Cruel Fate - you have surpassed yourself!

 

My best buddy - and principal FPL antagonist - and I have long consoled ourselves with a humorous 'superstition' that there is a balance in the Cosmos: that ill fortune in one area of our lives will inevitably be soon balanced out by some unexpected good fortune in another.

Hence, if things go very ill for us in the current FPL Gameweek, we seek to cheer ourselves up with the reflection that we must be about due for something nice to happen to us in the real world. You know, we'll find some money in the street, or have a friend finally return that favourite book of ours they borrowed five years ago, or at least have an uncommonly pretty girl flash us an uncommonly flirty smile at the supermarket checkout on Thursday evening... One of those little things that make life worth living.

And vice versa: if the real world hasn't been terribly kind to us recently, we become robustly confident that we're about to experience our best Gameweek in months.

And it is uncanny how often this crackpot 'belief' seems to be borne out by events. (I suppose it's our old friend, the 'confirmation bias': we have a low threshold of proof for things we really want to believe in.)  The toilet springs a leak, but Patrick Kluivert scores a hattrick of penalties! I lose my phone, but my highest-scoring player of the week gets auto-subbed into the starting eleven because of a warm-up injury to Cole Palmer! Somebody steals $500 from my hotel room, but I get a ton-up weekly score... in a Single Gameweek, and without playing a chip!

I swear, these are things that have happened; this is my life.

But of course, this is not a reliable rule. I'd like to think it's more of a guideline - but in truth, it's not even that.

I've just had one of the worst months of my life (well, the worst three months or so, actually - but who's counting?), so.... I was kind of looking forward to a compensating upswing in my FPL fortunes.

But oh no, I just had one of my worst weeks of the season, one of my worst weeks ever. Even a modest success for a 'bold' captaincy punt on Nordi Mukiele in the final game couldn't drag me up to the minimum respectability of the 'global average'!!

And this was the first week in a long time - certainly the first one this season - in which I've suffered the triple whammy of losing three key players to injury in quick succession.

To be fair, though, I have quite often in the past suffered a quadruple- and even a quintuple-whammy of injuries - so maybe it's not really all that bad.

When Cosmic Justice breaks down as a consoling principle, at least we still have Perspective.

Another little curveball

 

As if we don't have enough uncertainties and obscurities to ponder and fret over in FPL-land already, it was just confirmed at the end of last week that one of this week's winning League Cup semi-finalists will have their league fixture from the weekend of the Final - Gameweek 31 - anteponed (brought forward) into Gameweek 26. (I really can't recall this ever happening in the past; if it did, it was incredibly uncommon. Last season, when most of the cancelled fixtures from the FA Semi-Final weekend were moved forwards rather than backwards, is the first instance of such a thing that I can remember.)

The victors in tomorrow's second-leg tie at The Emirates, either Arsenal or Chelsea, will thus be enjoying a 'surprise' and rather imminent Double Gameweek - the week after next; as will their scheduled league opponents from the weekend of the Final.

We will know by Wednesday morning if we're going to get a Double Gameweek 26 of:

Brentford v Arsenal        Forest v Wolves        Wolves v Arsenal

OR

Chelsea v Leeds        Everton v Bournemouth        Everton v Chelsea

Of course, Arsenal and Wolves or Chelsea and Everton will also have a Blank Gameweek in GW31 (as will City/Palace or Sunderland/Newcastle) - which is likely to be a much bigger deal; but at least we have a fair amount of time to get ready for that.

The teams in the other semi-final, on Wednesday, seem likely to be spared an anteponing like this because of the European schedule: Newcastle and Crystal Palace (Manchester City's GW31 opponent) have a pair of midweek play-off games in GWs 26 and 27. Hence, it seems likely that, if City or Newcastle reach the Final, their Blank on GW31 will be made up by a more typical postponement - probably to Gameweek 33.

Yes, it is a lot to keep track of....

Facebook page (An Administrative Note)

When I launched this blog nearly 18 months ago, I set up a parallel Zen and the Art of FPL Facebook page.

If you've never visited it, you haven't really missed anything. I only used it as a platform to share links to posts here on the blog, and it didn't really include any 'original content' (except that in providing short introductory summaries to each linked post, I would occasionally frame its topic or purpose in a slightly different form of words than I had used in the original piece...). I was only using the Facebook page to try to gain a slightly wider exposure - to try to increase the blog's prominence in search-engine results, and perhaps to make it easier for folks to share any piece of mine that they happened to like.

