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.)

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'.

Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 31

 

The disruption of four teams suffering a Blank Gameweek was the major curveball for FPL this week (and, of course, that wasn't - or shouldn't have been - at all unexpected; it should have been planned for weeks out). And there was a fair bit of fatigue evident, after a week of hugely consequential midweek games in the European competitions for 6 of the 16 sides playing this weekend.

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: 

Penalties awarded: 

Penalties not awarded: Manchester United have a good case that Amad Diallo had been briefly held back in the area and should have received their second penalty of the evening from referee Stuart Attwell. The oversight was compounded by the fact that Bournemouth immediately broke down the other end and won a penalty of their own (which also resulted, rightly enough, in the sending-off of Harry Maguire) to tie the score again. So, this decision turned the result of the game. To be fair, all three penalty shouts in the game were rather similar, and all kind of 50/50: a hand placed on the upper arm or shoulder of the attacker, only briefly and without much force (well, the Jimenez foul was straightforward, and extended tug on the shirt, but the other two were both brief hand-on events, which can be very hard to judge), the victim seeming to exaggerate their reaction, twistng violently off-balance and going down. If the referee happens not to have noticed the fleeting illegal contact, he might suppose that the attacker is merely 'simulating'. However, the TV pictures gave a much clearer view, so it is a mystery why VAR did not intervene here.

It really looked as if Danny Welbeck should have had a penalty too, when a stumbling Konate clearly through his arm out across the forward's midriff to prevent him reaching the ball. VAR does not seem to want to have anything to do with penalty decisions these days.

Tight/dubious offsides: Welbeck looked just off for his second goal, but it was allowed - and we never saw an SAOT picture to justify the call. We don't like to see goals ruled out on super-thin margins; but, unfortunately, the whole decision process in inspiring zero confidence at the moment.

Goals wrongly allowed/disallowed: 

Surprise omissions/early substitutions/injuries:  Alisson and Mo Salah were missing for Liverpool, after picking up muscle problems in the Champions League game on Tuesday. Romeo Lavia was subbed off just short of the hour (probably no-one owns him in FPL, but it's a worrying sign that Rosenior may be prone to early substitutions). Xavi Simons was left on the bench by Igor Tudor.  

Malick Thiaw was unexpectedly omitted from the starting lineup in favour of Sven Botman - but came on for the last half-hour or so; time enough to concede two goals and return a nul-pointer. That had a big impact for FPL, since he was already a fairly popular defender pick, but had more than 500,000 new managers come in for him this week as a short-term replacement for blanking players like Gabriel, Timber, O'Reilly and Guehi.

Near misses:  Igor Jesus nearly scored an own-goal early on, when an attempted back-headed clearance looped on to the crossbar. Mathys Tel let fly a dipping drive from distance that was brilliantly tipped on to the crossbar by a flying Matz Sels. In the second-half, just-returned-injury Lucas Bergvall managed to race in unmarked on to a square-ball to the back-post - but was unable to put his shot on target.

Newcastle started brightly, and Elnnga had a great chance for them in the opening minutes, blasting a powerful header only inches over the bar. A little later, a long-range curler from Chemsdine Talbi was only just finger-tipped away from the top corner by Ramsdale at full stretch, one of the saves of the weekend.

Big misses/big saves: Mathys Tel let fly a dipping drive from distance that was brilliantly tipped on to the crossbar by a flying Matz Sels. And the Forest keeper made another good stop near the end, from a strong Solanke drive from the edge of the area. But apart from that, Spurs were barely in the game: indeed, the BBC highlights made it look as though they might easily have lost 5-0 or 6-0 - they are starting to look like Dead Men Walking.

Konstantinos Mavropanos headed clear from under his own crossbar twice - to keep West Ham in the game against Villa. And a screaming 30-yard drive from Ross Barkley had to be fingertipped over the top by Mads Hermansen.

Outstanding goals: John McGinn's deft 20-yard curler was the 'Goal of the Week'; although Harry Wilson's was a close second, and we also saw very nice finishes from Danny Welbeck, Zian Flemming, and Beto.

Outstanding performances: Harry Wilson once again had a bit of a stormer.

Big mistakes: The usually dependable Lewis Dunk gifted Liverpool an equaliser with a ridiculous back-header that played in Kerkez behind him for an easy goal.

