Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Although I'm not American, I do have many American friends, and through them I have come to embrace Thanksgiving Day as my favourite holiday of the year! (Slightly less protracted than Christmas, and without the unwelcome additional stress of gift exchange or - for me - obligatory family socialising! But with all the good bits ramped up to the max: eating and drinking prodigiously with good friends. And I love turkey; rarely get to eat it any other time of the year!)

Now, I don't currently have many (any?!) regular readers on this fledgeling blog (I know, nobody reads long-form content any more in this smartphone age....); but, just in case anyone should happen here by chance in the next few days, I send you all my best wishes.

Reflecting for a moment on what I have to be grateful for in Fantasy Premier League... I am initially a bit stumped for inspiration! I'm having my worst start to a season ever!! But then it has been a weird season so far, with a lot of upset results, yo-yo-ing form, and freakisly low-scoring gameweeks! At least I can console myself that things are slowly getting better....

And I've finally been able to afford to get Saka in! I'm pretty chuffed about that.

Best wishes to ALL for a great start to the 'holiday season'!!

Luck-o-Meter (12)

 

Fulham v Wolves was a thoroughly crazy game, with 3 of the 5 goals being absolute worldies... and Fulham battering the woodwork an additional 3 times (1 of them an attempted own-goal by Air-Nouri!!), with Raul somehow contriving to miss an open goalmouth from a few yards out.  Cunha coming up with 2 of those worldies (and setting up a teammate with a very sweet assist!) looks likely to be the single biggest factor in determining the weekly ranking in FPL. While he has been coming into sensational form since about mid-October, there were still reasons to be wary of him (until recently, he'd been mostly playing rather deeper, and looking likely to be more a provider than a frequent goalscorer himself; Wolves have been abysmal defensively, and looked like they might continue to struggle even against a run of 'softer' opponents in the second quarter of the season, and certainly can't have been favourites to win at Craven Cottage; and Cunha did have a worrying injury record last season...); but his ownership has more than quadrupled to 1.25 million over the past few gameweeks, and those 'prescient' (or jammy) managers who've brought him in already are enjoying a huge advantage this week.

'Near-Miss of the Week', though, might have to go to Antoine Semenyo's last-kick-of-the-game volley against Brighton that smashed against the top of the crossbar! And Baleba's sending-off in that game was ridiculous: there was clearly no foul for his second yellow card (scarcely, indeed, any contact at all - and what there was, surely 'initiated' by the Bournemouth player rather than him). Hello, VAR - WAKE UP! How were they not revewing that? That's their whole damn job! Hopefully, Brighton can get that decision overturned on appeal.

Although... Noni Madueke managing to clear Cole Palmer's shot off the Leicester goal-line might also be a contender!  The main issue in the Gameweek's opening fixture, though, was the unfathomable failure to send off either Ndidi or Soumare for absolutely dreadful challenges early in the game (and, yet again, we weren't told what VAR's view of these incidents was). The later penalty shout against Fofana was fatuous: indeed, Mavididi should probably have been booked for opportunistically somersaulting over his trailing leg. The penalty that was awarded was a bit 'soft': on multiple slow-motion replays, it was possible to discern Lavia stepping on the back of De Cordova-Reid's heel, but I think that was invisible to the naked eye. The Leicester forward had plainly tripped over his own heels just before that, and was already on the way down; it was only because he was losing balance and pitching forward that his rear foot was still planted, and thus unexpectedly just where Lavia's foot was about to land. I suppose it was a technically 'correct' decision (although the rules and their interpretive guidelines are so complex these days that I wouldn't be entirely sure), but it felt unjust, and very, very unlucky - there was scarcely any contact, and it was completely unintentional. Fortunately, it didn't have any impact on the result. But if even one of those sendings-off had been given, Chelsea would surely have won this game much more comfortably.

There was also here an early goal from Madueke which was eventually ruled out for the slenderest of offsides; and the offending attacker's foot was heavily blurred in the video still frame - so, I really don't see how they can claim to know where exactly the tip of the toe was at the critical moment. The decision against Merino in the Arsenal v Forest game was pretty tight too, and took a long time to resolve. This is the one thing in the current officiating that most inuriates and depresses me. 

[Side Rant: I've said it in this series before, and I'll probably say it again, but it is foolhardy to profess to be able to make offside decisions on such fine margins. There are problems with framerate and screen resolution and parallax compensation that mean it is, in practice, impossible to make reliable judgements to less than a centimetre or two [I'll use metric, in deference to the 'international audience'], at best... even if you can determine with absolute accuracy the moment at which the last pass left contact with the player making it. And you just can't. At the last World Cup, they were trialling that fancy 'automatic offside decision' technology, with 3-D CGI modelling of the players' relative positions, and the 'critical moment' apparently being determined by a sensor inside the ball measuring its acceleration. But that didn't really convince, as the graphic renderings often took a long time to appear, and sometimes didn't at all. But, more importantly, there was still some margin of doubt as to how that 'critical moment' was being determined. When a player's foot kicks a ball, his foot may be in contact with it for over a tenth of a second; and the peak acceleration - presumably what this gizmo at the World Cup was purporting to measure as definitive - is probably at least a few hundredths of a second after the first contact; the ball breaking contact with the foot possibly several hundredths later again. So, it really makes quite a lot of difference whether your 'critical moment' is defined as being the instant that a player first makes contact with the ball, or the instant it breaks contact with him. In my distant youth, I believe it was generally understood to be the latter; although, back then, it made no practical difference. 

Nowadays, with offside decisions being made for matters of centimetres, or sometimes seemingly even millimetres, it very much does matter. Two players sprinting in opposite directions can put a few metres between each other in a tenth of a second. Even feet moving at a brisk walk - at their peak acceleration in the step cycle - can cover some tens of centimetres. The Offside Law of old was simple, commonsensical, easy to understand and easy to apply: we looked at the players' upper bodies - the torso and hips of the attacking player had to be closer to the goal-line than any part of the torso and hips of the nearest defending player. Easy. And you'd always allow the attacking player the benefit of the doubt: you can't make these calls on matters of a few centimetres or less - a ripple of fat on the hips or the billowing of a shirt in the breeze might account for that much of a margin. Unless there was some clear daylight between the attacker's body and the defender's.... he was ONSIDE.  Can we go back to that??  PLEASE.]