I'd only just remembered to put a link to the Facebook page in the sidebar here a month or so ago....

And almost immediately I'd done that, I got shut out of my Facebook account... again.

Now, this has been happening more and more frequently over the last year. Indeed, just lately, I seem to have been getting 'locked out' once or twice a month! Most of these exclusions are rescinded within a day or two, sometimes after just a few hours; but more often I'm cut off for a full week; and, in the worst cases, once or twice for a month or so.

This latest interruption of service looks like being a particularly bad one - so, I've given up, for now, even trying to get back in; I'm expecting that I won't be able to regain access until at least the end of January.

Hence, there have been no posts on the Facebook page since just before Christmas. Indeed, at the moment, it doesn't appear to be visible any more - which may be an escalation over Zuck the Schmuck's previous persecutions of me.

Now, the loss of this rarely-visited-by-anyone page does not grieve me all that much. But I also maintained an FPL info page for my country of residence - which I saw as being a useful public service, and which put me in touch with a small community of fellow enthusiasts for the game. (That page still appears to be visible; but it's effectively now 'dead' since all posting rights seem to have been suspended.)  The loss of that second FB page galls me considerably.

The loss of access to every other Facebook page, however, and to my account details, my list of contacts, the messaging service - that is little short of a disaster.

In East Asia (and in many other parts of the 'developing world', I shouldn't wonder), Facebook is enormously popular. Most small businesses can't be bothered to set up and maintain their own website, so rely on a Facebook page instead; thus you can't readily keep abreast of openings and closings of local restaurants etc., special offers and promotions, special events like concerts and parties and such, without Facebook. The dratted site has also become the default option for setting up mutual support forums for various interest groups, especially among the expat community; so, you can't access 'buy & sell' groups, property rental listings, or general advice on how to deal with health issues, noisy neighbours, or whatever... without Facebook. And, worst of all for me, Facebook Messenger has become the preferred means of communication for just about everyone out here (I imagine there are alternative messaging services in the local languages of the region, but these perhaps don't support the use of English; so, anyone who wants to communicate with anyone else in English uses FB - not SMS, not even Whatsapp,.... Facebook!!); hence, when I'm shut out of my account, I can't contact my landlady or my visa agent or my doctor... or the handful of friends I have out here....  

Being cut off from all of that is not just an enormous hassle, it is potentially life-threatening. It is downright irresponsible of Facebook to shut people out of their accounts (without warning or explanation; and without providing any avenues for seeking redress!).

I hate you, Mark Zuckerberg, and all your incompetent minions! And most of all I hate your botlets of Artificial Stupidity which repeatedly judge me (oh, the irony!) to be potentially 'not a real person' - which is why I keep getting locked out.

At last, a little bit of REST....

It's all been a bit too much over the past month or so, hasn't it? Especially over this last fortnight since Christmas...

Although we should, of course, be paying attention to what goes on in the 3rd Round of the FA Cup this weekend, at least we don't have any more Premier League/FPL to worry about for a whole 8 days - until the lunchtime Manchester derby on Saturday, 17th January.

Make the most (or the least...) of the TIME OFF!

Feeling overwhelmed...?

 

For no particularly good reason (only the TV companies' remorseless appetite for airtime-filler...), the opening match of the Gameweek 21 schedule, West Ham v Nottingham Forest, is kicking off tonight - Tuesday evening, 8pm, UK time.

These midweek gameweeks are a huge hassle for everyone in FPL, because almost everybody has less time to attend to these things during the working week: certainly less time during the day to check up on the latest team news, but also probably less opportunity to watch games live - or perhaps even to catch up on highlights (promptly, or at all...).

But it's even worse for folks like me living in Asia - well, anywhere east of the Arabian Gulf or the Caspian Sea, really. For us, evening games are starting at midnight or later, much too late for most of us to even think of watching them live; much too late, in fact, or most of us to even be staying up until the FPL deadline to try to catch late-breaking team news before finalizing our squads.

And when the games are staggered across multiple days, that hassle is greatly increased; especially when having an 'early' game or two, a day ahead of the majority of the gameweek fixtures, compresses the gap with the preceding gameweek such that we'll have no real opportunity to learn about new injury problems,... or, really, to ponder our FPL squads at all! It is a right pain-in-the-arse, frankly. 