Bad luck/good luck: Hugo Ekitike had to go off after just a few minutes, apparently with a dead-leg (although it did not appear that there had been muvh if any contact made with the Brighton player; I wondered if perhaps he'd jarred ot twisted his knee in spinning away from the challenge).

FPL weirdness: I usually restrict these weekly roundups to what's happened on the pitch (and the FPL points allocations related to that), but.... this week there do seem to have been a lot of problems elsewhere - with the FPL website. I've seen numerous complaints in the last few days about Free Hit changes having failed to be acknowledged in the gameweek summary (annoying; but probably to the victims' ultimate advantage, since playing the chip this week was almost certainly a huge mistake), or once or twice about a Free Hit having apparently been shown as activated when the manager had not chosen that (seems unlikely, but.... who knows? The FPL Gnomes are endlesssly inventive in contriving new ways to screw up our beloved game....). And one of my best friends - who I suppose I must believe - insists that his weekly team selection was 'forgotten': not such a disaster as it might have been, since he'd already made the necessary transfers to ensure he had bench cover for his blanking players (and they would all be subbed in automatically, even if FPL had ignored his chosen starting order); but he'd wanted the captain's armband on Wilson rather than Palmer, so that cost him a valuable 7 points. If this was indeed a ccmmon type of glitch this week, many managers will no doubt have suffered even more heavily from it (although I would think that a majority were probably banking on Bruno Fernandes as captain, last week and this). 

I have encountered this exact glitch quite often in the past myself, a team selection being initially acknowledged, but then somehow 'erased' again at the start of the gameweek; but I haven't suffered it for some years now. I believed that it was the result of the FPL servers getting overtaxed in the last hour or so before deadline, so started avoiding last-minute team selection - seeing it as an essential precaution. (Of course, that might just be a superstition of mine. I don't suppose FPL would ever let on if this were a known problem; so there's really no way we can ever know for sure.)

I'm afraid we must accept that, in addition to all the randomness regularly inflicted on us by team coaches and the members of PGMOL, there are times when we can't even rely on the game itself to reliably record our teams for us.

Unexpected results: Liverpool losing is not really a 'surprise' any more; but Chelsea getting such a thorough spanking from Everton was a bit of a turn-up. A derby game is always tough to call; and, given Newcastle's yo-yo form this season, their tendency to be lacklustre after a big European game, and their poor record over the past decade against Sunderland, a defeat for them, even at home, was not really unexpected either; although the extent of their capitulation - after a promising start - was perhaps a bit of a surprise.

The FPL 'Team of the Week' at least includes Bruno Fernandes and Harry Wilson this time; and in a gameweek with so many forced squad changes for everyone, probably quite a lot of people would have been starting Kelleher, Welbeck, and Keane as well; although the latter was eventually edged out of the lineup by 'randoms' like Pinnock and Bijol, and it's still a pretty oddball collection overall. Moreover, these 'non-random' stars of the week were in a lot of squads anyway (especially Fernandes, Wilson, and Kelleher), so it's difficult to see how anyone will have gained much advantage from playing the Free Hit or Wildcard - unless they got very lucky with some of those less expected big returners! Thanks to a good haul for the popular captaincy pick, Bruno Fernandes, and excellent defensive returns for Everton, Brentford, Leeds, and Villa, the global average isn't nearly as bad as it might have been, but still a pretty meagre 38 points. I see from scanning the mid-sized leagues I'm in that the points distribution this week is particularly skewed: the great majority of managers are around or somewhat below the global average; and quite a lot are way down in the teens or single-digits. However, there is a very long thin tail, with some people having picked up a number of those unpredictable good hauls, just from having brought in new players fairly randomly for short-term cover in the blank gameweek; quite a few people seem to have managed something in the 50s or lower 60s, and that looks like a very good score this week; but a fortunate few somehow managed to get up into the 70s and 80s, and a handful even scraped above the 100-point threshold (though not by much...).

