Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 23

A few unpleasant selection surprises again this week; although, at least, not too many new injury disasters to add to our FPL troubles.

These weekly 'summaries' have been getting a bit too involved - and excessively time-consuming for me! - so I'm going to start trying to keep them briefer from here on. Let's see how that goes... [Um, not well, it would seem. I just can't help myself!!]

Perhaps I'm just unreasonably cranky this week for some reason, but I found the West Ham v Sunderland game unwatchably dull. West Ham, to be fair, are starting to show a marked improvement, but Sunderland - without the talismanic Xhaka, suddenly revealed to be suffering from an ankle injury - were miles below their best. Regis Le Bris made three changes at half-time, and the visitors looked much better after that, and the final result did rather flatter the home side. West Ham's opener was a good goal exploiting some poor defending, but the second was a fairly soft penalty award and Bowen slipped on his standing foot and was lucky not to scuff his effort wide or get a double-hit; while the third was a thirty-yard screamer out of nowhere from Matheus Fernandes just before half-time (and he almost did it again in the second-half when a similar effort smashed against the underside of the bar). There was really little incident of note apart from this, and for the most part it felt very much like a bad Championship game (I confess I gave up on watching it live half-way through the first-half!).

Burnley are continuing to show improvement, and came agonisingly close to their first win in months against Spurs - only to see a powerful diving header from Romero save a draw in the dying seconds of regulation time. Spurs showed flashes of promise with the energetic Solanke back leading their attack (Dubravka supposedly made 9 saves in the match, and was Burnley's 'best player' according to the BPS; but not many of them were significant enough to make it into the BBC highlights!), but their back line was pretty shambolic. I'd have a bet on Thomas Frank now losing the job this week. (The upcoming Champions League game against Frankfurt is really a bit of an irrelevance, since no-one expects Spurs to be able to win a knockout tie in that competition, whether it's the play-off or the Round of 16.)

Fulham v Brighton was a tight and thoroughly entertaining game (my favourite of the day: well, second only to Bournemouth v Liverpool - it can only have been scheduled last on on 'Match of the Day' because they are two such 'unfashionable' clubs), and included a pair of absolute bangers from Yasin Ayari and Harry Wilson. Even Marco Silva admitted that a draw would have been a fair result here. It was very harsh on Brighton that Wilson's free-kick would seal a late win, so soon after Danny Welbeck's excellent goal on the break had been ruled out by VAR for another of these ridiculously tight offsides (a matter of a fraction of an inch, entirely dependent on where you choose to draw 'the line' on his upper arm - and of course on whether you trust SAOT to be able to correctly determine the 'decisive moment' of ball release to within hundredths of a second).

Doku was injured (which allowed both Cherki and Semenyo to play; I doubt that will often happen), and Pep decided to rest the recently weary-looking Haaland and Foden (only bringing them on for the last 20 minutes), which gave Marmoush his first start since early in the season - an opportunity which he enthusiastically made the most of. New boys Guehi and Semenyo (who scored one, and might have had a second with a thunderous left-foot shot which clipped the far top corner of the woodwork) both had excellent games too. Wolves had a shakey start, but gradually toughened up and showed a lot of resilience and defiance after falling behind so early on; in the second-half, they even had a few chances to score themselves. Khusanov clumsily ran through the back of Mané on the edge of the box: it probably was just outside the area, but we should have had the reassurance of a VAR check to confirm exactly where the contact had occurred - and we didn't get that. City had a much stronger penalty claim when the ball caught Mosquera's outstretched arm just inside the elbow; but debutant referee Farai Hallam bravely stuck by his original decision not to make the award, rather than accepting the implicit suggestion from VAR that it had been a culpable handball - it's a pity we don't see that more often (it is shameful that he's been dropped from the roster for next gameweek, though; this looks very much like 'punishment' for going against his colleagues - even if it's not, that's what it looks like). Absolutely the right decision from the commonsense point of view: Marmoush had flicked the ball at him from very close range, perhaps deliberately looking for such a contact on the arm. The ball wasn't bound for the goal, or even for another City player; and the defender knew absolutely nothing about it. It is absurd to be giving handball penalties for incidents like this; and yet we do see them given almost every week! However, the ref's rationale that the arm had been "in a natural position" was possibly a bit dubious, as the arm was well out from the side (arguably for balance, as he lunged to attempt to block a cross; but such circumstances are usually - though possibly wrongly - judged 'handball' these days). But that whole section of the rule is a nonsense which regularly leads to confusion and inconsistency: unless the ball is goal-bound - in which case, I think, any contact on the arm should be 'strict liability', though 'position of the arm' would determine degree of culpability for a possible red card - the position of the arm should be irrelevant.  The major oddity of this match was that Donnarumma, despite being credited with only one save, got the second highest BPS total - WTF???

Ekitike was strangely left on the bench, and only came on for the last half-hour or so (Slot continues to  infuriate FPL managers by making changes just before the hour: this time Frimpong and Macallister were pulled off for Ekitike and Jones in the 58th minute, while Kerkez was switched with Roberston at half-time). Jimenez had looked well offside for Bournemouth's second goal, but SAOT eventually pronounced that he had been 'on' by the thickness of his shirtsleeve. (I'm happy enough to see a good goal stand, but... we really don't want to see decisions being made on such absurdly slim margins. And the frequent wide discrepancies between TV freeze-frames and the SAOT computer graphics of these incidents undermine viewer confidence in the system.) Liverpool are perhaps starting to pay a bit more attention to set-pieces, as they got back into the game with a near-post header by Van Dijk from a corner - although the ball looked as if it had come off Evanilson's shoulder and should have been an own-goal. Wirtz had a good cross-shot tipped just beyond the post by Petrovic near the end; and Liverpool are peeved that the ref wrongly awarded a goal-kick. But Bournemouth were coming at their visitors in waves for the last 15 minutes or so, and had been the better team in the match on balance overall - so their last-gasp winner from Adli in a goalmouth scramble felt deserved. Slot's position is looking more and more under threat; although my feeling is that he'll still be safe until the end of the season.

Forest finally seem to be recovering something of the composure behind the ball and the threat going forward which gave them such a good season last year; but they were helped in this game by a very flat performance from home side, Brentford. The opening strike should be a leading 'Goal of the Month' contender (although we've seen an awful lot of more eye-catching long-range bangers this month...), a neat move down the right covering the length of the pitch, mainly orchestrated by full-back Ola Aina, culminating in a sharp turn and half-volley by Igor Jesus.

Cole Palmer was another player whose injury problem had been played down during the week, but proved to be not even fit for the bench. Chelsea didn't do too badly without him, although Palace were very lacklustre opposition for them here, even playing in front of their home crowd. There was another odd VAR fiasco, where Darren England was eventually prompted to give a penalty against poor Jaydee Canvot by the backroom team (at least it was Chelsea's third goal, so can't be said to have had any impact on the match outcome). I really don't know what the Handball Law says any more; we seem to be discovering new bizarre wrinkles to it every week. The referee stressed that he considered the contact to be 'accidental' (that in itself is not a term that I've heard used in reference to a handball decsion.... for years), and gave that as his reason for only giving the Palace defender a yellow card (if there was 'no fault', why should there be any card at all???). However, because the ball had been goalbound, any contact on his 'arm' was deemed a strict liability offence requiring the award of a penalty. But it looked to me as if the ball hit him very high on the upper-arm, pretty much on the shoulder - which would have been an allowable contact even under the older version of the regulation, before the recent extension of the 'sleeve-line' to some nebulous point not quite half-way down the upper arm! Worst of all, the VAR playback - which the poor ref had to look at multiple times to try to get an idea of what had happened - initially only showed the worst possible view of the incident, where you really couldn't see the ball striking the defender's arm at all. Eventually, two further views were offered - which still didn't provide any very clear sight of the crucial moment of contact. We'd seen the incident from in front, from behind, and from Canvot's left side; but since it was his right arm in question, and since he'd started pulling it away from ball (and behind his body, not away from his side; he was obviously doing his best to get it out of the way of the ball) while simultaneously twisting his body in the same direction as the arm - in all of these views, his body blocked a view of the ball hitting his arm. But.... later on TV, we were shown a view of the incident from Canvot's right - where you could very clearly see that the ball had hit him up by the shoulder; WHY was this view not used for VAR???  We're seeing this kind of incompetence every week, and it undermines the whole system. And there was even more woe for Palace near the end as their crucial midfielder Adam Wharton get himself sent off for two slightly rash challenges within five minutes. At least they bundled in an injury-time consolation goal from a goalmouth scramble, but it was a pretty wretched day for Glasner's team.

