perhaps it is every week, and I'm somehow just noticing it more this time?)

And Bournemouth full-back Alex Jimenez, who was probably the 'Man of the Match' at The Emirates, somehow failed to make any impression under the obscure 'defensive points' or BPS ratings, and came away with a paltry 2 FPL points from a game in which he was absolutely superb. Ain't no justice. (If there were any 'fairness' in our game's scoring system, he really ought to have got about 10 points for that match-saving last-ditch tackle on Gabriel alone....)

In general, I approve of the considerably more generous approach being taken to 'assists' this year (in recent seasons, we've seen far too many good final balls fail to be rewarded because of an inconsequential touch from a defender), but I feel the new principle was being taken rather too far with Jarrod Bowen's third 'assist' on Friday. Actually, I don't think players should be getting 'assists' just for taking corners anyway (most of the time, these days, there's a complete melee in the penalty area, and the quality of the initial delivery isn't always very relevant to the ultimate outcome of the passage of play), or not at the full rate of 3 points, anyway. But when the corner is cut out at the near-post and half-cleared,... that is a consequential intervention by another player. Just about all other stats compilers - including the FA themselves! - did not categorise this as an 'assist'; only FPL did!

Unexpected results: West Ham - though only playing the weakest team in the league - were almost unrecognisable from earlier in the season, or even just a month or so ago; they somehow came up with their best performance of the season to run out with a thumping Friday night win. Arsenal have been widely expected to start 'choking' with nerves on the title run-in; and Bournemouth were never going to be a pushover; but probably no-one was really expecting the league leaders to be so comprehensively outplayed at home, by a mid-table side who hadn't managed to win a league game in two months! Liverpool may have steadied their nerves with a decent home win against Fulham; but they really weren't good enough to have prevailed with any comfort - the scoreline severely flattered their performance.  Brighton were miles off their game, and really didn't deserve any more than a point against a Burnley side who were well in the match, and were cruelly treated by being denied a pair of goals for non-existent 'offsides'. And Manchester United suffered a major dip in their recent form to allow Leeds to claim a first away win against them since the start of the 1980s!!

The FPL 'Team of the Week' again (as in just about every Gameweek this season!) includes almost no-one that anyone owns so far. Van Dijk was lucky to come away with a clean sheet in a game that Liverpool didn't really dominate; Thiago's been consistently impressive all season (pretty nearly the only player, certainly the only forward, who has been!), and Verbruggen has been a fairly popular recent acquisition because of next week's Double Gameweek - but no-one else in the 'best 11' has any sort of ownership at all; and even those two were displaced from the selection on Sunday.... by only-just-back-from-injury Robin Roefs and Jean-Philippe Mateta! Nobody could reasonably have been expecting even Taty Castellanos, and certainly not Mavropanos or Wieffer (nominally playing as a makeshift right-back) to get even 1 goal, let alone a brace! 

The global average ended up at a modest 46 points. There haven't been that many poor refereeing decisions, at least; although a rather unjust penalty for Arsenal, a very clearcut penalty not given to City, and 2 absolutely baffling offside decisions against poor Burnley were pretty egregious errors. With several goals from unexpected sources, and many more very near misses, as well as some moderately eccentric game outcomes (a bad defeat for Arsenal, an unexpectedly comfortable home win for West Ham, rather undeserved wins for Liverpool and Brighton, very narrow wins for Sunderland and Palace, and a most unexpected win for Leeds...), this one is looking like a 6 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'.

Dilemmas of the Week - GW 32 (25/26)

After nearly three weeks without any Premier League games (four weeks, for Arsenal, Manchester City, Crystal Palace and Wolves!), anticipating relative 'form' is going to be even more of a crapshoot than usual going into this Gameweek. But at least there haven't been too many new injuries since GW31,... and quite a few welcome recoveries.

Despite the relative dearth of new injury concerns, this is a prime moment to consider major changes leading into the league campaign's final run-in - and, in particular, to gear up for the imminent Double Gameweek in GW33 and the subsequent Blank Gameweek (because of the FA Cup Semi-Finals) in GW34. Indeed, if exceptional need - or foolish impatience - haven't prompted you to use the (largely superfluous) 2nd Wildcard yet, this is inevitably the optimal gameweek in which to do so. (And very nearly 500,000 managers have indeed done so. But that does beg the question,..... what the heck are the other 12 million up to???)