Of course, there is an increased likelihood of this kind of thing happening in a gameweek in which everyone is being forced to make multiple changes, but this unusually high number of completely unforeseeable good returns has made this an even more chaotic gameweek than most of us anticipated. And then, on top of all those wildly unpredictable hauls, we also seem to have seen a large number of FPL website glitches possibly robbing some people of some of their selections for the week; I don't know that there's any way to verify this, or to estimate the scale of it - but I've seen so much griping about it online, I'm fairly sure it has been occurring at a significant level this week. Even if we did know for sure how many people had been affected by problems like this, it's still difficult to quantify its impact in terms of the 'luck' factor I usually try to address in these posts - since I've thus far focused them exclusively on incidents in the game action. However, I do feel that if there has been a significant amount of FPL letting its managers down through 'losing' their team changes, that probably ought to be worth at least another 1 or 2 points added to the weekly 'Luck-o-Meter' total; but since we don't really know if it happened or not (I'll keep my eyes peeled for further reports, and possible conclusive evidence - or even an admission of fault from FPL?!). 

The large number of good returns from random players (in a week in which their ownership was likely to be - randomly! - higher than usual) probably ought to be worth a couple of extra 'Luck-o-Meter' points too; but again, since I haven't previously thought about how to quantify and incorporate this sort of factor into these weekly roundups, I'll refrain from making any adjustment for that either. Not much terrible refereeing, at least, so perhaps only a 5 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'. But it really feels as though, in practical terms, it ought to be a lot more - especially if there really have been a lot of screw-ups with the FPL website this week!!

Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 30

In the middle of the European 'Round of 16' ties, we've inevitably seen a few surprising and inconvenient rotations this weekend; and, yet again, some up-and-down performances from the big teams.

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: Gabriel Gudmundsson's sending-off for a second yellow seemed a bit harsh, as the incident looked like an accidental coming-together rather than a rash challenge. And the referee, Thomas Bramall, who'd evidently forgotten he'd carded the player earlier, would surely have been likely to take a more lenient view if he'd realised it was a sending-off decision. (Leeds will also complain about a lack of consistency in the refereein, in that Brennan Johnson also committed a mild but bookable offence shortly afterwards, and was spared a second yellow card.)

Red cards not awarded: Yankuba Minteh was very fortunate not to get a second yellow card against Sunderland (and Hurseler immediately subbed him off, to avoid the near-certainty of his dismissal for any further infraction). His second foul was a fairly mild contact, and might have been seen as an 'accidental' coming-together - but it was the sort of contact we usually see cards given for. Hannibal was even luckier to get only a yellow card for his wild, overreaching lunge which cuaght Truffert above the ankle; the VAR team were again, unfathomably, sitting on their hands (it was a bad enough foul that the referee should at least have taken a second look at it).

Penalties awarded: 

Penalties not awarded: Michael Keane plainly clipped Havertz's heels not once but twice, bringing him down in the penalty area in the first-half at The Emirates; VAR's silence on the incident is utterly baffling. 

Cole Palmer was clipped on the edge of the foot by Woltemade's rash challenge: the contact was very slight, but it was clearly there - and it was enough for a penalty to be awarded. [Along with two good efforts on goal, one saved, one just wide, Palmer, despite looking still at only about 85% of his full capacity, was not far off a 20-point game, but came away with only 2 points. So it goes....]

Richarlison should have had a penalty at Anfield at the start of the second-half when Van Dijk was clearly holding him back; the referee didn't have a clear view of the offence, VAR did - but VAR didn't want to 'overrule' their on-pitch colleague. This is getting ridiculous.

Brentford surely should have had a penalty on Monday, when Andre wrestled Kevin Schade to the floor at a corner. It seems that adjudicating all this goalmouth grappling is becoming such an insuperable challenge for the officials that they're just throwing up their hands in despair and refusing to give any decision on these incidents now. Something's got to change, and soon.

Tight/dubious offsides: The offside against Brennan Johnson was very, very tight; the one against Dan Ndoye was just plain wrong.

Goals wrongly allowed/disallowed: Sunderland are unhappy about Brighton's goal, as Diarra had been shoved to the ground on the preceding corner-kick; but that contact might not have been violent enough for a foul, and Diarra appeared to be rolling around on the ground to try to perusade the referee to reconsider his decision on that, rather than because he was actually hurt; he certainly didn't have a head injury, so there was no reason to halt the play.