At least, if the Gameweek started on Wednesday, we'd have a full two-day breather after GW20, and some chance for press conference updates to filter through to us on the far side of the world. Thanks to this bloody West Ham game, we're essentially flying blind into this one...

All of which is to say.... no, I don't really have time to do my usual detailed preview for Gameweek 21; sorry.

The main NEW INJURY PROBLEMS I'm aware of are:

Wesley Fofana (illness) and Robert Sanchez (muscle strain) missed the last game for Chelsea.

Jefferson Lerma (concussion) Nathaniel Clyne (groin strain) both had to come off with knocks in the weekend game against Newcastle at the weekend. That leaves Palace stretched very thin in defence.

Leeds right-back Jayden Bogle missed the weekend's game against Manchester United with a calf problem.

Hugo Ekitike was missing at the weekend with a slight hamstring strain.

The big news of the gameweek though, is that Josko Gvardiol had to come off early in the second-half against Chelsea with a leg injury, and has since needed surgery on a cracked tibia - so, he's likely to be out for several weeks at least (a major blow to the 10% or so of Fantasy managers who own him). Even worse for Pep, Ruben Dias also had to come off shortly before the end of the game with a leg-muscle problem. I wonder if they might have to recall Manuel Akanji from his loan to Inter.

Jacob Murphy had to come off before the end against Palace, complaining of a tight hamstring.

Callum Hudson-Odoi missed the Villa game with a sore Achilles tendon, and goalkeeper John Victor had to come off in the second-half with a pulled muscle behind his knee.

Sunderland striker Wilson Isidor was also missing at the weekend, apparently because of a training-ground knock.

Mo Kudus had to come off against Sunderland with a thigh strain.

Lucas Paqueta missed the Wolves game with a back problem.

Joao Gomes and Hwang Hee-Chan both had to come off in the West Ham game with muscle soreness, Gomes suffering in the groin and Hwang in the calf.

At least there ae no new suspensions to worry about for this game. And Xavi Simons, Moises Caicedo and Ethan Ampadu are available again after serving their bans.

Oh, and Ruben Amorim's been sacked at last (about 8 months too late, but better late than never...). Youth team coach Darren Fletcher is expected to take over as an interim manager, but I wonder if the ownership made the move now because they think they can land the suddenly available Maresca. A change like this is always disruptive, but Amorim has been such an embarrassment of flailing disaster (and a source of constant uncertainty for his players as he messes with the line-up every single week!) that I would expect the 'new manager bounce' at United could be huge - even if only short-lived.

The video clip at the top is of course from the seminal campus comedy National Lampoon's 'Animal House': the classic little scene where the boys go shopping at a local supermarket to get food for an upcoming toga party at their fraternity house, and geeky freshman Kent Dorfman (Fraternity name: 'Flounder'), played by the late Stephen Furst, for a while manifests unexpected dexterity in catching the avalanche of food items tossed his way by his mischievous frat brothers. It is, I think, one of the great bits of improvised physical comedy in cinema. (I saw this film during my first week at university; and I like to say that I have never looked forward since...)

New Year's Resolutions

1)   I will not use my 2nd Wildcard at once.

I wouldn't actually be tempted to this year anyway. But, just as the Wildcard can be a too-ready 'comfort blanket' if you have a really bad start to the season, so too it can seem like an easy quick fix if you've suddenly taken a battering from all the seasonal injuries in this miserably cold December. But I generally feel that even if you are feeling thus battered, it's almost always better to take a hit or two to repair the damage, and/or soldier on for a while with one or two holes on your bench. An even worse injury crisis might well pop up later. And, if it doesn't, the Wildcard can be very useful at the end of the season for dodging around a Blank Gameweek, and/or optimising your squad for a Bench Boost play in a Double Gameweek. Or just for adapting to a major 'turn' in fixture-difficulty for a lot of teams. Having a few gaps in your squad at the start of the second half of the season is not a sufficient reason to give up such an important chip.

2)  I will not buy Dominic Calvert-Lewin. (Yet...)