We saw cracker of a penalty save from Dean Henderson at Villa Park (but why the hell was Youri Tielemans taking it??); and a few more outstanding pieces of work from both keepers, most notably Emi Martinez's phenomenal last-minute save from Jeffrey Schlupp's fierce drive. The penalty calls in that game looked fair enough, although Watkins's later shout was the kind of clumsy contact from a defender that we often see given.

Norgaard's sending-off was generally agreed by the punditry to have been ridiculous; his follow-through on Pickford was unavoidable,and - since both were moving towards each other - the contact entirely accidental. That's another one that should be overruled, but probably won't be. And it's another example, I fear, of the 'second look' instruction from VAR effectively being taken to mean 'change your mind!' These pitchside reviews ought to be undertaken with no advance bias, the referee entirely free to make either decision; but that is not happening.

The Southampton v Liverpool game was nearly spoiled by some very poor officiating (mostly Michael Oliver's fault on the VAR, I felt); indeed, Southampton fans will feel that it was spoiled. They had 3 good penalty appeals turned down for no convincing reason - and yet the one they were awarded was, for me, an obvious mistake. Oliver's protestation that there 'was no conclusive evidence' of where the contact occurred was preposterous, an abject abdicaton of his responsibility (and probably prompted by a sense of guilt or embarassment about the earlier incident where he'd turned down the shout against Konate on the left side of the box; that was a very slight push in the back, yes, but any push is illegal, it did tip the attacker off-balance, and it did obviously happen directly above or just inside the line at the side of the penalty area: absolutely clearcut penalty!). There was clear video footage of Robertson having the whole of his foot planted in front of the edge of the penalty box as he made the challenge with the lower-leg immediately above that foot. Even  if his leg bent or rolled towards the penalty area under the impact of Dibling's leg (it did, but not much), the initial point of contact must have been most of the thickness of his lower leg outside the box - and he's got a chunky leg! That would be several centimetres at least. And yes, Dibling's leg remained in contact with Robertson's as he rolled over the top of it, and maybe some part of the area of contact was eventually just above the line rather than in front of it; but that doesn't matter - the instant of first contact is supposed to be what they look for. A few centimetres is a tight margin, yes, but it's not indistinguishable, too close to call; heck, we're often seeing offisde decisions given now for alleged margins barely a tenth of this!

Mo Salah spurning a few chances to complete his hattrick also tickles the Luck-o-Meter. As does his foolishly getting himself a booking for taking his shirt off to celebrate converting the penalty! And, presumably because of that booking, BPS ultimately accorded him only a 1-point lead over Szoboszlai - so, he might have scored two goals and secured the win for Liverpool but only have received 2 bonus points!!  I think that would have had pitchfork-toting mobs converging on FPL Headquarters. But oh my good god! I discover the FPL gnomes have again conducted a surreptitious manipulation of the BPS numbers very late in the day (possibly after the Gameweek had officially 'closed'?), somehow contriving to award Szoboszlai a whopping 11 extra credits, to catapult him above Salah (??!!) to the maximum bonus points spot. These shenanigans have got to STOP! Time to reach for those pitchforks....

At least the weekend concluded with an utterly uncontroversial match between Southampton and Manchester United. It is nice to be reassured that they can still happen. Unfortunately, it has become such a rarity this season that you feel any ref who manages it should receive a special award in thanks - a No Fuck-Ups Trophy.

It's probably too much to hope that we might be able to hand out another one for Monday night's game between Newcastle and West Ham...

Yep - that was just a little too much to hope for. The final game of the weekend would probably have turned out very differently if Isak's fine breakthrough goal had been allowed to stand; the offiside call against him looked very, very fine (not one that could have been made accurately with the naked eye by the linesman); and, on the highlights I saw, no justificatory VAR graphic was ever shown, so I'm not sure if it even was reviewed. Late in the game, Callum Wilson had a very strong penalty shout after being bundled over by Mavorpanos - but this was one of those where VAR seemed afraid to question the original decision. At the moment, there is a ridiculous level of 'policy bias' towards allowing the original on-pitch decision to stand in all circumstances; there is no room for that kind of slanting of the process - sometimes, often, the referee is wrong and needs to be corrected (or, at least, encouraged to reconsider). With the VAR team being so timid in most of these instances, the bar for questioning the original call being set so absurdly high, there is basically no point in having VAR at all.

There were some fantastic goals this weekend: Partey, Hutchinson, Iwobi, and a couple each from Cunha and Maddison. Also - again - a few more unexpected goalscorers, like Porro and (even more unexpected!) Wann-Bissaka. Also penalty stops from Henderson and Kelleher, and several other impressive saves, the pick of the crop being Martinez's late game-saver against Schlupp.

I wouldn't count the Spurs win at The Etihad as a surprise result, since they do have quite a record of turning over Pep - although the margin of victory, the contemptuous ease of it was something of a surprise (particularly given how poor Spurs had been last time out). Ipswich's home draw against United was entirely predictable too, since it was unrealistic to expect Amorim to turn around their dismal season overnight. However, Wolves's win against Fulham and West Ham's against Liverpool, Palace's draw at Villa, and Southampton nearly taking points off Liverpool at Anfield must all be considered upsets of the form book.

Recently out-of-favour-with-the-gaffer Maddison and disappointing Porro, forgotten men Emerson and Wann-Bissaka, and Ismaila Sarr and Enzo Fernandez all made the 'Team of the Week' -  so, you know it was a weird gameweek!!

Still, not a week with a huge amount of out-of-the-ordinary excellence or clumsiness from players; but.... oh, my god, a terrible performance from VAR, with a few incredibly tight and possibly dubious offsides ruling out crucial goals, several at least 'contentious' penalty calls, and 4 red card decisions that were plain WRONG! That, I'm afraid gets the week up to an 8 out of 10 on the Luck-o-Meter.

GW12 - What did we learn?

One might feel a little sympathy for Leicester, having to make do without their two main creative forces - Buonanotte serving a totting-up suspension (already??), and Fatawu out for the season, after damaging his ACL while playing for Ghana last week - and then losing midfield lynchpin Harry Winks just a few minutes into the game. However, they've never really shown much of a consistent threat in any of their games I've seen yet; and here, it appeared that their strategy was "If we pretend not to be here, maybe they won't be able to see us...."  Steve Cooper is starting to look every bit as clueless as he did in the latter stages of his tenure at Forest last season, and would now be my favourite for early replacement. [Usually, although I compose these comments on individual matches serially over the weekend, I don't publish them until the Gameweeek's completed on Monday or Tuesday. This week, however, I published the first batch of remarks on Sunday morning - still the early hours of Sunday morning on UK time - and barely 12 hours later, Leicester were announcing they'd sacked Cooper. Even I was taken a bit by surprise by the suddenness of this. I hope they've already lined up a promising replacement. I would like to see Leicester at least making a good fight of trying to stay up; but at the moment, they look about the least likely to. Next managerial victim looks set to be Russell Martin or Julen Lopategui...]