I am trying to streamline these weekly round-ups a bit from last year, restricting myself for the most part to just the injuries etc. affecting players that are likely to have a major significance in FPL; and also, of course, only to new injuries - I figure everyone should be aware of players who've already been ruled out for some time!  

[For some years, I have found the 'Injuries & Bans' summary on Fantasy Football Scout the most reliable resource for this kind of information; although this site, Premier League Injuries, is a very good alternative (often a little quicker to update, I think - though it did go through a bit of a glitchy period for a while last year).  Go check these out for more comprehensive coverage. 

I see the Fantasy Premier League site has added an improved 'Player Availability' page this year (though hidden under 'The Scout' tab?!). That also seems to be reasonably comprehensive and up-to-date, but god knows how it's supposed to be 'organised' - maybe by 'date of injury'? Obviously, arranging it by club and alphabetical order would be more sensible; but the denizens of FPL Towers seem to have a deep aversion to the sensible.]

I've recently discovered this additional resource, the weekly Predicted Lineups from Fantasy Football Edits. My longtime standby for this sort of news, Fantasy Footall Scout, does usually provide some explanatory commentary on its predictions, even including reminders of the key injury concerns, and sometimes also some discussion of possible alternate selections; so, if you like a bit more detail with your 'probable lineups' for the week, that could still be the preferable roundup to look at. But because FPL Edits is so stripped-down, it's rather more straightforwardly accessible, easier to scan through quickly; and I think it's also perhaps a tad more reliable with its expected formations and lineups, and a little quicker to update.

So, what are the conundrums we face ahead of Gameweek 32?

Does anybody need to be moved out because of injury?

Unwelcome uncertainties for Arsenal on their title run-in, as the recently impressive Piero Hincapie has apparently picked up quite a serious leg-muscle issue while playing for Ecuador, while Bukayo Saka, who was withdrawn from availability for the internationals for unspecified reasons (which were widely assumed to be exaggerated or entirely fake), is apparently still unfit to rejoin the playing squad. Moreover, Jurrien Timber, who suffered a heavy knock on the ankle against Everton in their last league game (four weeks ago!) is still a doubt, and Martin Odegaard - who has been almost constantly troubled by injury this season - had a fairly lacklustre game against Sporting in midweek and appeared to be limping when he was pulled off before the end. And now Riccardo Calafiori is also a doubt, after suddenly going missing from training on Friday. At least Ebere Eze appears to be over whatever phantom niggle was keeping him home from international duty....

Jadon Sancho suffered a heavy fall in a club friendly two weeks ago, and has a damaged shoulder which may continue to make him a doubt for a little while (although he's never really established himself as a regular starting prospect for Unai Emery).

Burnley's Hannibal Mejbri is going to be out for a while, after pulling a hamstring against Fulham last time out.

Palace winger Evann Guessand suffered a knee injury in Thursday night's game against Fiorentina, the severity still being assessed.

Leeds are suffering a tide of injuries in their back-line at a very inopportune moment: both Joe Rodon and Anton Stach had to come off in the FA Cup win over West Ham, after rolling their ankles badly. while Jaka Bijol (training knock) and Gabriel Gudmundsson (minor groin strain) were unavailable for that game, and might still be doubts this weekend.

Alisson was a late withdrawal from Liverpool's last league game, the defeat against Brighton, after suffering another leg-muscle issue - which now seems likely to keep him out until 'near the end of the season'. At least his new understudy Giorgi Mamardashvili was looking pretty sharp in Wednesday's game against PSG - but looking their talismanic long-time goalkeeper is further unwelcome disruption at a time when the club are starting to look in serious disarray.

Ruben Dias missed out on the League Cup Final three weeks ago because of a hamstring issue, and has since suffered a further setback which probably makes his return date still at least a week or two off (although you wonder if Abdudokir Khusanov hasn't been playing well enough to keep him out of the team now....). And John Stones withdrew from the England squad with a sore calf-muscle (although - who can remember the last time he was fit for a decent run of games??).