Arguably, we're already a little bit 'late' to be considering that. It might have been nice to get him 2 or 3 gameweeks back, when it was becoming apparent that Leeds had taken a major step forward in their performance level, and that big Dom had settled into a scoring groove again - rather than just enjoying a one-off (or two-off, or three-off...) stroke of untypical good fortune. But 6-in-a-row is an exceptional scoring streak for anyone, and it must be due for a break now. And Dom, bless him, has rarely managed to stay fit for this long in the last several seasons. Moreover, that run of good results for Leeds in December came from a big slice of good fortune with the fixtures: they met Liverpool, Chelsea, Palace and Sunderland when they were woefully out of form. They are still at the bottom end of the table for a reason, and have few if any 'easy' fixtures; in the next couple of months, they might struggle to pick up points from anyone except Everton and Forest. Admittedly, Calvert-Lewin could be a handy 'budget enabler', if you were to decide you wanted to bring in Ollie Watkins or Hugo Ekitike. But I would imagine that most people are currently content with Thiago and Woltemade, who have generally been in excellent form, and have very nice runs of fixtures coming up.

3)  I will not buy Cole Palmer. (Yet. Or, probably, ever. Not this season, that is.)

Now, I am a huge fan of Cole Palmer. I think he's the best advanced playmaker we have in the Premier League. Only Foden and Odegaard come anywhere close; but Foden's much less consistent, and Odegaard far less of a goal threat - so, not that close. But Chelsea are a mess at the moment: no balance in the side, no consistency. And Joao Pedro and Liam Delap have not provided the answer to their scoring problem; they probably now regret letting Nicolas Jackson go! Now, 'Ice' Cole is capable of carrying a team on his own, and he might yet go off on a scoring streak, once he's fully regained his fitness. But it feels like that might still be some way off. With Chelsea's current form, his prospects don't look strong enough to be bringing him into your squad on spec.

4)  I will not bet on either Arsenal or City to win the title.

It's a two-horse race this year, and, at the moment, too close to call. I've long had a hunch that City will edge it - largely because they're so much more free-scoring: they'll rarely or never drop any points just from conceding a single goal; Arsenal probably will. But I think it would be rash to put money on that hunch. The outcome could well turn on significant injuries for one or other contender; losing Haaland would surely be catastrophic for City; but so might losing Saka or Saliba or Raya for Arsenal. Let's hope they both keep their full rosters intact, and give us a thrilling title battle right through to the end of the season.

5)  I will not laugh at Manchester United.

Well, you've got to have at least one that you know you're going to break almost immediately, and you're happy to allow yourself that. Even with some 'better' performances finally emerging (and a long overdue departure from the unbalanced, ineffective 3-4-3 system to which Amorim had been so stubbornly wedded for the whole of his first year), I still don't have much confidence for their season. They'll still almost certainly be the year's most risible under-performers - a club with pretensions to being European champions again who struggle to finish mid-table in their domestic league... And they accomplish this non-achievement with such an inventive array of foot-shooting every year, they have been a reliable source of mirth ever since Fergie retired. [Ha! - well, it looks like I'll be able to adhere to this one after all. With the United ownership finally putting an end to the Amorim fiasco just a few days into the New Year, we were suddenly able to start seeing again what such a talented group of players is really capable of. With the remarkably impressive start they've made under Michael Carrick's tenure as manager, they're starting to look as if they might even have a slight chance of getting into the title conversation! It's nice to have one of the tradtional 'Big Six' getting back to those sorts of levels. Competition at the top of the league feels a bit thin this year, with Liverpool and Chelsea still floundering rather - and Spurs again flirting with relegation.]

Now, of course, the 'resolutions' above about player choices or chip play might seem to be purely hypothetical for me, as some will remember that I got excluded from the game this year by a maddening FPL glitch at the start of the season. However, I am still 'playing along' on my own. And I empathise with all those who are still in the fray, still battling for mini-league glory.... So, I hope these observations may prove of some use.

Packing 'em in

 

From Boxing Day, December the 26th, we entered a run of fixtures where we get 4 full Premier League gameweeks inside a fortnight: we only have 4 days of the 14 up until Thursday 8th January without a match on them. (It's even worse for those of us who live in more easterly latitudes: most of these games are late at night for us, or in the wee small hours of the morning - so, we won't have any opportunity to catch up with them until the following day,.... which can throw the internal sense of chronology out-of-whack even further!)

Gameweek 19 is staggered over Tuesday and Thursday this week (at least we're all getting a 'day off' for New Year's Eve!!); so, we only have one full day clear - today, Monday the 29th - to ponder team revisions before the next FPL deadline.