There was a bit of a question-mark over Ross Barkley's goal for Villa, as Onana, in an offside position, bad been standing directly on the line of the shot (and it might actually have touched him); he probably wasn't impeding Lammens' view of the ball, but the fact that it might have touched him was surely 'distraction' enough (again, perhaps the rule is not framed that way; but it should be!).

Dan Ndoye appeared to have scored a deserved winner for Forest against Fulham. To the naked eye, he had looked comfortably onside; but SAOT reckoned his heel had been 'off' by a matter of millimetres - a severely unconvincing contention; and the technology should not be attempting to adjudicate such unreasonably tiny margins anyway.

Surprise omissions/early substitutions/injuries:  Viktor Gyokeres was rested in favour of Kai Havertz (although anyone who'd been rash enough to include the Swedish striker were rewarded with a gaol from him when he came on from the bench). Jurrien Timber picked up an injury, and was subbed off just before half-time. Tarkowski and Branthwaite failed to appear for Everton (and there's no excuse of European football there, so presumably there are undisclosed injury issues of some sort?).

Alex Jimenez, who's been almost an ever-present for Bournemouth this season, was dropped in favour of Adam Smith - although he did get decent minutes off the bench.

Sandro Tonali was a last-minute absentee for Newcastle, after suffering with an illness this week. Robert Sanchez got a somewhat surprising recall in the Chelsea goal, though apparently this was down to Jorgensen having picked up a slight groin-strain rather than Rosenior having had a change of heart about him.

Dean Henderson was missing in goal for Crystal Palace, because of an illness. Dominic Calvert-Lewin, however, was a surprise starter, despite missing most training over this past week with a niggly knee problem.

Benjamin Sesko, despite excellent recent form, was moved back to the United bench, with Mbeumo moving into the centre-forward role and Diallo returning on the right wing.

Perhaps with an eye on the challenging return leg against Galatasaray in the Champions League on Wednesday, Arne Slot rested both Mo Salah and Hugo Ekitike from the start against Spurs.

Raul Jimenez surprisingly did start for Fulham, despite having lost his father just a few days prior. Harry Wilson was also able to play despite having been suffering with an ankle problem all week, but Emile Smith Rowe unexpectedly gave way to young Josh King, after reporting an issue in training shortly before the game.

Near misses:  Everton nearly embarrassed title-chasing Arsenal when McNeil's long-range curler had Raya well-beaten, but slammed against the post - and Ndiaye got to the rebound first, but put it wide. Only moments before, a close-range drive from McNeil had been somewhat fortuitously blocked by Calafiori's hopefully flailing leg, as he lay sprawled on the ground. Reece James's 30-yard free-kick late in the game clipped the outside of the foot of the post, with Ramsdale struggling to get across to it.

Ola Aina, played in by a delightful through-ball from Murillo, smashed a half-volley against the bar from just outside the box. Taiwo Awoniyi, breaking clear one-on-one with Leno late on, but dragged his shot wide (though it looked as though he might have been 'offside' by a toecap...).

On Monday night, Igor Thiago looped a header past Sa on to the angle of crossbar and upright - very, very close to putting Brentford into an unassailable 3-goal lead. Adam Armstrong also hit the post for Wolves at the end of a quick breakaway early in the second-half. Then, near the end of the game, Arokodare smashed a header against the crossbar. In the dying moments, Brentford then had another chance to take the win, with substitute Reiss Nelson ghosting in behind for a free header, but taking his eye off the ball and having it come off his shoulder - and go just wide of the post.

Big misses/big saves: Erling Haaland had a pretty quiet game, but did square the ball to set up Semenyo for what should have been a decsive opportunity - but the usually impeccable forward side-footed the shot just wide of the post. It wasn't a terrible mis, but it's looking very much as if might be a decisive one in the title race. Palmer had a great early chance against Newcastle, but lashed the shot just wide. Robert Sanchez pulled off a very good flying save from Gordon's fierce long-range curler. A little later, Liam Delap blazed the best chance of the game way over the bar. Ellborg's reaction save with his foot to deny Hinshelwood's point-blank shot will probably be the 'save of the weekend'. Evanilson rounded the keeper early on, but his effort was blocked at the near-post by Bashir Humphreys. Jadon Anthony absolutely smashed one against the underside of the crossbar; the best chance of a fairly dour game against Bournemouth. A little later, Marcus Tavernier's crisp left-foot shot clipped the outside of the post.