Newcastle produced an uncharacteristically lifeless home performance against Villa, and were particularly flakey at times in defence - absolutely awful in allowing Watkins to ghost in at the far post for the second goal. Joelinton was perhaps a tad lucky not to receive a first-half red card for stamping on Onana's leg with an over-eager lunge of a challenge. Bruno Guimaraes, whose ankle 'knock' had initially been played down by Eddie Howe as seeming fairly trivial, but is apparently more serious, and he was sat up in the stands with his family for this one; this could be a major worry for Newcastle, as they've never managed to win a league game without him, since his arrival. Yet another banger from outside the box in this one, this time from Emi Buendia. And one absolutely outstanding save by Emi Martinez from a Miley header. And - remarkably - almost no sign of any dodgy refereeing at all!

Resurgent Manchester United finally managed to upset Arsenal's stately procession towards an increasingly inevitable-looking title, with a well-deserved win at The Emirates. It was a thrilling and open game, but the home side once again laboured to create any decent chances from open play, and looked very much second-best in almost every aspect of the game. I was disappointed that my boy Timber apparently didn't get his toe-end on Odegaard's mishit shot for the first goal (the Thai commentators I was stuck with evidently thought he had, saying his name over and over again with much delight; and none of the TV pictures seemed all that decisive that it was actually Lisandro Martinez's heel that had got the final deflection towards the goal). There were two other mild moments of controversy: Zubimendi - but, perhaps tellingly, absolutely no-one else - protested that Dorgu had controlled the ball with his left arm just before unleashing his thunderbolt from outside the box to take the lead 2-1; it looked to me as if the ball had got a trivial, non-consequential brush on the back of his arm at the same time it hit his midriff or hip; but VAR rather strangely, and worryingly, pronounced that it only found in the attacker's favour because the video evidence on this was "inconclusive" (we've seen a lot of incidents recently where the VAR team only seemed to be able to review a limited number of TV angles - and, conspicuously, not the best one that actually showed what happened!). Later, Harry Maguire deflected a low shot with his hand, but he had slipped and fallen as he lunged into an attempted block, so was only putting his hand out to the ground to break his fall; on that basis, he was certainly non-culpable, but... the shot looked goal-bound, and surely 'culpability' is not in issue there: if he prevented a likely goal, surely that should have been a penalty? Another banger of a goal from Cunha late on to clinch the points, Mbeumo's gift of an equaliser when Zubimendi played a sloppy square ball to him 30 yards out - and Arteta's decision to start with Jesus again instead of Gyokeres (although no-one really should have either of those players for FPL!) were the other rather unexpected, 'lucky' incidents in this one.

The Everton v Leeds game on Monday night was very much a 'game of two halves', with the visitors absolutely bossing the first period - they might well have taken an unassailable lead if Calvert-Lewin had been a little sharper in front of goal. Moyes, however, got his hairdryer out at half-time, and rushed just-back-from-injury Branthwaite and Dewsbury-Hall on for the second-half (at the expense of youngster Harrison Armstrong and no-longer-in-favour Dwight McNeil), which suitably re-energised his team. Relentless pressure produced a deserved equaliser from Barry, and they could have gone on to win, with their just-back-from AFCON pair both going close, Ndiaye bringing a flying save out of Darlow with an improvised prod with the outside of his right boot, and Idrissa Gueye smashing a drive against the crossbar. There seem to have been no refereeing upsets in this one either (maybe things are slowly improving with the officiating??).

The FPL 'Team of the Week' this time is actually one of the least strange we've had this season: well, none of the very 'big names' are on it, but at least everyone is a good enough player to warrant some level of FPL ownership, there's not the rash of 'complete unknowns' we've been seeing most weeks. However, it is looking likely to be yet another miserably low gameweek average, with the total being a dreadful 44 points. Apart from the 'shock' omissions of Haaland, Foden, Ekitike, and Xhaka (and the first two of these might have been reasonably anticipated; while the first three were apparently all 'leaked' in advance on social media - though only a matter of minutes before the FPL deadline!), there weren't too many selection upsets on Saturday; Sunday, though, also saw somewhat unexpected omissions (even from the bench!) for Palmer and Guimaraes. At least there have been few refereeing cock-ups (only a bad penalty award against Palace, a possibly wrongly attributed goal for Van Dijk, and a couple of very tight, rather dubious offside decisions: one goal allowed, one disallowed - both probably wrongly). West Ham's and Bournemouth's wins were rather unexpected, and Fulham's rather lucky; but the games have gone mostly as might have been expected. This is perhaps one of the least freaky gameweeks we've had this season, only a 4 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'.

Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 22

As I said last week, the great, inevitable winter downturn in form continues on and on through the shitty weather and cramped fixture schedules of January and February - and now even has an added sprinkle of further uncertainty and confusion from the mid-season transfer window.  In a season of almost nothing but awful gameweeks, this one looks like it could be competing to become the worst of the worst. Almost everyone looks leggy and jaded, form is all over the place. Fulham losing to Leeds and Spurs losing (at home!) to West Ham were perhaps not entirely surprising, but United winning so comfortably against a lacklustre City was, and Sunderland beating Palace and Arsenal and Liverpool being held to draws by bottom-of-the-table sides were even more so.

A few surprises in Michael Carrick's first selection, with Dorgu being retained as an attacking player (though back on the left, rather than the right - where he had unexpectedly thrived in a couple of experimental run-outs under the the last days of Ruben Amorim), Shaw and Maguire coming back into the back-four (at the expense of Leny Yoro) alongside Martinez and Dalot, Sesko being dropped at centre-forward in favour of just-back-from AFCON Mbeumo, and Mainoo slotting in alongside Casemiro in the midfield engine-room (that one not so surprising - although he looked just a little ring-rusty, after being frozen out of competitive football for so long, his swift turns away from a pressing opponent were as useful as ever). Pep dropped Cherki for Semenyo, but the new boy struggled to make any impact in this one; and Matheus Nunes had apparently gone down with 'flu, so Rico Lewis had to deputise for him at right-back. It was one of the most entertaining lunchtime games we've seen this season, although it threatened for quite a while to be a thrilling nil-nil: both teams playing some slick football and progressing the ball quickly, but struggling to find the necessary incisveness when they got near the opposition penalty box. United, however, were having all the most dangerous moments: Donnarumma came out like a thunderbolt to clear Alleyne's weak back-pass off the toes of Dorgu and Mbeumo early on, made good saves from Dorgu and Diallo (and another save from Diallo at the beginning of the second-half, followed by a double-block on Casemiro's attempt to follow up), saw Maguire smash a close-range header from a corner against the cross-bar just a few minutes in, and was relieved that quick breaks in behind from Amad Diallo and Bruno Fernandes  - who were both able to get round him rather easily and coolly slot home into an empty net - were shown a late flag for tight-ish offsides (Amad's looked like a matter of only 6 or 8 inches, Bruno's more like 18 inches or so); another moment of panic was uncannily redeemed by super-fast reactions from Khusanov to steal the ball off Mbeumo when a misplaced pass on the edge of the City box had gifted the ball to Bruno who was able to square it to his striker in acres of space. Pep made the harsh decision to sub young Max Alleyne at half-time (shunting Ake into central defence from the left and restoring Nico O'Reilly to the left-back slot), but that did nothing to stop the rot, and it began to seem inevitable that United would eventually find a breakthrough - as they eventually did with a lightning three-man counter-attack confidently finished by Mbeumo. Cunha, brought on to replace Mbeumo after 70 minutes, also looked lively in his cameo, and set up Dorgu for a second after just a few minutes on the pitch; and shortly afterwards another fast break from Diallo - on the left this time! - ended with him lashing a shot against the post. Late substitute Mason Mount appeared to have made the margin even more decisive in added-on time, but a long VAR check eventually decided that Cunha had been very narrowly offside when running on to the initial through-ball. City, somehow, were misfiring in almost every single aspect of their game here (well, apart from the goalkeeping), and were really pretty fortunate not to go down 5-0. United fans are justifiably ecstatic - though they'll probably now be questioning even more why they didn't ditch Amorim last summer. City fans might perhaps console themselves with the 'what if' that the game might have turned out very differently if Dalot had been sent off, as he really should have been in the opening minutes, when his clumsy follow-through on Doku raked studs down the side of the winger's knee with sufficient force to bend his leg dangerously inwards - very lucky to inflict only a painful bruise rather than season-ending ligament damage.