We again only have one clear day before the Gameweek 20 matches this coming Saturday and Sunday.

And although most of midweek Gameweek 21's fixtures are on next Wednesday evening, for no conceivable reason (well, OK, it's TV scheduling; but is that really a good enough reason, at this time of year, when players and fans alike are not getting nearly enough time off...?), West Ham v Forest is on Tuesday and Arsenal v Liverpool is on Thursday.

So, for 3 Gameweeks running, there is only a one-day gap between the end of one and the beginning of the next. It is very difficult for the beleaguered FPL manager to keep up. Over the coming two weeks, many are, no doubt, going to inadvertently miss a deadline - or hurry into changes without having had any chance to check up on all the relevant team news. It is a beast.

At least we've then got a 'mini-break' coming up,.... with Gameweek 22 not starting until lunchtime on Saturday, 17th January. I think we're all going to need this little bit of a rest from the game.

Another little bit of Christmas fun

For anyone growing up in the UK in the '70s or early '80s, veteran comedy double-act Morecambe & Wise's 'Christmas Special' TV show on the BBC became more of a central institution of the family Christmas than the Queen's annual 'Message to the Commonwealth', a highlight of the year anticipated for weeks beforehand.

The secret of the duo's showbiz longevity was the remarkable chemistry they shared, along with Eric Morecambe's peerless deadpan delivery; but the Christmas shows were also often memorable for some fantastic bits of visual inventiveness - like this.....

Merry Christmas, again!

Here it is.....!

 

For an Englishman like me, there is only one 'Best Christmas Song of All Time'; and it's certainly not the cringe-inducing Wham! or the saccharine Mariah Carey offerings that get so exasperatingly overplayed at this time of year. No, of course, it's 'Merry Xmas, Everybody!' by Slade - an actual celebration of the occasion, rather than just a routine love song cynically grafted into a seasonal setting, and just the right combination of simplistic structure but great melody and raucous rock energy to propel it into the stratosphere of ageless anthemic songs.  What would Christmas be without it?

Merry Christmas, Everybody!!!

What gives, BBC??

 

Dear Auntie Beeb, WTF is up with this??  Midweek 'Match of the Day' programmes almost never seem to be available on the iPlayer any more! Only (if we're lucky) bare highlights of individual games, with no team line-ups shown at the start, and no pundit analysis afterwards.

And no explanation is ever offered for this strange - and exasperating - omission; at least, not any very readily accessible one; at least,... not one that the ever-deteriorating Google can find. The only possibly relevant notices the Internet seems to have about the non-appearance of the full programme are generic and out-of-date FAQ answers which vaguely suggest it might be down to 'a rights issue', with no further elaboration. And sometimes the programme appears as normal; but sometimes it doesn't.  WHAT GIVES???

Now, some may object that I shouldn't really be watching the BBC iPlayer anyway, since I don't in fact live in the UK (and haven't for nearly a quarter of a century!). But come on, the BBC obviously don't really give a shit about that, because they must realise that at least two-thirds of their streaming viewership is accessing the service from other countries via VPNs (it would be easy to stop, if they wanted to; and they have, occasionally).

And, as a sometime lawyer, I don't really get this argument about 'rights issues' in other territories. Where cable and satellite services - to say nothing of the dear old Internet - are now so widely available cross-border, there can be no effective exclusivity of broadcast rights within any particular geography. And the nominal 'exclusivity' for its rebroadcast rights that the EPL sells can only meaningfully apply against rival providers in the same medium (terrestrial TV, or cable, or satellite, or streaming) as well as the same territory,... and only for the same type of content (presented for the local audience, with commentary and discussion in the native language). It is utter nonsense to suggest that anyone shouldn't have access to BBC programming in English because a TV station in a nearby country might be offering coverage of the same event in a different language.

But good grief, BBC, if you are going to randomly withold some of your programmes from the Internet - without any obvious logic or consistency - you should at least give us a NOTICE OF EXPLANATION, easily available, every single time. It's not that hard to do.

The distant laughter of the Fantasy Gods....

 

On Saturday - when half the world had bet their precious Triple Captain chip on him - the great Erling Haaland played like a man who'd been heavily on the lash on Friday night....

But just three days later, he comes up with a goal and 2 assists, for what would have been a very decent return on the TC chip!!!