Leicester might whinge a bit about Mavididi's turned-down penalty shout, but I don't think they've got any case there; he pretty obviously just jumped over Fofana's rear leg, without the Chelsea player making any movement towards him at all - and, indeed, with there probably being no actual contact. And the late penalty they did win shortly afterwards was very, very fortunate. They were also lucky not to have had two of their midfielders sent off for dreadful challenges early in the game; if Andy Madeley was showing any bias in his decisions in this game, it was mostly in Leicester's favour.  The FPL Sheep are no doubt up-in-arms again over the fact that Palmer blanked for the second week in succession - shock, horror! he must be rubbish, after all!  No, of course not: he had another outstanding game, constantly involved (despite regularly getting lumps kicked out of him) - nearly scored, nearly assisted;. You can't get FPL points every week, people; but Palmer is one of the few players - in fact, probably the only one - who looks as if he might every single week. Jackson and Cucurella were again superb, also.

Yep, the scrap for the title is still a two-horse race - but it's Liverpool and Arsenal, not Liverpool and City. With  Chris Wood too tired to start after flying back from Samoa (a trip which, I imagine, must require multiple stopovers) and Gibbs-White out with a knock, Forest couldn't muster any attacking threat of their own; but even with those two available, they probably wouldn't have got a look-in here - Arsenal were dominant, imperious, probably the best we've yet seen them this season. While the loss of Ben White (supposedly only a 'minor' knee surgery, but the recuperation period might last until January or February?) might look a further major setback, in fact it seems to be giving them the prospect of a new-look back-four which might actually work rather well. I've felt since the start of the season that  Jurrien Timber would be a very attractive way into the Arsenal defence, if only we could count on him getting a run of starts: now it seems that opportunity is here - if he can stay fit; and, even better, he's going to be on the right flank rather than the left, where the opportunity to link up with Saka and Odegaard should give him nice prospects for an occasional assist. On the other side, though, Calafiori looked out of sorts, and needed to be subbed off fairly early in the second half (perhaps just being rushed back a bit too swiftly after his own recent injury problems?). I remain optimistic about the impact he could have too; but Timber's form is stronger at the moment.... and he's cheaper. There might be a bit of a concern about Saliba though, who took a very heavy whack right at the end of the game.

Although Villa were missing a number of players after the international break, the extent to which their form has deserted them must be a big worry for Emery now. Although they dominated possession 2-to-1 in this game, they failed to create many clearcut chances, and ultimately looked rather lucky to salvage a draw. While Oliver Glasner can take heart from his team's fluent couner-attacking play, and the form of Dean Henderson in goal (who produced one of the best penalty saves we've seen for a long time), they were still fairly ragged in defence - and have a lot of questions to answer about how they gave up the equaliser so tamely from a corner. Watkins and Mateta are both looking impressive; alas, the teams behind them are not. 

Both Everton and Brentford continue to play isolated snatches of bright football, but look utterly toothless upfront (it was not evident that the recently impressive Wissa and Mbeumo were even on the pitch!). With the fixtures Brentford now face in December, I fear they might well be back down in the bottom three, or perilously close, going into the New Year. (At least Mark Flekken, who I consider to be probably the weakest keeper in the EPL this year, pulled off one very good save here - credit where it's due.)  Norgaard's sending-off was yet another VAR-contrived error; we're seeing far too many of these this season.

Fulham v Wolves was a weird game. Wolves really didn't look to be in it that much, but - as with Brentford against Bournemouth recently - they just kept coming up with world-class finishes out of nothing. Against a team missing most of their preferred central defenders (although, since Wolves have had the worst defence in the league so far, maybe this was a blessing-in-disguise??), Fulham should have been able to make more of their early dominance and their breakthrough goal; perhaps, if Raul hadn't lashed that sitter against the crossbar early on, things might have turned out differently. But Fate just wasn't smiling on Fulham here, as Air-Nouri came within a whisker of blasting the ball into his own net, and recently prolific Harry Wilson also landed a dipping shot on the top of the crossbar. Marco Silva must take a large share of the blame too, though; both for failing to find a more incisive approach against a vulnerable opponent, and for rashly using up all his substitutes fairly early in  the second half, thus leaving his side with 10 men when Joachim Andersen picked up an injury in the 75th minute and had to come off; it was in that short-handed spell at the end that Wolves finally got on top of them and added 2 more late goals. Cunha is now looking an irresistible asset for FPL (in the form of his life, and now playing a bit further forward, alongside Strand Larsen as a main goal outlet, rather than wider or deeper, as he had mostly played until a month or so ago); while Raul, I fear, has lost the magic dust again.

The south coast derby between Bournemouth and Brighton was a close and exciting game, neither team quite at their best, but both still showing some moments of great quality. Bournemouth again showed great fighting spirit to almost claw back a draw, and really looked like they deserved more out of the game. And I feel smugly vindicated in nominating Joao Pedro as an acquisition this week - even though, in truth, that was hardly a surprising or visionary insight. Baleba's sending-off for a second yellow was unjust - and hopefully might be overturned.

Dear, oh dear - City are unravelling, aren't they? This might just be a case of the 'post-international blues' that I mentioned the other day as being a likely cause of unpredictability in this weekend's results:  everybody just a bit flat and fatigued, and 'out of practice' in working with their teammates. (Though that evidently wasn't a problem for Spurs at all!)  Everybody for City had an off day: Gundogan, Silva, and Foden in particular; and even the returning Kevin DeBruyne, making a late appearance off the bench, was unable to have any impact on the game (his erstwhile happy knack of immediately conjuring multiple assists on his first game back after a long spell on the sidelines now deserting him...). Kyle Walker is past his sell-by date and starting to stink; he might still have some of the old pace - just about, on occasions - but he now seems to lack the stamina or the desire to call on it very often,... which leaves him often not where he needs to be. (And he used to be able to cross a ball occasionally, didn't he? That appears to be something else he's completely lost. What on earth is the point of pushing up into the final 5 or 10 yards if you don't do anything with the ball once you get there??)  Gvardiol was also all over the place defensively, and looks to me as if he might be in need of a rest (having run himself into the ground for most of the season as a Micky Van de Ven-style one-man safety-blanket against the frequent counter-attacks City have been suffering).  Rico Lewis's owners, however, might take some comfort - despite his nul points return here! - from the fact that Pep seems to love him so much that he'll play him anywhere (here deputising for the injured Kovacic as a central defensive midfielder - a role for which, despite his terrier-like eagerness and energy, he simply does not have the necessary physical presence). At least Haaland managed lots of shots (Vicario needed to be in sharp form to preserve the clean sheet), even smashing one against the crossbar; so, I don't think he's too far away from becoming a goal-machine again. But the rest of the team needs a lot of work.