Chelsea were able to field their 'best 11' for the first time in a while (although Palmer still looked somewhat short of full match fitness, and was completely drained by the end), but still their ultimately quite comfortable win was a little bit of a surprise, given the strength of Brentford's recent form. Somehow, though, the visitors didn't bring their best game this time, and despite having a slight majority of possession, they couldn't do much with it; all their best chances fell to Schade rather than Thiago, and the German just hadn't brought his scoring boots with him. Chelsea should also have had a penalty early on, when a defender clipped Joao Pedro's heel in the box; not a very strong contact, but completely clearcut - Pedro's rather theatrical dive probably worked against him (well, that and the fact that Chelsea just never get penalties any more!.... although they did in fact get a rare award here in the second-half, comfortably despatched by Palmer). At least VAR was doing its job for once, correcting the linesman's rash decision that Joao Pedro had been offside for his well-taken opening goal (it was tight, but he was pretty clearly onside, even to the naked eye). Chelsea weren't really all that good, but they were good enough to prevail over a misfiring opponent.

Liverpool v Burnley started out a fairly drab and scrappy affair, but slowly warmed up. Gakpo earned possibly the softest penalty of the year so far by walking into a Burnley defender and falling over. Szoboszlai, now claiming the penalty duties (why is not Ekitike??), was perhaps so embarrassed by this decision that he smashed his spot-kick against the cross-bar. Liverpool started to get on top after this, and Florian Wirtz ended up having his best league game for the club yet - smashing in a goal very emphatically from 15 yards out, having another decent effort soon after, and playing in Gakpo for an attempt that had to be cleared off the line by Humphreys. Burnley, though, kept plugging away, and their excellent winner from winger Marcus Edwards felt well-deserved. Indeed, they might have snuck away with a win if Konate's latest lapse had proven costly: shortly before the Burnley goal, the increasingly clumsy-looking defender had prodded a low cross from Edwards powerfully towards his own goal - demanding an outstanding save from Alisson to preserve the tenuous lead. Liverpool piled on the pressure over the last 20 or 30 minutes, but couldn't break their obstinate visitors down - although Ekitike had an apparent late winner rightly ruled out for offside (and a possible handball too), and then somehow failed to get a touch when unmarked at the far post as Curtis Jones's fiercely driven square ball (mishit shot??) whizzed past the end of his toe.

Lucas Perri was replaced in goal by Karl Darlow, after a few shakey performances of late. Daniel Farke might have wished he could replace his whole team, as this game against Fulham was a dour, lifeless encounter that had 0-0 written all over it from the outset. The recently on-fire Brenden Aaronson and Harry Wilson had the only two decent half-chances in the match, but both failed to get their efforts on target. A late breakaway by Ampadu down the right set up substitute Nmecha for a superb goal just as we entered stoppage time at the end of the game; and the German forward nearly made it a brace a minute or two later, when his fierce shot after a solo break down the left brought an excellent save out of Leno.

Mavropanos, who looked as if he had suffered a serious head and/or neck injury in the FA Cup last week, was fit to start after all, and produced a very good looping header that forced Vicario into a flying save in the first-half. Spurs suffered another injury blow when Ben Davies had to leave the pitch with a serious leg injury after just a quarter of an hour, while new signing Conor Gallagher made an immediate start, but failed to have much of an impact - in a game which West Ham were able to dominate for long periods. The home side came out with much more cohesion and purpose in the second-half, and were able to get back on terms through a powerful Romero header. Indeed, they looked like they should have been able to take charge of the game, with Areola being forced into saves from powerful efforts by Bissouma and Simons; and they feel they might have had a penalty when the ball touched Scarles's hand (I don't know how the no-penalty decision was justified under the current labyrinthine guidelines, but it seemed fair enough to me: the ball barely brushed his fingertips, and he knew absolutely nothing about it as the ball was played on to him by the Spurs player from only inches away). But flapper Vicario yet again allowed himself to get boxed in at a corner, and substitute Callum Wilson was able to lash home an injury-time winner. Another disastrous home result had the fans baying for Thomas Frank's dismissal at the final whistle, and I fear his position at the club has surely now become untenable.

Sunderland were re-energized by the return of Sadiki and Reinildo from AFCON, but visiting Palace still had the better of first phase of the game - not notably discombobulated by the sudden loss of Marc Guehi or by Oliver Glasner's shock announcement on Friday of his intention to leave the club at the end of the season. Unfortunately, Yeremy Pino's neat opening goal was almost immediately cancelled out by Le Fee, and in the second-half the home team increasingly asserted themselves until another goal became inevitable; indeed, they really should have had a penalty when Romaine Mundle was barged in the back by Justin Devenny. Adam Wharton might have been a bit lucky to escape a second yellow card as well. Unfortunately, the game itself was soon overshadowed by Glasner's glum comments afterwards, complaining at feeling his team has been "abandoned" by the club's ownership (he seemed especially aggrieved at the failure to at least hang on to Eze and Guehi a bit longer, to try to delay their transfers to squeeze one or two more games out of them, but that's probably not a realistic demand; his bigger gripe is surely the failure to promptly bring in adequate replacements, which left him with a threadbare bench this week). This surely signals that he'll depart the club this week rather than at season's end - an unfortunate loss to the English game (unless he perhaps takes the Spurs job??).

Accumulating defensive injuries at Arsenal have finally given Ben White a route back to the starting place that was his right a couple of seasons ago - but for how long? Arteta also brought in Martinelli (who put the only decent chance of the first-half agonisingly just an inch or two wide of the far post) for the recently prolific Trossard (but swapped them back at half-time, which can't be likely to boost the confidence of either player), and - a rare occurrence indeed! - rested Saka (no doubt to the chagrin of many FPL managers, quite a few of whom might have made him captain for this fixture) in favour of Madueke, while giving the seemingly 'out of favour' Eze a scant 10 minutes at the end. Saka and Merino, though, got on for the last half-hour or so (at the expense of Madueke and Gyokeres, denied full appearance points), and Saka produced the best effort of the game - a towering header that brought a flying fingertip save from Sels. Forest, much improved on recent lifeless performances, had the best of the game for the most part, and did a good job of frustrating their visitors - who may have been feeling a bit of extra pressure from the fact that they unexpectedly had a chance to extend their lead in the title race. A mostly rather dull and uneventful match was distinguished by the oddity of having 2 dubiously turned-down penalties: Hudson-Odoi was pulled/tripped by Timber on the edge of the area, but both the referee and the VAR team somehow concluded that the 'decisive moment' of the illegal contact had occurred a fraction of an inch short of the line (I think absolutely everyone in the stadium, including the Arsenal fans, must have thought it was a penalty!); but then the balance of injustice was perhaps restored later in the game when Aina clearly handled the ball in an attempt to keep it in play, but this was somehow excused on the 'natural position for the arm' clause (oh yes, if you're trying to keep the ball from crossing the line, you naturally move the crook of your elbow towards it!).

In a gameweek of almost entirely limp matches, Wolves v Newcastle was undoubtedly the limpest. Usually 0-0s result from sterling defensive performances, but here neither keeper earned 'saves' points, and only Mosquera earned 'defensive points' (no-one else came anywhere near). The only decent effort in the game came from Wolves's explosive teenager Mateus Mané, whose cute over-the-shoulder volley from 10 yards out unfortunately went straight down the middle into Pope's arms. Newcastle were fortunate that Trippier and Botman were fit again to plug the gaps in their defence, and Trippier might have been 'Man of the Match' - curling a free-kick into the outside of the side-netting, and putting in a sublime cross early in the game that Woltemade somehow failed to make contact with. (And he was playing through some discomfort, as Mané had accidentally stamped on his forehead early on, leaving him with a deep cut across the bridge of his nose.) Woltemade, Tonali, and Gordon were all taken off in the 65th minute: reasonable enough, since they weren't having much impact in this stalemate of a game - and at least they got their minimum FPL 'appearance points' from the outing. The main takeaway from this one is that Rob Edwards has finally got Wolves playing like a side who don't deserve to go down: they're still a long way from great, but at least they're now showing some confidence and cohesion, and are becoming tougher to beat.