Calvert-Lewin produced one of the best penalty misses we've seen this season. Most of them have been tame efforts, scuffed straight at the keeper; but Domnic hit his cleanly, with power, just.... a bit outside the post!

Spurs looked much improved against Liverpool (who didn't...), and Alisson was forced to make a good save from a long-range shot from their new teenage Brazilian left-back Souza. Vicario might have been a little at fault for letting Szoboszlai's free-kick go in despite apparently getting a good hand on it, but a little later he redeemed himself by fingertipping Gakpo's fierce low shot from the edge of the box on to the foot of his post.

Outstanding goals: 

Outstanding performances: 

Big mistakes: Jose Sa was allowed to pick up a back-pass without punishment from referee Stuart Attwell. That would have been a good scoring chance for Brentford - that might have put the game completely out of Wolves's reach. Not only that, but Wolves immediately broke down the other end to get a goal back; so, the home side might feel doubly aggrieved: that one decision almost certainly cost them the win.

Bad luck/good luck: Bernardo Silva's inch-perfect chip was... pretty obviously a mishit cross. Mineth's goal from a tight angle against Sunderland was also a fortuitous mishit, as he lost he feet and sliced his shot.

FPL weirdness: 

Unexpected results: Although denied an obvious penalty, Arsenal were fairly lucky to come away with a win, as Everton looked much the better side for most of the match. City then failing to get a win against battling West Ham has probably cost them the title. Newcastle managed to get a win away from home, against an oddly lacklustre Chelsea. In a battle of the under-performers at Anfield on Sunday, Spurs showed much greater improvement than Liverpool, and were very unlucky not to come away with a win. And... credit to Wolves for a spirited performance, but Brentford were so on top of them in the first-half, they really should have won by a landslide.

The FPL 'Team of the Week' includes almost no-one that anyone owns - apart William Saliba (and even he's a much less popular choice from the Arsenal defence than Gabriel or Timber; or, recently, Hincapie!), Bruno Fernandes and Dominik Szoboszlai. Once more, we've seen a bunch of low-scoring games, and no hauls from any of the week's more fancied prospects: Semenyo, Haaland, Mbeumo, Joao Pedro, Palmer, Ekitike, Wirtz all giving no joy. The global average is a miserable 43 points (driven mostly by clean sheets). With a few surprise last-minute omissions and some unexpected results, two or three missed red cards (and one rather harshly given), a couple of goals denied for ridiculously tight offside calls, and three pretty clearcut penalties not given, and a missed award of an indirect free-kick on the edge of the six-yard box for Brentford on Monday night that might have decided the course of the game, this is looking like an 8 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'.

Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 29

 

Again, we've seen a fair number unpleasant selection surprises this week; and some up-and-down performances from the big teams.

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: Jacob Ramsey's second yellow card for 'simulation' when he went down in the penalty area was a ridiculous decision from Peter Bankes; the player pretty obviously just slipped over. At the moment VAR has no jurisidiction over second yellow card decisions (although, thankfully, that is going to change for the World Cup). Fortunately, his removal actually seemed to galvanise Newcastle, and may have saved the game for the home team rather than costing them a defeat.

Red cards not awarded: 

Penalties awarded: 

Penalties not awarded: Andoni Iraola was convinced Bournemouth should have had a penalty, when Tavernier lost his footing in the act of shooting. It did appear that Kayode might have caught his Achilles, but the contact was so fleeting (and not clearly visible on any of the TV camera-angles) that I think you can forgive the officials 'missing' this one.

Leeds were aggieved that Luke O'Nien had briefly had both his arms around Struijk's neck at a first-half corner, but the Dutch defender went down very easily, and there wasn't really much in it - a 50/50 sort of call. (Leeds were also unhappy with the penalty awarded against Ampadu, but that one looked straightforward enough: the first contact on his arm was slight and unavoidable, but he did then appear to make a deliberate second movement towards the ball, prodding it away with his elbow.) They might have had another shout at the end, when a corner fell against Dan Ballard's arm; he was in the middle of a ruck of players, and knew nothing about it - but with the mess the Handball Law is in at the moment, we often see these given.