Spurs - as I'd again predicted on Friday - were immediately back with a bang (though I wonder if their fans might not have taken a draw against City here in exchange for a win against Ipswich; the humiliation of that result last time will still smart when the euphoria of this triumph at The Etihad has faded...); and they've always somehow been a 'bogey team' for Pep. However, I wouldn't necessarily take that much encouragement going forward from this one outstanding result: strange as it is to say, I can't see them facing many other opponents who play as badly as City did here. And there's still a bit of a mystery as to what's gonig on with James Maddison: has he just had an undisclosed fitness problem, or was there some spat with Ange, now patched up? Or is he only going to get an occasional rotation appearance, perhaps when Brennan Johnson needs a rest, or Betancur (slightly more creative than Bissouma or Sarr) isn't available for the central midfield role? When he was subbed off at the end of the game, he went straight down the tunnel, with barely a word to his manager - which isn't a very encouraging sign. You'd think he'd be undroppable after his stunning brace here, but.... who knows?  Dominic Solanke was again dropping deep in the link-up so much that he was rarely getting into dangerous positions in the box (indeed, once or twice, he, Maddison, and Kulusevski were rather threatening to get in each other's way in the No. 10 space!); he's being too unselfish a facilitator at the moment to offer much prospect of the prolific goal return that so many hoped for when they bought him three weeks ago.

Liverpool were perhaps the team most affected by that post-internationals drop-off phenomenon I mentioned above, looking mostly very flat and lifeless going forward (t iwas hard to tell that Gakpo and Nunez were on the pitch), and repeatedly getting exposed on the counter-attack. Perhaps they were also saving some players for the big upcoming European clash with Real Madrid; but they really look so much better with Luis Diaz starting on the left. Southampton gave a very good account of themselves, but were yet again let down by their flakey defending - compounded here by the extreme rustiness of Alex McCarthy in goal. Both sides were let down by some very poor officiating (although I'd lay most of the blame on Michael Oliver in the VAR room rather than Sam Barratt on the pitch): Robertson's foul on Dibling was clearly just outside the penalty area, yet was adjudged a penalty, and led to Southampton's equaliser. That small injustice was probably fair enough overall, though, because Southampton had 3 other much better penalty shouts that were all bizarrely overlooked. Liverpool can really count themselves very, very fortunate to have come away with the 3 points from this one.

The Amorim era for United got off to the best possible start, with Amad Diallo making a flying break down the right-wing just into the second minute of the game, eventually squaring beautifully for Rashford to toe-poke home from 5 yards out. Unfrotunately, the new-look Reds were unable to capitalise on that dream opening. While they did show more cohesion, purpose, and consistent workrate than they usually did under Ten Hag, that is quite a low bar; there was still a lot about this performance that was disappointing, particularly the lack of imagination in going forward, and the inability to assert any extended control over the game. And the lack of real pressure to try to claim the win in the closing phase may have been a particular worry to their fans. The new manager made a lot of changes to try to shake things up, but the new introductions seemed less at home with his tactics, and the life drained out of the United game in the closing minutes - making it relatively easy for Ipswich to hang on to their hard-earned point. The home side will actually feel that they should have taken all three points, as they had much the better of the game overall, especially in the first half, and only two exceptional saves by Onana from Liam Delap kept Manchester United in with a chance of a result. Ipswich are finally starting to look like quite a formidable opponent, and vindicating my early-season prediction that they would be the one promoted side to stay up this year. I still have my reservations about their keeper, Muric, though; he appeared to be well-ositioned to gather Diallo's low cross at the edge of his six-yard box, but he just knelt down and waited for the ball rather than moving towards it - thus allowing Rashford to nip in and jab it past him for the opening goal.

The new 3-4-2-1 formaion didn't yet convince, with a lot of players feeling as though they were playing slightly out of their best position, and most - not unnaturally - still looking rather unsure about what exactly they were supposed to do in different phases of play. I found Garnacho and Fernandes, especially, not looking like great fits for the 'dual 10s' (Garnacho, one suspects, was only tried out in this role because Amorim is reluctant to lose his goalscoring threat... or is simply afraid to drop a currently popular player; but he really doesn't look to me as if he's going to fit anywhere in this set-up).. Indeed, both were occasionally tending to revert to their more normal styles of play rather than staying narrow and advanced, in close support of the central striker (and thus poor Rashford was left very isolated for a lot of the game); Bruno would often drop a lot deeper to try to pick up the ball, while Garnacho sometimes drifted out wide to try to get round the back of the defence (which probably discouraged Dalot from always pushing as far forward as Amorim would like), and so the formation often felt a bit more like a conventional 4-5-1. A lot of the initial personnel choices were quirky and unexpected (giving endless headaches to FPL managers; it would probably be much better to just avoid all United players - apart from the outstanding Onana - until things settle down a bit). I wonder if Amorim just wants to try everyone out in his opening weeks, or if he is already planning on using a lot of rotation long-term, to try to keep all of his squad involved. The lineup that ended the match is far closer to what I'd expect his regular starters to be (although, as I just said, the subbed-on players mostly failed to make any impact - perhaps they'd been omitted at the start because they'd had less time to work with the new coach this week, or had struggled more with absorbing his ideas?): Zirkzee and Mount as the 'dual 10s', Hojlund as the No. 9, Ugarte rather than Casemiro as the 'stopper' in midfield and Bruno dropping in beside him, Shaw rather than Evans on the left side of the back-three (you'd have to think that just-about-fit-again Leny Yoro will soon replace Maszraoui on the other side of De Ligt too). The only standout success of this first outing was Amad Diallo, who really ran himself into the ground from the first minute to the last in trying to stake his claim to the right wing-back role, and showed excellent qualities in both the attacking and defensive dimensions of the mission.