Of all the slumps in form we've seen this week, Villa's was perhaps the most dramatic and alarming. They dominated possession against visitors Everton, but really weren't able to do anything much with the ball. All the best chances fell to Morgan Rogers, who managed to miss them all badly (apart from one good curled effort from distance near the end, which might have been just sneaking under the bar, until Pickford flew across his goal to tip it over). Their closest chance was actually a miscued header from Guessand which deceived Pickford and looped on to the face of the crossbar behind him. Ollie Watkins was so anonymous in this game that I had to double-check the match reports to see if he'd even been playing: absolutely zero mentions in the commentary, and just about zero touches of the ball! Villa also lost the inspirational John McGinn, who limped off the pitch early on with what looked like it might be a knee-cartilage problem. And in a mostly fairly glum, uneventful match where neither side created much scoring threat, they managed to give a goal away with a dreadful double error: Pau Torres's miscontrol giving the ball away just outside his own box, and then Martinez spilling Dwight McNeil's weak curled effort right at the feet of a surprised and grateful Thierno Barry. Jake O'Brien had also headed home from a short-corner routine, but Harrison Armstrong was adjudged to have been offside at the edge of the six-yard box as Garner played the ball in. (This again was a rather unsatisfying decision. The TV picture kept freezing the frame as Garner was beginning to swing his foot at the ball. At this point, Armstrong was clearly a foot or so behind the line of the defenders - but he was already stepping back towards an onside postion as the defenders were quckly dropping deeper, so their relative positions changed dramatically within one or two tenths of a second. And it really wasn't clear when Garner's foot had made contact with the ball... or when that contact finished, as he was playing a gentle scooped cross with a fairly prolonged contact on the ball: this was actually a very, very tight decision, and a few frames of the video playback could have made all the difference. It would have been reassuring to see an official SAOT graphic to justify this call - since this technology can supposedly identify the 'exact' moment a pass is struck via a sensor inside the ball - but none was forthcoming.) And the visitors had come close to nicking what might have been one of the three or four fastest goals in Premier League history when a long-ball from Pickford reached baby-faced midfielder Merlin Röhl who cracked off an early shot from the edge of the box; he didn't make particularly good contact with it, but it caught Martinez by surprise and eluded his dive, rolling against the foot of the far post... just under 11 seconds from the opening whistle. (It would have been nice to see that go in, just for the little bit of history.)

Monday night's south coast derby between Brighton and Bournemouth might have been the most entertaining fixture of the gameweek - although that's not saying much. Brighton had 'rested' three of their most crucial players, Baleba, Rutter, and Minteh, and although making a lively and dangerous start to the game, soon allowed their visitors to start taking control. Adli's fall in the penalty area at the end of a swift break led by Tavernier was initially judged a 'dive' by Paul Tierney, but for once VAR proved useful in showing that Verbruggen had indeed touched his feet as he grasped vainly for the ball. It's interesting to see that after Semenyo's departure and Kluivert's injury, Tavernier is now on penalty-taking duties, and looking very confident in the role. Bournemouth were then all over the home side for the last part of the first-half, with Evanilson beating Verbruggen with a neat dink but seeing the ball come back off the inside of the far post, and then putting a header inches wide. Brighton reasserted control in the second-half, however, and began looking particularly dangerous after the belated introduction of their three star performers in the 66th minute. However, a resolute Bournemouth managed to defy them until teen substitute Kostoulous came up with a bicycle-kick goal at the beginning of added-on time. A good game - apparently unmarred by refereeing cock-ups (almost unique this gameweek).

Yes, once again it's a super-weird FPL 'Team of the Week'; of the preliminary line-up after Saturday's matches only Bruno Fernandes, Dorgu and Chalobah had much of an FPL ownership (and the latter two not that much); the only subsequent change was that Chalobah got bumped out by Thiaw. There was a dearth of goals (the 10th lowest-scoring gameweek in Premier League history!), almost all of the most fancied FPL players came up blank, and pretty nearly all of the results confounded expectations. In a season of miserably low gameweek averages this week's figure of 40 points is almost a new nadir! Also, there were 5 penalties probably wrongly not given (2 in the same game!), and 1 wrongly given (and missed!), a couple of red cards missed, a slightly dubious disallowed 'offside' goal for Everton, and a fair old welter of near-misses and efforts against the woodwork; also some unwelcome selection surprises, and generally sub-standard performances from almost everyone - this is again looking like about an 8 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter' for this gameweek.

Dilemmas of the Week - GW 22 (25/26)

 

We've had a little break from Premier League action for the past 9 days; but of course, everyone was involved in FA Cup ties last weekend, and 4 clubs also had the first leg of their League Cup Semi-Finals this week. So, there have been some further injuries since the last EPL Gameweek, on top of the heavy crop we suffered in that first batch of 2026 games. Also, the January transfer window is starting to cause a little bit of turmoil - with Manchester City looking set to poach all the players that their rivals most covet, and that the better mid-table sides most rely on.

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

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

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

So, what are the conundrums we face ahead of Gameweek 22?

Does anybody need to be moved out because of injury?

Arsenal lost another defender when Piero Hincapie limped out of the GW21 clash with Liverpool with some kind of leg-muscle injury. And as there's still no sign of Calafiori being able to return, this presumably means that Myles Lewis-Skelly or Ben White (with Timber switching to the left) could finally get a run of starts. When we see which of those options Arteta goes with, this might be a tempting cheaper route into extra representation from the Arsenal defence.

Villa's midfield lynchpin Boubacar Kamara had to come off in the FA Cup game against Leeds with a knee injury - which might keep him out for a while. And Emi Martinez came off during the last league game against Palace; apparently it's a calf-strain this time, rather than another instance of his recurring back problem - but he's still a doubt for this weekend.

Justin Kluivert has had to have a knee surgery which has probably put an end to his season. And back-up striker Enes Unal has picked up a leg-muscle problem which will sideline him for at least the rest of this month.

Jordan Henderson rolled his ankle badly in the FA Cup game against Sheffield Wednesday, but his subsequent withdrawal in that game was said to be just 'precautionary', and Keith Andrews is hopeful that he'll be OK for the visit to Chelsea.

Jamie Gittens and Liam Delap missed Wednesday's League Cup game against Arsenal because of an illness (though, for my money, Delap hasn't been looking good enough lately to earn a start ahead of Guiu, let alone Joao Pedro). And Malo Gusto and Reece James missed both this week's Cup games because of training knocks - but are expected/hoped to be OK again for this weekend. Cole Palmer also missed these last two games with a thigh muscle problem, although Liam Rosenior hopes it was fairly minor and won't keep him out any longer.

Everton's Tim Iroegbunam missed last week's FA Cup tie against Sunderland with a knock.

Conor Bradley collapsed near the end of the last league game against Arsenal with a serious knee injury; apparently he has not suffered ACL damage, but has needed surgery - and might miss the remainder of the season.

Fabian Schar suffered a serious ankle injury in the last league game against Leeds, and has needed surgery; he'll be lucky to return for the last few games of the season. Tino Livramento then suffered another hamstring strain in the FA Cup against Bournemouth and seems likely to be out for some time. It seems that Sven Botman may be rushed back into service alongside Thiaw in central defence, and Lewis Miley will have to continue to serve as a makeshift right-back: this is not promising for Newcastle's prospects in a fairly testing run of fixtures over the next month or so.

Forest goalkeeper John Victor somehow injured his knee (in the act of conceding their third goal against Villa in GW21, rashly charging 30 yards up the pitch to leave his goal empty); it's not clear what the problem is, but it's taking some time to resolve - so Matz Sels seems likely to step back between the posts (probably a more reliable choice anyway!).

Bertrand Traore returned early from AFCON after picking up an unspecified injury; so, he's back with Sunderland now, but it's unclear if he'll be available to play this week.

Lucas Bergvall and Rodrigo Betancur both had to come off with leg-muscle injuries in the GW21 loss to Bournemouth, while Richarlison pulled a hamstring in last weekend's FA Cup defeat by Villa.

Konstantinos Mavropanos had to be stretchered off in the FA Cup tie against QPR after getting caught in the back of the head by an opponent's knee as he was falling to the ground. It was at first feared that he might have suffered a serious neck injury; that seems not to be the case, fortunately, but it is likely he also suffered a heavy concussion, so will surely miss a week or two for that alone.

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

Michael Keane is serving a three-match ban for 'violent conduct' (although he's got the first one out of the way already in last week's FA Cup game), after his silly tug on Tolu Arokodare's braids. Fortunately, Nathan Patterson is ready to come back in at right-back, so Jake O'Brien can probably be slotted into central defence alongside Tarkowski - but Everton are stretched a bit thin at the back, with Coleman and Branthwaite still unavailable.

Manchester United's teenage winger Shea Lacey has a one-match ban after picking up two yellow cards in quick succession in the FA Cup tie against Brighton.

Oleks Zinchenko is on loan from Arsenal, so can't represent Forest against his parent club this week.

Oliver Glasner has said that Marc Guehi will not play for Palace this weekend, as a transfer away is being finalised. (Looks like City have landed him.)  Presumably, Jaydee Canvot - or perhaps Jefferson Lerma, who has played a few times on the right of the back-three - will step into his slot. But Palace too are looking very stretched in defence now.

Did anyone give other cause to consider dropping them?