Haaland went down after a collision with Matz Sels. He was 'looking for it', but the goakeeper's challenge was rash, culpable. The only reason referee Darren England didn't give it must be because of Haaland's reputation as a bit of a con artist in these situations; the only reason VAR didn't intervene must be because of their excessive timidity about challenging on-pitch decisions this season, especially for penalties.

At least VAR was doing its job, for once, at Fulham, directing referee Matt Donohue to take a second look, after he'd initially awarded the home side a penalty when Tom Cairney went down in the act of shooting; Castellanos had indeed been innocently in the way of the Fulham player's kick, not making any kind of challenge himself. These days, alas, the VAR team almost never has the courage to question an onfield penalty decision like this.

Tight/dubious offsides: Ollie Watkins appeared to have given Villa the lead for a second time when he supplied an emphatic finish to a lightning quick breakaway - but SAOT ultimately determined that his shoulder had been inifinitesimally closer to the goal-line than the last defender's. This was another instance where there are questions about the reliability of the timing of the SAOT freezeframe, because to the naked eye he had looked well onside - and this was a call that might have turned the course of the match.

Ismaila Sarr might have had a hattrick on Thursday night against Spurs: his opening effort, a solo  breakaway, was eventually ruled out for offside by one of those deeply unconvincing SAOT graphics; everyone in the stadium thought he had looked 'on' by about a foot, but the computerised decision system apparently reckoned his forehead had been 'off'. (But, dear me, that guy should not be on penalties.)

Goals wrongly allowed/disallowed:  

Surprise omissions/early substitutions/injuries:  Robin Roefs has strained a thigh-muscle doing the splits to make a save at the weekend, so was a late omission against Leeds on Tuesday, replaced by his new understudy, January signing Melker Ellborg. Granit Xhaka, only recently back from injury, was also rested - though he came on for the last 35 minutes.

Saliba was suffering with a knock, so Mosquera started in his place; while Brighton were without their defensive stalwart Lewis Dunk.

Liam Rosenior made multiple changes to his Chelsea line-up for the visit to Villa, the most momentous being his dropping of Sanchez in goal (the third most popular pick - after the stupidly over-popular Raya and Dubravka - with an ownership of nearly 14%) in favour of Jorgensen, but Reece James was also switched into midfield, making room for Gusto to get a start at right-back, Fofana came back into defence in place of Tosin, and Garnacho, who had seemed to have fallen from favour, came back in on the wing in place of the suspended Neto.

Eddie Howe was also moved to drop a keeper in apparently dodgy form, replacing Pope (only 4.5% owned in FPL; though that's not an insignificant figure) with Ramsdale for the visit of Manchester United. Woltemade was also missing, the latest victim of a virus doing the rounds. And Carrick replaced Dalot with Mazraoui - presumably just a 'rest'.

Harry Wilson hadn't recovered from the sore ankle he suffered at the weekend, so young Josh King got another chance.

Near misses:  Marcus Tavernier might have had a hattrick against an out-of-sorts Brentford: first, he put a curler just wide early on, then rounded off an incisive break by beating Kelleher with a great sliding effort only to see it hit the foot of the post (and might have won a penalty in this moment too), and late on unleashed an absolute scorcher that smashed against the near-post. Later still, his super cut-back was drilled just wide of the far-post by Kroupi... Nothing broke for the poor guy in that game.

Idrissa Gana Gueye nearly added a late third goal against Burnley on Tuesday night when his fierce dipper from the edge of the box smashed against the crossbar.

City really should have beaten Forest much more comfortably: Semenyo unlieashed a fierce shot inches outside the near-post in the opening minutes, and Haaland had a good deflected effort loop on to the roof of the net early in the second-half.

Kieran Trippier saw his floated cross beat everyone - and come back off the inside of the far post.

Big misses/big saves: Sunderland's stand-in keeper Ellborg made a very good save at the foot of his post from Stach's low free-kick.

Jose Sa probably produced the save of the gameweek on Tuesday night, Rio Ngumoha's cross-shot on to the post; athough Jordan Pickford was running him very close with another worldie, an amazing reaction save in the dying seconds to thwart Lyle Foster's close-range flicked volley.