And damn, Monday night's result at Newcastle was probably the biggest surprise, the biggest 'upset' of the gameweek: how the hell did Newcastle, who've still looked like they had good 'top six' potential and have shown strong improvement in recent performances, suddenly collapse.... at home, against West Ham, who have thus far looked to be in relegation danger? They dominated for long periods, and were so on top in the first half, they really should have won comfortably: Isak and Gordon both had good chances thwarted. And Isak's fine early breakthrough probably would have made it a completely different game if it had been allowed to stand - but he was the victim of yet another ridiculously tight offside call. Callum Wilson appeared to have won a penalty near the end, but that wasn't given either. And West Ham's goals both came out of nothing: Soucek being left unmarked at a corner, and then Wann-Bissaka (noted for being one of the least-scoring players in the league!!) hit a tame scuffed cross-shot which Nick Pope seemed to misread and allowed to bobble past him and bounce in off the foot of the far post. Bizarro! Newcastle only have themselves to blame; it was a strangely flat performance from them, and the fight really seemed to go out of them after they conceded a second goal soon after the break. While the return of Wilson and Trippier after long injury absences may buoy Eddie Howe's spirits slightly, he's stil got a lot of fires to fight. And have West Ham really turned a corner? I'm not convinced: they were merely less-awful-than-usual against an out-of-sorts opponent, rather than actually 'good'. Lopategui's job would surely be in question if they hadn't got this win; and I think it will continue to be under discussion over the coming month.

I fear I'm going to have to abandon this series. While I do enjoy attempting these potted analyses of all the individual games - and I'm finding it very helpful for myself, forcing me to pay closer attention, and helping me to remember key incidents more clearly (I am at that time of life where memories of distant events are usually far sharper and more readily accessible than those relating to things that happened last week or yesterday...) - it does get very time-consuming. While I might be more willing to devote a few hours to such an endeavour during the week, when I have nothing else much to do, on Sunday mornings - pausing my 'Match of the Day' re-run every two or three matches to jot down some notes - I'd far rather be getting out and about, rather than chaining myself to the keyboard for two or three hours. The insane fixture logjam in December is also a discouragement: I can just about cope with taking on this mountainous task once a week... but not twice!  I will try to perservere with my Luck-o-Meter series of summaries of the events that have had the biggest impact on FPL results (which cover much of the same ground anyway).

Picks of the Week

DISCLAIMER: I always refuse to identify myself as any sort of FPL 'guru' or 'mentor' or 'expert'. And I have previously on this blog expressed my reluctance to share many details of my own selections, or to make very specific player recommendations.

However, in addition to occasionally critiquing common 'sheep picks' of the moment (not all necessarily outright bad, but ridiculously over-popular selections), I thought I would start occasionally trying to highlight one or two players who seem not yet to be very widely owned but are starting to look very tempting prospects.

I will generally try to come up with at least 2 options per week - so that it doesn't look like I'm making a sole recommendation. And these suggestions are intended to be simply 'worth thinking about', not at all 'must-haves'   (And some weeks, I'll have nothing.....)

So, first off, in Gameweek 12, I give you Anthony Gordon. After a bit of an up-and-down start to the season - which has seen his price crash from 7.5 million to 7.2 million (that makes him a tempting bargain in itself!) - he's really begun to look back at his best in the last two games against Arsenal and Forest, and in the recent games for England. And Newcastle overall are on a strongly upward trend too, with the new-look defence finally starting to click, Isak looking fit and sharp up front once more after his injury issues (and Callum Wilson just about ready again, just in time to provide occasional back-up during the busy holiday schedule).  And apart from Liverpool at the start of December (who they at least face at St. James's), Newcastle really have a very nice run of fixtures now, all the way through into February.

Joao Pedro looked absolutely sensational on his return from injury for the last 25 minutes against City. And after another two weeks to work on his fitness over the international break, he should now be ready to play a full 90 minutes. His ability to play a variety of different roles should mean that he is more rotation-proof than almost any of Brighton's other attacking players. And if he's back on penalty duty, he could be a significant points provider over the coming weeks. And even if he's not, I'd fancy him to displace Welbeck as the primary goal-provider (not necessarily to take his place in the team, just to start nabbing more of the goals), particularly as the veteran centre-forward must be in danger of getting a bit weary or stale after such an uncommonly long scoring streak (and, for him, an uncommonly long streak of staying injury-free), and will surely get some rest rotation over the Christmas fixture logjam. Brighton have a few more challenging fixtures in January and early February, but their run through to the end of the year is looking very sweet - and that makes many of their players suddenly much more attractive FPL assets, but most especially, I think, Joao Pedro.

How did they do?

Well, a bit of a mixed bag for my first venture into the 'Recommendations' business! Joao Pedro, although subbed off for a rest alarmingly soon after the hour mark, did indeed have another superb game, notching a goal, an assist, and maximum bonus points for a 12-point haul. Gordon, on the other hand, had an oddly subdued game, managing only one attempt on goal (well blocked by Fabianksi) and getting pulled with 25 minutes still to play - for a scant 2 points. I have faith that he will soon do better; evening games often throw teams out of their stride - Newcastle are usually much better than this.

I will try to remember to check in on these guys here again from time to time over the next couple of months.

Alas, as Brighton's form mysteriously crumbled in December, Joao Pedro had a frustrating time of it: still looking pretty good in patches, but the rest of the team weren't playing well enough to create many good opportunities for him. In the next 5 games from GW13 onwards, he managed only a solitary assist and a disappointing total of just 13 points.

Gordon has looked a more solid acquisition. Though he hasn't quite caught fire yet, as we know he sometimes can, he got either a goal or an assist in 5 of the 6 games up until the end of the year (being rested in GW15 against Brentford and only getting half an hour off the bench).

TC temptation.....

 

A lot of Fantasy managers are contemplating punting their Triple Captain chip this week.

After all, Salah is playing bottom-of-the-table Southampton, who've conceded nearly 2 goals per game so far. While Palmer is facing Leicester, and Saka has Forest at home (much less of an apparent pushover than the two promoted clubs, but still probably a bit of a gulf in class below Arsenal at their best).  I think you also have to fancy a resurgent-looking Newcastle and the in-form Gordon or Isak (or Barnes, or perhaps even Joelinton) at home against West Ham on Monday night, who have looked pretty terrible defensively of late. And Mbeumo or Wissa might get some chances against still occasionally shaky-at-the-back Everton (although they might still be slightly doubtful for a start this week?).

Some people are getting very excited about the prospects of Fernandes (or Hojlund?) against Ipswich, but I don't think we should expect immediate miracles from Ruben Amorim, and Ipswich - who, for me, have always looked much the best of this year's promoted trio - showed last time against Spurs that it is a mistake to take them for granted. 