Antoine Semenyo's move to City creates much uncertainty about how often - and where - he might play for them. Rather surprisingly, he got immediate starts in the FA Cup and League Cup games this past week, and notched attacking contributions in both. But Pep made extensive rotations from his usual 'first-choice' line-up for both games; and given that Semenyo's most likely competing for a place with Cherki and Doku - who've both been outstanding this season - on either the right or left of the attack, it looks rather doubtful to me if he will be able to rely on regular starts.

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

Well, I did a little 'Picks of the Week' post yesterday on some players who've looked really good recently (but are still surprisingly low-owned in FPL): Brenden Aaronson, James Garner, Mateus Mané, and Harvey Barnes.

BEST OF LUCK, EVERYONE!

Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 21

The 'holiday' mayhem continues into a cold, wet January - now with an added sprinkle of uncertainty and confusion from the opening of the mid-season transfer window. And it's another midweek gameweek, following on with very little break from the last batch of fixtures at the weekend...!

The 'early' fixture on Tuesday, West Ham v Forest, was a pretty drab affair. West Ham were somewhat improved over their recent terrible performances, and might feel a little aggrieved that the Fates were so harsh on them here: they appeared to have taken a 2-0 lead early in the second-half through Summerville's stinging half-volley from the edge of the box, but it was ruled out for a very narrow offside by someone else during the build-up. They conceded an equaliser soon afterwards, again an unlucky fluke: Dominguez's near-post flick-on from a corner was completely uncontrolled, intended merely to help the ball on towards the far post - but it fortuitously looped high into the far top corner of the goal. And then the visitors sealed the points with an extremely soft penalty (goalkeeper collides with an attacking player when trying to punch away a corner - when is that ever culpable?).

Bournemouth finally ended their long - and often very unlucky - winless run with a narrow victory over a spirited Spurs. Their visitors had taken an early lead with a fine solo effort from Tel (although his final shot from the edge of the box was not very powerful, and Petrovic was probably somewhat at fault in letting it past him), but Evanilson soon equalised with possibly the best header we've yet seen this season. A rasper from Kroupi then put them ahead, but in the second-half Spurs pinned them down in their own box for long periods, and an equaliser began to seem inevitable. Spurs were frustrated when a penalty awarded to Van de Ven, going down in the box after one of his marauding 60-yard carries, was rescinded after a pitchside review; but the wonder here was that Darren England ever bought such an elaborate dive - the Spurs man was really lucky to escape a booking for 'simulation' (although he got one anyway for arguing about the decision); presumably that was only because there had indeed been some contact with the Bournemouth defender, but clearly 'initiated' by his own leaping into him. Other good efforts - a long-range curler fizzed on to the roof of the net by Bergvall in the first-half, a corner headed against the foot of the post by Richarlison early in the second - had failed to go in, but eventually Palhinha got them their deserved equaliser with a spectacular bicycle-kick. Alas for Spurs, this roused the home side to go on the attack again in the closing 10 minutes, and Semenyo finally came up with a screamer in the final moments of added-on time. There seems to have been only one bad refereeing decision in this one, and that was corrected with the help of VAR. But it was remarkable that all of the goals were such improbable bangers (a mini 'Goal of the Month' competition in one game!): both teams had an xG of only about 1.4, but the match ended up 3-2??!

Poor Sunderland really seem to be struggling without their African contingent, especially their midfield lynchpin Sadiki. They barely mustered an attempt on goal at Brentford, and even squandered a chance to equalise from the penalty spot (Kelleher will presumably be credited with a 'save', but Le Fee chipped it tamely into his hands). Brentford really could have won by a much bigger margin, with Lewis-Potter (from a free-kick) and Schade both rattling the woodwork.

Villa were well below their best on their visit to Palace, and although it was quite a lively game, both defences ultimately came out on top. Palace had most of the chances, but couldn't convert; and the best opportunity probably came right at the end for the visitors, when Lindelof got a great header on Cash's left-footed cross, but it hit the post. Villa fans - and some FPL managers - will be alarmed that Emi Martinez, perhaps suffering from his 'back problem' again, had to be replaced at half-time by Marco Bizot.

Michael Keane popped up for a goal yet again, his third of the season; although this was a somewhat untypical one, not powering home a header from three yards out, but having a hopeful swing at a mishit shot by Iroegbunam. He nearly notched a second not too long after, heading powerfully against a post from Garner's delightful dead-ball delivery. But Wolves fought back bravely in the second-half, and their new teen sensation Mateus Mané again grabbed a superb goal to earn them a point. Everton had to weather a late storm after Keane foolishly got himself sent off for tugging on Arokodare's braids as they both jumped for a high ball in the middle of the park. And in the closing minutes, Grealish also got himself sent off for showing dissent twice in quick succession. Shortly after that, Hugo Bueno nearly claimed a winner, his 25-yard curler being brilliantly fingertipped over the bar by Pickford for the 'Save of the Week'.

Fulham failed to make the most of their one-man advantage, after Cucurella had got himself sent off early in the game for hauling back a breaking Harry Wilson just short of the penalty area; Chelsea were still on top for long spells, and unfortunate not to put away some of their chances. But the irrepressible Harry Wilson - the hottest player in the league at the moment - came through with a late winner for them (after being denied one earlier for a very harsh offside).

With Dias expected to be out for at least a month with a thigh strain and Gvardiol facing a lengthy recuperation from a broken leg, Pep opted to bring back 20-year-old Max Alleyne from loan at Watford (where he's had 15 starts, and has apparently been playing very well) to start in central defence along with the recalled Khusanov. As if that weren't disruption enough, he also chose to 'rest' not only just-back-from-injury Rodri, but also Cherki and O'Reilly, two of his best players over the last month or so. Not so surprising then, that City were so far off their usual game (although it was a lack of control in midfield more than a lack of cohesion in defence that seemed to be the problem early on), and Brighton dominated the early part of the game, forcing a few saves out of Donnarumma and a superb last-ditch challenge from Khusanov to deny Rutter. It was unfortunate for the plucky visitors that they conceded the lead - to a Haaland penalty, after carelessly giving the ball away 30 yards out on their right-flank, leading to City's only decent attack of the opening period - deep in first-half stoppage time. The second-half was more even, although Brighton still had slightly the best of it (though being lucky to survive some big scares, particularly when twice passing the ball to Bernardo Silva in their own box; the first time, shortly after the interval, he rushed his shot and slammed it against the outside of the post; the second, he unselfishly squared the ball to Haaland, who couldn't beat Verbruggen) and deservedly got an eventual equaliser through Mitoma.

Interim United coach Darren Fletcher switched to a much more sensible 4-2-3-1 line-up, with a potent-looking attacking three of Cunha, Fernandes, and Dorgu supporting Sesko, and they produced one of their best displays for a long while - with Sesko bagging a brilliant brace (very nearly a hattrick, or more). The home side, however, rose to the occasion and gave perhaps their best performance of the entire season. Burnley left-back Bashir Humphreys, making only his third start of the season, gave the home side a fortuitous lead when his cross took a huge deflection off Ayden Heaven to loop over Lammens into the goal. And shortly afterwards, the youngster preserved the lead by clearing Cunha's header out from under his crossbar. A little later though, Sesko was unjustly denied an equaliser when his goal was ruled out for a non-existent 'foul' by Martinez (Walker had fallen over under the lightest possible push in his back, scarcely even a caress...). Esteve then made an even more stunning goal-line block from Dorgu's dink over the keeper. United made a storming start to the second period, with Sesko grabbing a quickfire brace, and Fernandes firing against the post, but then Jaidon Anthony finally found his scoring boots again (remember, he notched 4 in the opening 6 games to make him a surprise FPL frontrunner, but has had a long string of blanks since then) to earn a point. In a thrilling match, 18-year-old United winger Shea Lacey, given a token run-out for the last 5 minutes or so, also cracked a superb effort against the crossbar. Overall, a draw seemed a fair result here, but this new-look United emphatically demonstrated that they are potentially a far better team than the inept Amorim has allowed them to be over the last year-and-a-bit.

Poor Malick Thiaw had some rotten luck, first falling over to give away the ball to Aaronson to nick the opening goal, and then having a penalty given against him to put the home side behind again (very harsh, this one: it was not clear where on the upper arm the ball struck him, and it was entirely outside of his control, as he was falling over and only had his arms extended to break his fall - I really don't see how this one was given); and then being withdrawn at half-time (injury, or just being spared further embarrassment/fearing that his confidence had been fatally dented??). They also lost Schar 15 minutes from the end, with what looks like it might be a bad ankle injury - so, once again, the club is getting dangerously short of fit defenders, and will probably have to look to bring in stop-gaps over the window. Despite these setbacks, Newcastle increasingly dominated the game as it went on, but they survived a big scare when James Justin beat Pope to an Aaronson cross from the left but headed against the crossbar, and then went behind again from another banger from Aaronson. But Aaronson was then penalised for a handball in the closing minutes of regular time to give the home side a lifeline (again very harsh: the ball was fired at him from such close-range that he really had no chance to get out of the way; moreover, he appeared to be just outside the box - and we never heard VAR's verdict on this issue). We then got a colossal 10 minutes of additional time indicated (apparently very largely for Leeds's time-wasting late in the game), extended yet further by an injury stoppage after the end of the regulation 90 minutes - enabling Barnes's to grab the winner in the 102nd minute! It was probably a deserved result on the overall balance of play - but very hard on Leeds, who'd come so close to a vital win.