Sven Botman suffered a facial fracture in the north-east derby three weeks ago, but recent reports say that he is being fitted with a protective mask and that there is a chance he can be considered for selection against Palace (presumably at the expense of Malick Thiaw, who has had a few struggles in recent games). Fabian Schar was thought to be close to a return from his serious ankle injury three months ago, but has apparently suffered from an infection in the foot which may keep him out for some more weeks. Even more worryingly for Newcastle, Bruno Guimaraes was just about ready to return from his hamstring layoff, but went down with the mumps last week - which can be a particularly debilitating virus, one that can have a lingering impact on physical fitness for several weeks afterwards; so, I'd be betting that we won't now see Bruno again until the end of the season, if at all.

Just to make things even worse for Spurs, it's been announced that Mohammed Kudus has suffered a serious setback in his rehabilitation from a hamstring injury and may now require surgery (although, when things get as bad as this at a club, you can't help but wonder if some players are exaggerating injuries to just avoid being involved in the ongoing shitstorm any more....). Mathys Tel had to come off with a knock in the last league game against Forest, and Pape Sarr picked up a shoulder injury while playing for Senegal, while first-choice keeper Guglielmo Vicario had to have surgery on a groin hernia at the start of the break and is likely to be missing for at least another week or so. On the bright side, at least the club's first-choice back-four appears to be available again.... for practically the first time this season.

Do we have any players who are dropped, or not looking likely to get the starts we hoped for?

Harry Maguire is suspended this week, after getting sent off for a 'denial of a goalscoring opportunity' against Bournemouth last time. Meanwhile, Brighton's Lewis Dunk and Wolves's Yerson Mosquera are starting a two-match ban for having reached the threshold of 10 yellow cards for the season. 

After this weekend, we have an amnesty on suspensions for accumulated yellow cards till the end of the season. These are the players who stand on the precipice: unsurprisingly, it is mostly the defensive midfielders who've got themselves into jeopardy with their 'taking one for the team' fouls - Caicedo, Casemiro, Bernardo Silva, Joelinton, and Wolves's Andre and Joao Gomes, as well as Bournemouth full-back Alex Jimenez and Brighton winger Diego Gomez are all just one more card away from a 2-game ban, and so will have to tread very carefully this weekend; they might indeed be 'rested' to keep them out of harm's way.

Enzo Fernandez has been suspended by Chelsea for this gameweek (and for last week's FA Cup tie against Port Vale) for imprudently mentioning his eagerness to live - and play? - in Madrid during an interview he gave over the international break. Sounds like storm-in-a-teacup stuff, and I wouldn't expect it to impact his selection or performance for the remainder of the season (unless Real or Atleti have already made approaches about buying him this summer....?).

Did anyone give other cause to consider dropping them?

I'm not betting on a De Zerbi Miracle at Spurs just yet. Neither is anyone else, it seems: the North London club are now the favourites to join Wolves and Burnley in the drop, with some bookmakers trimming the odds on them going down to as little as 13/10.

Recently, Liverpool are starting to look very nearly as toxic, and it's now looking very much as if - without a dramatic turnaround in the league (I think we can write off the chances of a comeback against PSG in the Champions League) - Arne Slot will be sacked at the end of the season.

Did anyone play so well, you have to consider bringing them in immediately?

Three weeks after the last batch of games, 'form' back then is scarcely relevant. Although.... Harry Wilson had another absolute banger there, and it is astonishing that fewer than 25% of FPL managers owned him then. (That might be a strong indication of how many people remain 'active' within the game!)

BEST OF LUCK, EVERYONE!

A little bit of Zen (89)

 

“By three methods may we learn wisdom:

First, by reflection which is the noblest;

Second, by imitation, which is the easiest;

Third, by experience, which is the bitterest.”

Kong Qiu ('Confucius')

παθήματα μαθήματα:  'Pathemata, mathemata' - "Learning, suffering - same thing."  

(Ancient Greek proverb)

Avid readers (if there be any; traffic stats seem to suggest I have a few regular lurkers, at any rate) may have noticed that my main purpose on this blog is to try to promote the first of Confucius's paths to wisdom - while also celebrating the third, but strongly discouraging the second (which is, unfortunately, by far the most common approach among the FPL hordes...).