There's even a surge of optimism for Haaland again - although Spurs have usually been a bit of a bogey team for Pep, and I would expect Ange to have his boys fired up to give an emphatic response to their humiliating fiasco at home against Ipswich last time out. A more left-field captaincy pick, though, might be DeBruyne - who does  have a bit of a history of absolutely smashing it as soon as he returns from a long absence.

It might be a good week for defences too, as 5 or 6 of the fixtures (it really is impossible to guess which way to call the Ipswich v United game; my love of the underdog would like it to go to Ipswich, but I can see United possibly pulling out a big game from somewhere....) look quite unbalanced: Liverpool, Chelsea, and Newcastle in particular, but also quite possibly Arsenal, Villa, City, and Manchester United might keep clean sheets;; so, it's not beyond the bounds of possibility that a defender or a keeper from one of those clubs might become the 'Player of the Week'. It's certainly feeling like it could be a very high-scoring GameWeek.

If I were a betting man (I am, sometimes...), I'd probably go for Palmer.

But I don't fancy him - or anyone else - enough this week to risk the Triple Captain on them.... because we're following on from an international break, and those bring so much uncertainty in their wake.

We're unsure of selections, because so many players might be fatigued or carrying a knock or late returning to their club after playing for their national squad. Many others, of course, were flagged with injuries after the last EPL gameweek (most of these were probably just phantom injuries, cooked up by their clubs to get them out of international duty - but we just don't know for sure); we've mostly had no updates on any of them until the last day or two, and it's still unclear whether some of them are going to be able to start. Worst of all, the usual schedule of training and tactical preparation within the club has been disrupted, and coaches have generally had, at most, a couple of days to work with their players again to get them ready for this weekend's games. While for those who haven't played any football, the rest might have been physically and mentally refreshing, some inevitable ring-rustiness from having missed the regular preparation routine for nearly two weeks is likely to outweigh that. All of this means that form in the first game back after an international break can be wildly unpredictable; many of the big clubs, in particular, have a tendency to misfire rather.

If this week's set of fixtures occurred at almost any other point in the season, in the midst of a regular run of games, I would probably be all over Salah or Palmer or Saka (or DeBruyne) as a prime Triple Captain opportunity.

But as it is, I think I'll wait: they're all facing bottom-of-the-table clubs again in January and February.

Well, Salah and Saka did indeed both have very bright games, notching 13 points each - which is a score you should be very happy with for the Triple Captain chip (although the foolishly greedy are always hoping for 15, 18, 20....).  Maddison and Cunha produced the two massive performances of the week, though; and I don't think anyone was betting on them as TC prospects!!

The 'curse' of the international break hit everywhere else, with United being predictably mediocre and largely outplayeed by Ipswich in Amorim's coaching debut, City having another shocker against bogeymen Spurs, Mbeumo and Wissa being completely invisible in a sterile goalless draw against Everton, while the gameweek ended with Newcastle producing a bizarrely lifeless display against a suddenly less-terrible West Ham and somehow losing, despite having the vast majority of the possession and goal chances. Funny old game, and all that.

Dilemmas of the Week - GW12

 

Every week, we need to take a long hard look at our squad, and ask ourselves if we want to make any changes....

And even if we do see a pressing case for a change here or there, we then need to weigh that against the possible advantage of saving our transfer - 'rolling' it over to use in a future week. This option achieves greater tactical complexity this season with the new rule that allows us to save up as many as 5 Free Transfers to use at one time. If we ever manage to do that, it would in effect be a 'mini Wildcard', enabling us to conduct a major squad overhaul in one fell swoop (particularly useful as there are a handful of 'premium' players who cost so much more than everyone else that you can't conveniently move them in and out of your squad without making multiple other changes as well).

Then, of course, occasionally multiple changes may seem so inescapable that we have to consider whether it's worth spending points on 1 or 2 extra transfers (a tactic which obviously deserves a whole post of its own one day).

So, what are the conundrums we face ahead of Gameweek 12?

Does anybody need to be moved out because of injury?

We saw the usual rash of 'yellow flags' pop up just ahead of the international break, as clubs cheekily exaggerated every slight knock and ache to get their boys excused from having to go and play for their countries. This blatant fibbing is really getting to ridiculous levels. However, there are, of course, some more genuine problems hidden in amongst all the lead-swingers, so it gets really difficult to sift through the injury bulletins and make decisions about your squad after a batch of international games like this. It looks as though most of the 'injuries' have indeed been trivial or illusory, with Palmer and Saka looking likely to be fine to play this weekend.  However, Ayari, who suffered an ankle injury in the last game, and Rice, who was suffering with a broken toe last time out and had to come off early, and Alexander-Arnold, who appeared to have picked up a minor hamstring problem, might still be out. And it is reported - how reliably, who can say? - that Mbeumo, Wissa, and Pinnock might not be available until next week (which would leave Brentford desperately short against Everton).

Trossard, Lindelof, Aina, and Bednarek picked up knocks in the internationals, though only the last of these looks serious enough to keep the player out (for a few weeks).

Ramsdale has suffered a finger injury which seems likely to keep him out of the Southampton goal for at least 3 or 4 weeks.

White and Fatawu have both had knee surgeries - the latter for an ACL rupture, which will probably keep the young Leicester star sidelined until at least the beginning of next season; very unfortunate. Ben White's problem appears to have been much more minor (cartilage?), but he's still unlikely to be available again until the New Year. This presumably means that Timber and Zinchenko will be Arsenal's starting full-backs this week; they're really getting stretched very thin.

Oh, I originally forgot to mention - Reece James pinged his hamstring again. a few minutes into the Arsenal game. The only surprise about this is that he'd managed to last 2 full games this time.  Apparently, it doesn't look too serious. But given his history of repeatedly re-injuring himself, I imagine he'll be eased back in very slowly this time. If at all....  After missing so much competitive football over the last 2 years, I fear the poor lad's lost much of his sharpness, and he no longer really looks as if he deserves a start over Gusto or Cucurella.

On the brighter side, Alisson, Elliott, Hwang Yoro and Shaw might be good to return this week....

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

Christie, Buonanotte, and Burn are all serving a 1-match ban for collecting 5 yellow cards. Palace's Kamada is starting a 3-game ban for getting himself sent off against Fulham. Kudus has had a 2-match extension added to his original 3-match ban for 'violent conduct', which will keep him out until the beginning of December. And Betancur has just been handed a 7-match ban (which would keep him out until Boxing Day - although Spurs are appealing the decision) for making some incautious jocular remarks about Son's ethnicity on Uruguayan TV.