The Arsenal v Liverpool game ended up being a tense goalless draw, as might have been expected. Arsenal imposed relentless pressure in the final third for the first 15 minutes or so, but couldn't find a breakthrough, and from there on the visitors were increasingly able to get into the game, and created more moments of real danger. The worst of these was when a hasty back-pass from Saliba found Raya charging out towards the edge of the box, such that the keeper had to make an immediate panicked clearance which went straight to Bradley, whose first-time effort from 30 yards struck the face of the crossbar. Szoboszlai also went fairly close with a long-range free-kick in the second-half. Arsenal's only major chance fell to Gabriel in the final seconds of the game, when he was first to Madueke's high corner at the far post but couldn't control his header. It's a measure of how sterile the game ultimately was that only Konate and Zubimendi earned 'defensive points', and only just barely; both sides had long spells of ultimately unproductive possession, not much to-and-fro. Liverpool, however, might feel somewhat cheated in that they had two pretty good penalty shouts ignored. In the first, Hincapie brought down Frimpong and left him in some pain: the contact didn't look that heavy, and might have been interpreted as a half-and-half 'coming together', but the Arsenal defender definitely stepped into the attacker, and happened to catch his toe just as he was lifting his foot - turning the foot sharply inwards and badly spraining the ankle. Later, Wirtz was brought down by Trossard, but again got nothing: the German probably ran into his opponent too readily, went down a little elaborately - but again, Trossard clearly stepped across him, and we see those given more often than not. Both calls might have been slightly contentious, not entirely clearcut; but to me they both looked considerably more than 50/50 in Liverpool's favour, and it really seems a travesty that they didn't get either of them. (Will these incidents stop Arsenal fans whingeing that big decisions never go their way? Of course not!)  Unhappy news at the end, when Conor Bradley collapsed on the touchline immediately after making a clearance in stoppage time, and looked as though he might have ruptured knee ligaments - let's hope not; he has been one of the few bright spots in Liverpool's thus-far tepid season. Hincapie also had to come off early in the second-half.

It's another rather weird FPL 'Team of the Week', with Thiago the only widely owned player featuring in it, and Kelleher coming out as top keeper for his not-really-a-save from Le Fee's epically bad penalty attempt. And it's yet again a miserably low global average of just 48 points - though at least this time we haven't had any such egregious misfortunes as an injury-flagged player unexpectedly starting and getting the haul of the week...! An unusually large number of goals, most of them again from somewhat unexpected sources, 3 red cards (all uncontentious, at least), an unjustly denied goal for Benjamin Sesko, bad penalty decisions against both Newcastle and Leeds in their game, a questionable one against West Ham to deny them a draw, and 2 very dubious 'no penalty' decisions for Liverpool which might have skewed the title race, plus a few very tight offsides again - it's not quite as bad as GW20, but still looking like an 8 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter' this gameweek.

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...)

Luck-o-Meter 25-26 - Gameweek 19

 

The peak month for 'randomness' draws to a close at last - although I'm not sure that January will be much better! It didn't seem a promising omen for the Tuesday batch of games - and perhaps for the gameweek as a whole - that BBC's 'Match of the Day' felt obliged to lead with the utterly dire game between West Ham and Brighton! Apart from the splendid top-of-the-table clash between Arsenal and Villa, this might well prove to be the most lacklustre gameweek of the entire year.

Newcastle were looking rather better than they have recently, possibly getting a boost in confidence from the return of Pope in goal. They could have gained more of a lead early on. However, their second goal - scrambled home in the goalmouth by Wissa for his first league strike for his new club - shouldn't have stood, as Guimaraes had clearly shoved over Laurent in front of the keeper before the ball was spilled towards his centre-forward in the middle of the six-yard box. The unfortunate Laurent put his side back in the game shortly afterwards with a great strike. A plucky Burnley fight-back had the away side's goal under siege for a while in the second-half, but their finishing just wasn't good enough. And Newcastle came back at them again at the end, with a Thiaw header being cleared off the line, and moments later Jacob Murphy, presented with an open goal, somehow scooped his effort over the bar. Newcastle eventually claimed the third goal they'd long threatened in added-on time, when a terrible mix-up on the edge of the box between Dubravka and one of his defenders gifted the ball to Guimaraes to curl the ball around them into an empty net. The big surprise/annoyance for FPL managers was that Nick Woltemade, owned by nearly 20%, was given a rest, and only came on for the last 10 minutes.

Chelsea dropped points yet again from being 2-1 up, and were perhaps fortunate to get anything from a game in which their defending from set-pieces was absolutely dreadful (Garnacho's marking in the box was so non-existent that he was withdrawn at half-time, and this has been such a consistent problem from him, I wonder if he'll now get any more starts; he may have value as an impact sub, but Neto and Gittens are obviously much superior options for almost every aspect of the game except take-ons), and in which Bournemouth had rather the better of the chances. Semenyo - widely feared to be making his farewell appearance for the club before an anticipated January transfer - was somewhat unfortunate not to get any FPL credit for for his long-throws which set up both of the goals (I really think 'pre-assists' are often more worthy of points than the official 'assists', which are often just accidental and/or uncontrolled flick-ons), and to concede a penalty for a very slight and entirely unintentional tap on Estevao's heel (not all 'contact' is culpable, and this was another of those right on the cusp, where many referees, perhaps the majority of them, would not have given it; except that Sam Barrott was here directed to take a second look by VAR, and that always prejudices referees towards reversing their original decision). Bournemouth had a much stronger shout for a penalty waved away when a high, dropping ball struck Gusto in the middle of the outside of his upper-arm; the contact was neither intentional nor consequential, but those are not the criteria these days; the ball struck him well below the shoulder, and his arm was extended a long way away from his body - 9 out of 10 incidents like that seem to be given these days. At least it was nice to see Palmer (from the penalty spot; although Petrovic had anticipated the direction of the shot correctly, and very nearly got to it) and Kluivert scoring again; but otherwise, yet another pretty drab match.

Everton's James Garner will perhaps be the most surprising inclusion in the 'Team of the Week', with the breakthrough early goal at Forest, a sublime assist for Barry's late second, another strong 20-yard effort flashing just wide, and a huge defensive contribution as well. Forest had a few chances, with Igor Jesus nicking the ball off a crowd of Everton defenders in the first-half but putting his effort just past the post, and substitute Bakwa striking a good cross-shot inches wide in the closing minutes. Everton regained some energy later in the game, especially after Grealish, back from several days sidelined with an illness, came on from the bench for the last 20 minutes. It was not a great performance from the home side; but even so, the result flattered Everton somewhat - this really felt more like a 1-1. Michael Keane was another late omission as a result of a 'training knock'.

West Ham v Brighton was a bit of a topsy-turvy game. 2 penalties in quick succession for Brighton, both utterly uncontentious (despite Nuno's inevitable gripes); but Danny Welbeck, having despatched the first quite competently, then bizarrely opted for a Panenka chip on the second and crashed the effort against the crossbar (and he couldn't turn in the rebound either). The visitors then gave up a penalty of their own for a supposed handball, which was much harsher - a shot fired at Dunk from point-blank range when he'd spread himself on the floor to try to block (my view on these is that it should be 'strict liability' if the defender's arm blocks a goal-bound shot; but that's not actually what the rules currently say - sometimes we see these given, sometimes we don't). In the second-half, the home side retreated into their shell and tried to hang on to their slender lead, and were increasingly under siege in their goal: as Areola flapped at a succession of corners, it became inevitable that one of them would be bundled in - and they were really fortunate to hang on to even a point. A limping Todibo had to be replaced by Mavropanos after half-time. And Mitoma finally returned from injury, playing the last half-hour, and bringing one good save out of Areola.