The pagan gods who preside over the realm of FPL are not just cruel and capricious, but fond of mockery; it is not enough for them to smash our hopes, they must then taunt us in the midst of our despair.

But really, backing Haaland against Leeds was the 'right' choice, Fulham are a way better team than Leeds, and this match was on their home ground: it was not nearly so favourable a prospect for a big haul from the lanky Viking. (But then, neither were the Bournemouth or Everton games; or even Burnley or Wolves.....! It's impossible to predict with any confidence when the big hauls are going to happen.)

TOO SOON!!!

Christmas has become strangely popular in East Asia over the last few decades - especially in China; but really, everywhere across the region.

The seasonal decorations started going up in my sleepy little hometown last weekend (and they'll probably stay up till around March!). And I got Whammed! for the first time on Sunday afternoon last week in a local supermarket. Come on, people, we're not even out of November yet!  Cruel and unusual punishment indeed!

I see the official challenge doesn't actually start until tomorrow, so I suppose I'm still in with a chance of survival. But the omens are not good....

Early wake-up

It is, somehow, an Iron Law of the Universe that, if you live in Asia, you are never more than about 150 metres away from some sort of construction project.

There is an unfortunate corollary to this Law - that if it's 7 o'clock on a Sunday morning, you are probably within 50 metres of someone using an angle-grinder....

Feeling THANKFUL?

I've long had a peculiar fondness for the American holiday of Thanksgiving - largely because I've so often been able to celebrate the occasion with American and/or Americophile friends, and a few times even in America.

This year, alas, I shall probably be making do with a turkey sandwich on my own. And maybe I'll make myself a pumpkin cheesecake for a sweet treat tonight...

Anyhow, a Happy Thanksgiving to any American readers who may stumble upon this obscure corner of the Internet (probably looking for content about the Fantasy version of their own gridiron game - the one that rather conspicuously involves very little playing of the ball with the foot....).

[And apologies to any Canadian readers who feel overlooked. But you're probably used to it! I am well aware that your version of this holiday falls much earlier, on the 2nd Monday in October, as I lived in Toronto for a year-and-a-half in my youth. However, that holiday never embedded itself in my psyche, even when I was a resident in the country. You Canucks are not so, um, culturally assertive as your American cousins, I suppose.]

For some reason, Linus's pitiful obsession with The Great Pumpkin - an autumn-themed deity of his own invention - was always one of the things that most resonated with me in the classic 'Peanuts' cartoons. This superstition of his was actually associated with Halloween, but it is Thanksgiving, with its own emphasis on pumpkins, that always recalls it to my mind. 

Linus, of course, was convinced that The Great Pumpkin would appear only to him, if he created a pumpkin-patch that was worthy of the demi-god's attendance; and he'd wait patiently every year, full of expectation - but it never happened.  In much the same way, we FPL managers convince ourselves that, if we only take enough care over our selections, one day The Great Gameweek or The Great Chip Play will manifest itself only for us.  Like I said, pitiful.

Again with the metaphors, Mr Wade?

To pod, or not to pod....?

I have a little bit of a 'following' (dread word!) on some of the FPL forums where I comment most frequently, a small coterie of discerning readers who actually appreciate and enjoy my observerations (on football and on life, as much as FPL). And a few of these have even exhorted me once or twice - perhaps only in jest?! - to launch a podcast,...  to provide a more 'readily digestible' version of some of the more useful content from this blog (where I know that, in pursuit of clarity and thoroughness, I usually end up being too long-winded for modern tastes). I have been considering it.

In fact, I had thought that last week would be an especially opportune moment to drop an initial episode: I should have had a bit more time to prepare material over the international break; and it was looking like a particularly intriguing gameweek, with a wide open field of possibiliies for the captaincy (I had quipped online that there were probably "at least 20 more promising options than Haaland this week"; and indeed, 17 players did better than the 8 or 9 points which I think would have been the Viking's best reasonable expectation for the gameweek, and another 20-odd did about the same; but since he actually blanked, 99 players outscored him!!); and there are many intriguing problems approaching (the midwinter fixture logjam, the extra transfers being doled out for AFCON, many managers still having all or most of this year's extra chips to get rid of, and so on....). Gosh, yes - it was an unusually rich week for FPL discussion.