South American internationals, notably Nunez and Diaz at Liverpool, must be considered unlikely to start after a long flight back this week.

And I would suggest that any Manchester United players are incredibly risky assets at the moment, as we wait to see what Amorim's selections and formation will be, and how well he'll be able to turn things around for the club (if at all....; a 'quick fix' certainly doesn't seem very likely). Training-ground reports suggest that he is looking to adopt his favourite 3-4-2-1 formation - which would probably mean no place for Garnacho (as I predicted in the last of these weekly round-ups) or Diallo (and moving forward, perhaps not Rashford or Mazraoui either.... or maybe even Mainoo). By contrast, 'forgotten men' Mount and Antony could be much more at home in this system; and perhaps Zirkzee too (playing as one of the 'dual 10s' rather than as an alternate for Hojlund at centre-forward). But even United's next two games against Ipswich and Everton might not be straightforward; and after that, they really face a pretty rocky fixture run through until the winter break. All these people rushing to buy Bruno Fernandes (because he'll enjoy playing for a fellow Portuguese??) have been eating the space candy, I fear!

Did anyone give other cause to consider dropping them?

Spurs's form has been looking so flakey of late, I wouldn't touch any of their players with a bargepole. (Although Spurs do have a record of upsetting Pep!)

But Arne Muric has actually redeemed himself somewhat in my eyes, with a very solid performance in Ipswich's impressive victory over Spurs last time.

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

Well, Bruno Fernandes had a fantastic game, but that was probably a one-off (they usually are with him). And as I just said above, there are so many reasons now to shy away from United players until the end of January.

Emile Smith Rowe also had a great game, and reassured those of us who were starting to become worried that he might be a little bit of a minutes-risk with Marco Silva's idiosyncratic selection policy.

I favour Joao Pedro and Anthony Gordon as the two most promising acquisitions after their. GW11 performances, though. I go into a little more detail here.

BEST OF LUCK, EVERYONE!

A little bit of Zen (17)

 

“Wise men don’t judge – they seek to understand.” 

Wei Wu Wei  (pen-name of wealthy English eccentric, and enthusiast of Taoism, Terence Gray)

The NEW United?

I had been thinking of doing a quick post on what I think United's lineup might start to look like under new coach, Ruben Amorim, but - as so often - I find I am in almost complete agreement with FourFourTwo's excellent analyst Adam Clery.

The only thing I'd add here is that I can really see Zirkzee thriving as one of the 'twin 10s' (at the expense of Rashford...).

But, as Adam points out, there's sufficient depth in the United squad that Amorim has the scope to try different players in different positions, and perhaps vary the selection occasionally according to his opponent. With this level of uncertainty, I feel it's hugely risky to take on any United assets at the moment, even the mercurial Bruno. (Onana might be the one exception.)

I had thought Amorim might have to move away from his tried-and-trusted '3-4-3' in order to better fit the personnel he finds at Old Trafford; but early training-ground videos apparently show him working on that formation. The main reason I thought Amorim might have to drop this approach, or only phase it in slowly, was that it might be difficult - undiplomatic - to drop Garnacho and Diallo, who have been United's two most dangerous players so far this season. They are likely to be the main casualties of the new tactical set-up, since it doesn't really have any place for conventional wingers. Although it's commonly billed as a 3-4-3 formation, it's actually more a 3-4-2-1, with the 'wide' attackers actually playing fairly narrow, dropping in behind the main forward as support strikers or dual 'No. 10s'; while the wide midfielders are wing-backs, for which defenders with some attacking capability will be favoured (although Antony, whose defensive numbers are very impressive, might get a look-in here).

I also wonder if Mazraoui might be somewhat at risk, since he's newer to United, and perhaps a bit less adaptable than Dalot (who has plenty of experience playing on either flank for the club), and a bit less of an attacking threat. The Moroccan's start looks safe for now; but when Shaw and Malacia are available again on the left, I can see Dalot switching sides and becoming the preferred starter at right wing-back.

This will be bad news for some FPL managers, since (until the recent surge of optimism about Bruno), Mazraoui and Garnacho are the two most selected players from United. Oops...

Sheep Picks (6)

 

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

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

Bruno Fernandes is a fantastic player, certainly. And he just bagged a goal and two assists against Leicester before the international break (and was unlucky that it wasn't 2 goals, 1 assist). But... that doubled his tally of attacking returns for the season! And even that monster 17-point haul only got him up to a fairly modest 50 point total (Salah, remember, is already past 100!).

He, and United, have had a really poor season so far. He's massively under-performing his expected goal involvements, and has seen his ownership drop steadily every week - until he got that goal against Chelsea at the start of the month. Now, suddenly, 300,000 managers have rushed in for him again.

As I warned here, sentiment plays a large part in a 'sheep pick' like this: Bruno is a very well-liked player (even when he isn't playing that well) and Manchester United continues to be a massively popular club worldwide (despite having become a comical calamity for the past decade-and-a-bit); so, any slight pretext to take some encouragement about their prospects is latched on to rather over-eagerly.

And when people wax lyrical about what a great FPL player Bruno is, they're allowing themselve to don the distorting, rosy-tinted goggles of nostalgia for a distant heyday. Yes, he was absolutely sensational in his first season-and-a-half at Old Trafford. But then he really lost his way towards the end of 2021: his productivity has fallen off a cliff over the following three seasons, dropping to literally half of what it was in his debut full season (OK, in points terms, down by about 40%). In some ways, it's even worse than that, because while his returns from penalties have held up pretty well, and he still gets the occasional pinger of a free-kick, his goals from open play have dwindled to almost nothing. (And he started to pick up a lot more yellow cards too...)

Bruno, has, unfortunately become one of FPL's  most notorious under-performers. He's in a similar zone to Son, whose occasional huge hauls make him sometimes a tempting pick, but whose lack of consistency can be very damaging: with Bruno, you have to be resigned to sometimes enduring long runs of poor returns. (In fact, he's rather less appealing than Son, because he generally manages fewer really big hauls in a season.... and almost never bags one in successive gameweeks.)

I discern two further reasons for this sudden flood of enthusiasm for the United captain:

1) The myth of the 'new manager bounce' - the optimistic delusion that a change of manager always produces an immediate improvement in form. NO, it does not; not always. 