Arsenal eventually came out comfortable winners against distant title rivals Villa, although the visiting team had some of the best chances in the first-half, and came back strongly again late in the second, to earn a deserved consolation from Ollie Watkins (via a particularly freaky 'assist' from substitute Malen - a toe-poke at goal from just outside the left post, which somehow squirmed through Raya's legs and rebounded off the upright across the face of the goal straight to Watkins's feet!). Arsenal's opener, however, a corner bundled across the line by just-returned Gabriel, was a bit dubious; the big defender had raised his elbow dangerously into the opposing keeper's chin as he jumped against him to challenge for the ball; the contact was probably only light, if there was any at all, and Martinez appeared to be guilty of going down easily looking for the foul (rather than standing strong and making sure he claimed the ball), but it did look like an unfair challenge - given the exaggerated protection usually afforded to keepers. This didn't ultimately matter, though, as Zubmimendi got the steamroller well and truly in motion shortly afterwards, and the home side went on to their most convincing win of the season.  There might have been another slightly contentious moment near the end when Raya scrambled a Watkins effort out from behind him on the line, and it looked as if the ball may momentarily been fully in the goal - but the goal-line technology didn't have a clear view of the ball, and the referee and linesman weren't going to find against the league leaders on something like that. Rice was a surprise late omission with a previously undisclosed knee problem, and Emery made his first substitutions right on the hour - but fortunately they all walked off the pitch just slowly enough to earn their FPL owners full appearance points.

There were a number of decent chances in the Manchester United v Wolves game, with Dorgu flashing a 20-yard cross-shot just wide, Sesko heading a corner against the outside of the post, and Hugo Bueno forcing Lammens into a good save with his leg. The opener for the home side, though, was a bit fortuitous - Zirkzee losing the ball on the edge of the box, but getting it back again from a kind rebound, then slightly mishitting his shot, which lacked much power but took a huge deflection off Krejci to leave the keeper stranded. Krejci got some consolation in the second-half when his powerful header won his side only their third point of the season. As I warned yesterday, Amorim can't be trusted to stick with the same selection or the same tactical approach for any two consecutive games, and although Dorgu, obviously brimming with confidence at the moment, again had a great game, his attacking scope was limited when returned to a left wing-back role in the clunky 3-4-3 system.

Thursday's other goal-dry games were at least quite entertaining, but Spurs's visit to Brentford was not. The home side completely dominated their woefully lacklustre opponents, but hadn't put on their scoring boots for this one. We did, however, see the most incomprehensibly awful refereeing decision of the whole season so far, when Andy Madley - and the VAR team - inexplicably saw nothing wrong with Romero's spastic attempted clearance which got nothing of the ball but wiped out Thiago as he was breaking through on goal 25 yards out; this was unquestionably a 'denial of a goalscoring opportunity' sending-off (and a free-kick in a promising position might have yielded an immediate goal). Spurs fans felt they might have had a penalty when Archie Gray went down on the edge of the box, but there was nothing in that one.

Fulham will feel frustrated they couldn't nick all three points away at Palace. As the home side's legs gave out in the last 20 minutes or so, the visitors' pressure became relentless. Raul had already put a good header against a post before Tom Cairney finally found the deserved equaliser with a sweet left-foot shot from just outside the box. Henderson pulled off a superb reaction save in the closing minutes, when the ball fell to Castagne unmarked in the middle of the box and he unleashed a fierce drive. Andersen had a similar opportunity in the dying seconds of added-on time, but scooped his effort over the top. Marco Silva feels Palace should have been reduced to 10 men in the first-half when Devenny caught Cuenca in the face with an elbow, but it looked a slight and accidental contact that the Fulham man was making a meal of. Somehow, though, 5 Fulham players wound up in the book in this game.

Vastly improved Leeds continued their robust defensive form to deny Liverpool at Anfield - although the home side should have had at least one penalty, when Bijol had both arms around Ekitike for several seconds in the first-half (and concluded by making a vain lunge through his legs, that also made contact with the forward and might have knocked him down), but he kept going rather than falling to the floor; and in the second-half Ampadu commited a very blatant handball right on the edge of the box - and VAR did not seem to check where exactly the contact was. In general, though, Leeds were good value for their point; and indeed they very nearly nicked the win when Calvert-Lewin steered the ball past Alisson in the closing minutes, but was flagged just offside. The FPL frustrations here were more 'rest rotations' - for Calvert-Lewin, Macallister and Kerkez.

Sunderland maintained their impressive defensive solidity to frustrate City and maintain their remarkable unbeaten home record. Their only major scare came when City won a corner in the opening minutes, and Haaland's near-post flick-on was lashed home by Bernardo Silva - but he had been narrowly offside. Pep caused more FPL woe by 'resting' Gvardiol and Reijnders at the start, and making a lot of early substitutions (the removal of Gonzalez and Savinho might have been down to knocks; Nico O'Reilly's replacement wasn't). At least Doku and Rodri were able to make a return from the bench.

It's yet another particularly weird FPL 'Team of the Week', with Krejci, Veltman, Brooks, Garner, Paqueta, and Guimaraes keeping out almost all of the more favoured picks. There were a lot of rest rotations and previously unannounced injuries - and a few early substitutions - causing grief to FPL managers. And it was another wretchedly low-scoring week, both in goals and FPL points - with a dismal global average of just 40 points.

Overall, there weren't very many poor refereeing decisions in this batch of games, but a dubiously allowed goal for Arsenal, a few missed penalty awards (and one very harshly awarded against Brighton), and Andy Madley's bizarre failure to send off Romero easily get this week's score up to an 8 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'.

FOUR types of selection decision in FPL

 

It occurred to me the other day, when I was writing about Phil Foden's recent improbably hot run of form, that we may discern 4 main types of selection decision in FPL, differentiated by their timing.

Timing of a transfer: the FOUR TYPES

1)  Anticipatory/Speculative/Precognitive

If you go in for a player before he's started to show any clear signs of form - just following a 'hunch', or because you have some sentimental attachment to him, or because he's a big-name player who's often done well in the past (ahem, Mo Salah...) - you may sometimes get lucky with that. But you have to appreciate that it's a very risky play. Going in so early for someone is inevitably a big gamble, even if you may have some good reasons - though very subtle and uncertain ones - for the choice. Those reasons might be founded on past history (e.g., the player usually recovers strongly from a brief injury absence, regularly displays a particularly keen hunger to return to the fray after missing a few games for any reason, always bounces back strongly after just a few poor performances, often has a great game against this particular opponent...), a positive shift in team form or lineup or tactics, a favourable run of upcoming fixtures, some background information which may suggest a likely psychological lift (a spat with the manager or a legal problem resolved, a family problem improving, a bereavement receding into the past), or subtle indications on the pitch of a possible turnaround in fitness or confidence that might herald a sudden, imminent uptick in points-scoring form. If you weighed up such factors, and subsequent performances by the player seemed to vindicate your assessment, you may congratulate yourself on a perceptive early transfer decision. But more often, FPL managers who go in early for someone are just taking a wild punt, based on no substantive rationale at all; and if that player suddenly hits a hot streak of form out of nowhere, they've just been incredibly LUCKY - but they'll never admit that. [Disgruntled rivals may complain of them relying on a crystal ball or a time-machine, because there really seems to be no other way to explain how such a bizarre decision worked out so well for them....]

2)  Hasty/Hopeful/The Calculated Gamble

If you go in for a player after 1 or 2 good hauls, that will sometimes pay off for you. But again, it's very risky - you might be falling victim to the classically over-optimistic vice of chasing last week's points. 'Form' is not always accurately reflected by points returns; 'form' is often transient or inconsistent. You need to look for evidence of a general upturn in form that is likely to persist - and improve further - over a number of games. You can only find that kind of evidence by watching full games with close attention; stats are no substitute for that; and a highlights roundup is not good enough either - you need to have seen the whole game. 

3)  The 'Goldilocks Zone'

This is the 'ideal' time to make a transfer, the time when most 'smart' managers recognise that a player is probably now worth having. Now, as I just said above, because 'form' is not always reflected fully - or, sometimes, at all - in the FPL points returns, this 'sweet spot' might come when a player has started playing better, but has not yet produced any worthwhile points; or perhaps, they've only produced a few modest hauls, but (not yet) a really big one. And, although it might sometimes be possible to discern indications of a decisive upturn in performance from just one game, usually it takes a little longer to be confident of that. As I wrote in this essay at the end of last season attempting to define the concept of 'form': One good game might be a freak; two on the bounce is very encouraging, but it still might mean nothing; three.... is form.  Of course, with the benefit of hindsight, you can pinpoint the individual gameweek in which a player first began a streak of good points-scoring - even if those returns were at first quite modest and/or quite intermittent (and perhaps not really reflective of any strong positive shift in the player's or his team's performance at that point!). But as the season is unfolding, it is almost always impossible to recognise the exact moment of such a shift: it doesn't generally become visible until a little later - one, or two, or three gameweeks further on. And that is when you should be jumping on the player. Don't beat yourself up that you might have missed a few good hauls from him; be satisfied that you're getting good points from him now, points that a lot of rival managers are still missing out on.