Ultimately, perhaps, there was rather too dauntingly much in the way of possible topics to choose from. And I didn't have much free time (friends visiting, job opportunities to chase, another big writing assignment to take care of....). Heck, I haven't even got very far with the first item on my Preparatory Checklist, which was shopping around to find a good, FREE online hosting platform. Then I realised there's an awful lot of background noise in my house (I've learned to tune most of it out, after so long of living in Asia; but I'm right by an intermittently busy road, there's a house under construction just a stone's-throw away, and my neighbours' kids are often quite exuberant... It's A LOT.); so, I probably can't muddle by with the onboard microphone on my decrepit old laptop, I'd have to shell out for a semi-decent mike & headphones set.

So, I think, if this ever happens, it won't be until after the holidays - sometime in January, at the very earliest. And quite possibly never.

And I'm really not sure I want to do it anyway. I am an intensely private person, and I don't like to reveal anything much of my true self online (the name I use here is only an alias; the many names that I use online are all aliases, always). I certainly wouldn't ever want anyone to know what I look like; and knowing what my voice sounds like is only a very small step away from that - to me, it feels similarly invasive, similarly compromising. And I am avowedly anti-narcissistic: I have absolutely no expectation that anyone should enjoy the sound of my voice, nor any desire for people to pay attention to me. (I do this blog and the forum comments primarily because I really enjoy writing [I've often made my living from it], not with any ambitions of becoming a large-scale 'influencer'.) 

I am intrigued by the challenge of trying to get to grips with a new medium of communication. But I confess that it is one about which I know next-to-nothing - which will doubtless be something of a handicap to my early endeavours!

Any advice, encouragement, or discouragement on this plan would be gratefully received! 

And the Lord taketh away...

For the last several years, my beer of choice among the local brews in my part of the world has been this tasty IPA-style offering from the Lao Brewery. (At least, when I'm in the Lao P.D.R. Although this beer can occasionaly be found in the neighbouring countries, it's still only manufactured in relatively small quantities, and doesn't seem to have any established export trade, even within the region.)

One of my biggest frustrations as a fan of Lao IPA has been the fact that it is only available in bottles, which militates against it as an option for home consumption (glass is heavy to carry, a hassle to dispose of 'responsibly', and carries that constant threat of breakage).

But look at this! A few weeks ago, I found some Lao IPA at my local supermarket in cans. Oh, frabjous day!!!

Alas, they appear to have had only ONE CASE of them; and when I'd bought all of those, they didn't replenish their fridge again. The appearance of the long-awaited Lao IPA cans in my life was naught but a taunting phantom, a tantalising glimpose of happiness witheld.  [I could craft an FPL metaphor out of this incident if I wanted to; but, for once, I shall restrain myself.]

I feel sorry for Archie Gemmill

I have a soft spot for Scotland and the Scots. Edinburgh is my favourite city on Earth, and I dream of retiring there one day.

I've always rather liked their national football team too. In my early childhood, England had an unfortunate habit of failing to qualify for the World Cup, so Scotland were the only 'home country' to root for in the tournament. And by the time England did manage to qualify again, in '82, I'd got rather used to following the Scots, and was actually inclined to root for them harder than 'my own team'. It probably also helped that Scotttish football was going through a 'golden age' in the '70s and '80s (the number of 'foreign players' at English clubs was strictly capped, but that rule didn't apply to the 'home countries', so there was a ready conduit for the best Scottish talent to move quickly to top English sides), and so their leading players were all familiar and beloved stars in the English First Division.

Also, my best drinking buddy from college, and one of my principal antagonists in FPL, is a proud Scot, so I always share in his joy, as well as feeling some of my own, when the Scotland football team does well.

And crikey, did they do well at Hampden on Tuesday night - securing a thrilling victory against a technically superior Danish side, to qualify them for the World Cup Finals for the first time in 28 years!! It was one of the most ecstatic football moments I've witnessed in many years. And I was very, very happy for my old friend - and for all other Scottish fans around the world.

But... it has bothered me rather that in so much of the subsequent commentary on the occasion, and in particular on the three remarkable goals which clinched the victory, people have been dubbing this result, or one of the three spectacular goals... The Greatest Moment in Scottish Football History.

Er, NO. Not unless you're a Very Young Person. It was a very great 'moment', certainly; ONE of 'The Greatest of All Time'.