Ryan Yates got a free header at the near-post from a late corner that could have nicked all three points for Forest against title-chasers City, but he blasted the chance wide of the post.

Raya made a rare boo-boo, passing the ball straight to a Brighton player from the edge of his box after just two minutes; fortunately for him, Gabriel quickly dropped in behind him and was fairly comfortably able to head clear Baleba's feeble attempt at a lob.

The Villa v Chelsea game might well have been even more high-scoring: Martinez managed to block a point-black header from Joao Pedro early on, and short afterwards Jorgensen made a great one-armed stop to deny a fierce drive from Watkins. Garnacho had a great late chance to grab a fifth goal for Chelsea, after being set up by Palmer and Cucurella, but shot tamely at Martinez's legs. And then Tammy Abraham looped a header against the crossbar in the dying moments.

Anthony Gordon snuck in round the back at a corner routine to get an unmarked chance at the far post, but skewed his effort wide. A little later, Aaron Ramsdale pulled off a very good flying save from a fierce dipping shot from Zirkzee that was bound for the top right corner.

Hermansen had to make a good save with his leg from a Josh King effort.

Outstanding goals: Elliot Anderson, of all people, coming up with a pinger from well outside the box.... to hand the title to Arsenal (possibly...)!

Will Osula, only on the field from the 86th minute, nicked a late winner for Newcastle with a delicious curler from just inside the box. Amazingly, he is owned by around 25,000 FPL managers; but I rather doubt if any of them started him.

Outstanding performances: Joao Pedro and Marcus Tavernier both had stupdendous games. But Tavernier, in fact, played the better of the two - yet came away with only 2 FPL points, against Pedro's 19!! Ain't no justice in this game of ours....

Big mistakes: Habib Diarra took an absolutely dreadful penalty for Sunderland on Tuesday night - but Karl Darlow made an even worse mess of saving it. Sometimes, it's just your night....

A dreadful blunder from Leno gifted Summerville the chance to claim all three points late in the game. Alisson had likewise handed Wolves their late win the night before.

Bad luck/good luck: Andre's last-gasp winner against Liverpool needed a huge deflection off a defender to wrong-foot Alisson (and it might be doubted if his initial shot was even on-target, although he has been credited with the goal).

Saka's shot from wide on the right shouldn't have been a problem, but it took a wicked glancing deflection off Baleba; Verbruggen was still behind it, but off-balance - and couldn't stop bouncing into the goal off his heel.

Ezri Konsa nearly put a mishit clearance into his own net in the first-half, and was hugely relieved to see his shinner loop millimentres over the bar. And a rare moment of unselfishness from Garnacho - squaring the ball to Joao Pedro to complete his hattrick, when he might have shot himself - had rather a big impact on the FPL points from the game; if he'd finished the move himself, Palmer would have got the assist, and quite possibly the third bonus point also.... On such small decisions and tiny margins do all our FPL fortunes hang!

FPL weirdness: The usual doubts about the counting of 'saves', 'defensive contributions', etc.... And how on earth did Marcus Tavernier, 'man of the match' by a mile, not even get close to earning 1 bonus ponit??? Something going wrong 'round here....

Unexpected results: Bournemouth v Brentford really should not have ended goalless. Liverpool getting beaten by bottom-of-the-table Wolves might look like a bit of a surprise, but given how ropey their form has been recently, it's not that much of a shock. City being held to a draw by Forest, Chelsea winning so comfortably away from home, 10-man Newcastle squeaking a win against United to end Michael Carrick's winning streak, and Arsenal sneaking another narrow win in a game in which they were largely outplayed.... were all rather more surprising.

Apart from Ellborg (who??) and Andre, the FPL 'Team of the Week' actually looks pretty reasonable, for once. And, after the utter shit-show of the weekend's refereeing, the decision-making has been mostly pretty good - although there have still been a couple of highly dubious offside calls, and a few missed penalty awards,... and a fair old welter of other 'lucky' incidents of various kinds, and a lot of injury absences/rest rotations. The global average is an almost-healthy 54 points (a big jump up after the final game; probably not because a lot of people were on Spurs or Palace players, but because almost everyone had at least one or two auto-subs promoted into their starting line-ups at the end of the gameweek!).  Overall, this one's ended up looking a fairly average 7 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'.