4)  'Late to the party'

Often, you'll miss these 'early signs' that a player may be about to go on a tear. And that's forgivable - especially if, like me, you don't have good access to live TV coverage of the games. And the 'Goldilocks Zone' is very unforgiving, usually an extremely narrow window of opportunity: it's often just a single gameweek, and, even with the most generous dispensation, it can rarely be extended to more than two or three. However, after that point, it should be fairly obvious that this player is now a top pick, and if you continue to ignore him - well, then you're really not paying attention; or, worse, you're being stubborn (sticking to a previous selection in defiance of mounting evidence against it), or unreasonably prejudiced against this new option (perhaps he hurt you in the past: the old 'He always starts blanking as soon as I buy him' superstition - we've all fallen victim to that at one time or another). Often, such stubbornness grows out of being in thrall to the ideal of self-consistency, or what is sometimes called a 'committment bias'  - one of the most deep-rooted and damaging of our cognitive biases: we may have convinced ourselves that a player we'd picked ahead of the newly in-form player was always going to remain the superior prospect, or we may have convinced ourselves early on in this emerging trend of form that it was going to prove ephemeral - and nothing will now change our minds about this choice, no matter how much evidence is stacking up that it has now become wrong. But.... better LATE than NEVER. If you can overcome your pride, your stubbornness, your prejudice, and accept that a player is now so hot that you must have him - you might still be able to catch one or two more decent hauls from him before the streak dries up (as they all do, eventually).

In summary, then:...

The first type of transfer is very early: made before there has yet been any evidence of an improvement in a player's performance (or at least, not in his FPL points returns); it is hence a big, and probably unjustified, risk. Such transfers can occasionally pay off very well; but you should ensure that such a pick is based on definite evidence - if only in the form of positive background factors, rather than anything yet in the on-field displays - and sound reasoning.

The second type is also early, and possibly over-hasty: it is made on the basis of an improvement in performance, but perhaps only scant evidence of such, perhaps from just one or two games - which is rarely enough to make you fully confident of a sustained upturn in form. If you're allowing yourself to get over-excited about one or two good returns, you're most often not shrewdly anticipating the next big thing, but simply falling prey to a fatuous 'sheep pick'.

The third type is based on an astute assessment of early evidence of an upturn in performance: not just the FPL points returns, but the overall contribution of the player and the way he and his team are functioning together. Such evidence may occasionally be visible in a single game; but usually it takes two or three games to become persuasive.

The fourth type is at least slightly late - or maybe very late! - only recognising the turn in form some time after it has become evident, at least to the smarter and more perceptive FPL managers. (As a general rule-of-thumb, if The Scout - FPL's vapid, anonymous, in-house pundit - has just recommended a player,... you probably should have bought him at least one or two gameweeks back.)

To apply this template to the recent example of Phil Foden's extraordinary streak of goalscoring form....

If you'd gone in for him in Gameweek 13, that was definitely a Type 1 decision. And it must have been based on having a crystal ball, because there really was no indication that he was suddenly about to come good so strongly, after a long run of 'blanks', and often pretty anonymous performances (he'd only produced 20 points from the previous 8 games, with just a solitary assist!). A fixture against Leeds was not sufficient reason to start fancying a player who'd shown almost no indication of suddenly becoming a major FPL points contributor again over the previous two months. (Neither was a moderately promising fixture-run immediately thereafter. And it was only moderately promising: Fulham away is not a particularly 'easy' fixture; Palace away certainly isn't.)

If you'd bought him for Gameweek 14, that would have been a Type 2 decision. Was there really any evidence in the Leeds game of a decisive change in mentality, confidence, style of play (or in team tactics, that might give him more scoring opportunities...)? Not really. And that good performance was only against Leeds, who are struggling at the bottom of the table. Moreover, there were two further Premier League games within the coming week, and we might reasonably have expected that Foden would get short minutes in these games - or perhaps be rested completely for one of them - and/or might have been inhibited a little by fatigue. I would say, getting Foden in GW14 was essentially just chasing last week's points; there was not yet any convincing rationale for buying him.

The interesting question is whether, after two outstanding displays in quick succession, it would have a Type 3 decision to get Foden in Gameweek 15. I would say NO. Foden had just played twice within a few days; and there was a crucial Champions League tie away to Real Madrid coming up the following midweek - and he did indeed get short minutes in this next match. Also, Sunderland were much the best of the three EPL teams he'd faced in this remarkable week - although they produced an uncommonly poor performance on this occasion, and, despite playing only just over an hour, Foden again managed to come up with a goal.

Acquiring him didn't really become a Type 3 decision rather than Type 2 until Gameweek 16; and arguably perhaps not even then. In the wake of the Real Madrid game, there was again a risk that Foden might be rested or subbed off early. And Crystal Palace are one of the best teams City have faced this season, the strongest defence in the league (after Arsenal's); especially away from home, a City win could not have been confidently predicted. Moreover, it is statistically extremely improbable that any player will achieve 4 double-digit hauls in a row (has it ever been done before??) - and while that wouldn't argue against acquiring Foden for this game, it should counsel that it was unreasonable to expect another very big points return from him. And yet - astoundingly - he did produce yet another haul! But that was a once-in-a-blue-moon freak; and if you bet on that, you were lucky rather than brilliant.

This might be a rare case where there was in fact no 'Goldilocks Zone' for acquiring Foden. There have been good reasons to doubt if he would be able to extend this scoring streak in each gameweek that it has continued; and the calculus on this was greatly complicated by the December fixture congestion and the huge importance of City's looming Champions League clash. In each of those four - closely packed-together - gameweeks, there were reasonable arguments for remaining hesitant about acquiring Foden: It was becoming increasingly unlikely in each match that he would produce another successive big haul, and increasingly likely that Pep might rest him. 

Moreover, Doku had been a very attractive pick from City for a while, and Cherki was just becoming so - before Foden suddenly caught fire. And if you already had one of these (or perhaps Nico O'Reilly; albeit that he's in a different position category, that pick would still be eating into your club quota from City), it would not have been unreasonable to hang on to them, in preference to Foden - whose newfound burst of form might well have quickly fizzled out again. And even if you had fancied bringing Foden it, it was still a somewhat speculative pick - so early in the emerging hot spell, after such a long barren streak, after such a disappointing season last year - and it might not have been a leading transfer priority; especially as the mounting toll of injuries and suspensions in the bleak midwinter was using up most of the available stock of Free Transfers for the majority of FPL managers (even with the bonanza of extra transfers we were just given in in GW16).

Perhaps, perhaps... transferring in Foden has jumped straight from a Type 2 to a Type 4 decision!

However, I would suggest that acquiring Foden now, for Gameweek 17, is probably the Type 3, 'Goldilocks Zone' moment. 

Yes, paradoxical as it may seem, I think he's only become a really unassailably strong pick now - when his super-hot streak is (almost certainly?) over. You will have missed 55 points from 4 games in the last fortnight; but a fortnight ago, that was completely unforeseeable; and even as the fortnight played out, it remained hugely improbable. You shouldn't suffer any self-recrimination for missing out on the benefits of such a bizarre freak performance.

But now, we have seen clear evidence that Foden - and his team - are playing extraordinarily well; and this does seem to be a sustained shift in performance. Moreover, they're in a pretty soft run of fixtures still, with only the New Year game against Chelsea offering a significantly formidable opponent in the next month or so (and at least that one's at home). At this point, it is definitely looking foolhardy to resist buying him any longer.

With the benefit of hindsight, we would all realise that Gameweek 13 was the ideal time to have brought him in. With the benefit of a crystal ball, we could have realised that he would become 'essential' in Gameweek 14.... or 15,... or 16. But we do not enjoy those two benefits. And without them, it was reasonable enough to hold off buying Foden until now. Most of the FPL managers I consider 'smart' have not bought him yet (the few that do have him, I think had punted on him earlier in the season - and had probably only stuck with him thus far because they'd had other higher-priority problems to address with their transfers); but I anticpate that the majority of them will be going in for him now.

Alas, it is now statistically very unlikely that Foden will achieve yet another massive points-haul in the next game - even against defensively flakey West Ham. And you can be pretty damn sure that he won't rack up another 50-odd points over the next 4 or 5 games. But he is in sensational form, and has some inviting fixtures coming up.

If you already got him in the last few gameweeks, good for you; but you were taking a gamble on him, and were fortunate that it paid off so extraordinarily well. Now, though, it really is looking as if all of us should join you.