But not The Greatest. Sorry, that's ALWAYS going to be this.,,,  Stocky, diminutive, prematurely middle-aged-looking midfielder Archie Gemmill suddenly channels his inner Brazilian to improvise a swerving run from the edge of the box that leaves three Dutch defenders flat on their arses, and then hammers an exuberant finish into the roof of the net..... to put Scotland 3-1 up against The Netherlands at the World Cup (and they - the Dutch, that is - were the best team in that tournament, the best team in the world at that point; should, by rights, have won the Cup that year!).

That was the single most sublime moment in my football-watching life. And I don't think it will ever be topped.

Dear old Archie (still with us; now 78 years old) is not getting the respect and remembrance he deserves.

People have such short memories today!

[By the by, of the three wondergoals Scotland conjured last Tuesday, I like Kieran Tierney's the best. Overhead kicks and lobs from the half-way line are spectacular rarities, but they're essentially a bit hit-and-hope - they require a substantial element of luck. Tierney looked like he knew his shot was going in three or four paces out from hitting it!]

Another little breather....

 

Yet another international break is upon us. We should really be grateful for a little bit of a rest from the relentless grind of the FPL season,.... and yet, and yet we do tend to fret at the sudden absence of our usual preoccupations and anxieties at the end of the week.

'Withdrawal symptoms'!!

Unlucky Alf revisited

Last week, I noticed one of my regular antagonists had been having a hard time of it in FPL lately, and had suffered a particularly abysmal Gameweek 10. I commented that there didn't actually seem to be anything amiss with his squad, and I hoped that he would have the fortitude to stick by his selections and not rush into a lot of panicky changes.

And look at this - he put out the same team in Gameweek 11, and enjoyed markedly different fortune. That's the way this game goes: some weeks, you're lucky, some weeks, you're not.

 

This time out, despite having again picked the 'wrong' captain, and getting disappointing returns from Calafiori and Szoboszlai (with perfect foresight, he could have had a few more points off his bench),.... he managed nearly twice the global average; that lifted him into the top 22,000 for the week, and probably put him top of most of his mini-leagues. 

That was nearly 11.5 million places higher than his miserable GW10 ranking - surely one of the biggest week-to-week swings ever recorded.

This example is a powerful illustration of the point I always try to stress about Fantasy Football: you have to avoid being too reactive, to resist being swayed by your emotions. When you have a bad week, you have to try to calmly analyse why it's gone badly for you - before you decide to make any changes. Often, there's nothing wrong with your selections at all; you just had a week where everything broke against you.

Even in a pretty good week, you usually have at least 3 or 4 of your starting eleven who will 'blank'; quite often, there may be 5 or 6 who fail to bring you a return. And - Statistics being the Cruel Mistress that she is - that means that you're occasionally going to have a week where almost everyone fails to produce any worthwhile points. It doesn't mean they're bad selections; you just had an unlucky week. Hang tough - and next week will probably be better; maybe a lot better!

Fireworks and baked potatoes....

It is one of the peculiar perversities of the English national character that we choose to 'celebrate' a terrorist who tried to blow up the King and the government (um.... and to overlook the unfortunate fact that the origins of this dark festival were rooted in anti-Catholic paranoia....), but so it is. 

For people who grew up in England, November 5th - Guy Fawkes Day - is probably second only to Christmas in the emotional resonances it conjures from childhood. It is the only day of the year on which we let off fireworks, one of the few in which we may have a barbecue,... and probably the only occasion on which we'll have large outdoor parties at night and build BIG bonfires. The fact that it happens just as the days are getting short and the nights are getting chill, as autumn starts to transition into winter, adds to the special mystique of the event. I haven't actually been to a Bonfire Party for years, but the recollection of them still brings on a swoon of nostalgia.

I think I will try to buy myself some nice big potatoes for baking today, and cook up a pot of chilli con carne to pour over them. I might even brew up some mulled wine...

It is hard to celebrate the traditional holidays of home on the opposite side of globe. But these occasions are mostly about the emotions, the memories - a few little prompts like the smell of baking potatoes are all that's needed to bring on the feeling...

And if there is a Fantasy Football tie-in here, it's probably this: I do like to see myself as a constructive anarchist, an irreverent upsetter of apple-carts, a swashbuckling 'freedom fighter' - striving to blow up the corrupt edifice of FPL fetishism and superstition. Yes, I can find a metaphor anywhere!