And, in terms of a profound structural change to a more positive attitude and a more successful tactical approach, that's going to take weeks - at least - to bed in. People may point to how quickly Arne Slot has managed to get Liverpool back to the top of the table; but he did benefit considerably from having a very easy run of fixtures at the start of the season. And he'd had the whole of pre-season to work with his players. And he was starting from a good position, with Klopp having built a culture of success at the club - which he could seek to adapt and improve on further, but didn't need to rebuild from scratch. Manchester United have been building a culture of failure for the last 10 years, and it's going to be a much, much harder job for Ruben Amorim to start putting that right. (Frankly, they just don't look like they have the players to finish any better than 8th or 9th, even with a big uptick in performance. They don't even really merit comparison with the currently disappointing Villa or Spurs, or the impressively over-performing Brighton and Forest; they're more on the level of Bournemouth and Fulham.)

An immediate lift in performance, when it does happen, is usually very short-lived - and is probably more properly attributed to the sense of relief among the players at having escaped from an unpopular/unsuccessful manager than to anything the new man has yet accomplished. That being the case, Ruud van Nistelrooy has probably already reaped all or most of the likely benefit of any post-Ten Hag 'bounce'.

While I am quietly optimistic about what Amorim might achieve at Old Trafford (he is, by some margin, the best appointment they've made since Fergie retired), the transitional period might be protracted and painful. He doesn't have a great squad of players to work with, and they're not all a great fit for the tactical set-up he's used at Sporting. 

While new managers sometimes bring a short-lived boost to a team on first joining, they also bring a lot of uncertainty. So, the change of manager this week should really make people more cautious about buying Bruno, rather than more enthusiastic.

2)  An exaggerated optimism about how 'easy' a win they'll get against Ipswich (away!). Remember how that went for Spurs last week? Ipswich are a decent side, dogged in defence, and dangerous on the counter. It could be a very tricky baptism for Amorim.

Moreover, as with a number of these 'sheep picks' I've analysed already, people seem to be fatally ignoring questions of wider context in rushing for Bruno now.

First, United have a pretty daunting fixture run up until the winter break: Arsenal, City, and Liverpool in quick succession, all away; and Forest, Bournemouth, and Newcastle at home probably won't be any picnic for them.

Second, you might want to keep a squad slot and a chunk of budget for the returning Martin Odegaard or Kevin DeBruyne. They are much more consistent playmakers and part of title-challenging sides, and should clearly take priority over Bruno if they can recover even 60% or 70% of their best form.

BONUS CHIPS - who needs them?

 

I dislike FPL's 'bonus chips' - for me, they are an unncessary gimmick, just a further randomising element in a game that is already plenty random enough.

And they are a relatively recent innovation, only being introduced into the game for the first time in the 2015-2016 season.

Even the best players won't manage a double-digit haul much more than once every three or four games on average across the season; and they'll probably 'blank' (i.e., produce nothing beyond basic appearance points), or only return a very low score, at least one game in every three. So, you won't get a really good haul from your regular captaincy pick more than one week in three (unless you're very, very lucky). And even when you do, it's unlikely to be your best haul of the week - because, if you have a good squad, there are usually at least 5 or 6 potential candidates for the captaincy (and very often one of your other squad players will surprise you with an outstanding week, while all the 'usual suspects' falter....). So, even getting the captaincy choice 'right' for an individual gameweek is largely a matter of luck, something that only comes good for you perhaps 20% to 30% of the time.

Now, there are certain fixtures where you might reasonably expect your star player to have a particularly high chance of a big score (and a particularly low chance of a poor score); but in practice, it doesn't often work out like that. I don't think the 'soft fixtures' actually produce significantly better outcomes most of the time. The odds in your favour are, hopefully, slightly enhanced if you choose your fixture to play the Triple Captain chip wisely, but you're still probably more likely to be disappointed than pleased with the outcome; and things can go very badly wrong. (Last year, I bet on Haaland against Bournemouth. The Viking was in smokin' form, and Bournemouth had started the season dreadfully, were deep in the relegation zone and conceding goals every week. This week, of course, was the week they suddenly began to turn things around. And our Erling apparently picked up an injury mid-way through the first half, and didn't reappear after the break - although it looked very much as if he might have been carrying some problem from the start, as he was completely off his game. The most in-form player in the league at the time faces one of the weakest defences.... and comes away with 1 point! Shit like this happens in our game all too often....)

And yet, at the other extreme, you might once-in-a-blue-moon (I mean, once every decade... or two....) happen to pick the week in which your favourite captaincy choice produces a monster haul for your TripleCap!! Even more galling, there are some people who seem to play the chip completely randomly on some not particularly fancied player... who produces a blinder out-of-the-blue - like Noni Madueke in Gameweek 2 of this season. Yep, it all too often happens that someone can take a wild punt on a frankly idiotic choice for the chip, and come away with 50, 60 or 70-odd points. There's little skill in it, little justice, just a huge amount of randomness.... and LUCK!

The Bench Boost chip isn't much better. You can identify gameweeks which seem auspicious to play it because of their heavy density of unbalanced fixtures, and perhaps even a good number of double-fixtures ('big' Double Gameweeks can indeed offer a significant lift to your Bench Boost return; but there aren't many of them to aim for - well, only ONE this year! - and it's a risk to wait until the very end of the season for this chance to play the chip); and you might even carefully 'set up' for them, with judicious use of transfers in preceding weeks - or perhaps the deployment of the Wildcard - to try to ensure that you have a stronger bench than usual, and a full bench. But that's the main problem with this chip: you really need to be absolutely sure that all 15 squad members are going to start in order to take advantage of it - and that hardly ever happens. It has been as rarely as 3 or 4  times in the entire season for me (and not on weekends with many 'good' fixtures!). Last year I was geared up to play my Bench Boost 3 or 4 times,.... and every time I found myself undone by one or two last-minute injuries, unable to go ahead with using the chip on a bunch of good fixtures because I suddenly had huge gaps on the bench.

Even on a Double Gameweek, it is quite possible for all of your bench players to disappoint in both games and leave you with a single-digit return for the chip. If you have to use it on a Single Gameweek, you can easily end up with next-to-nothing. And a haul of 15-20 points is really about the best you can reasonably hope for; most of the time, you'll probably come out with a bit less than that. But, again, some people can get absurdly lucky with the chip, racking up 30 or 40 points or more on it.

It's just a roll of the dice!  Why do we need this extra gambling element in the game??  We DON'T. 

But gambling, alas, is addictive. Too many FPL managers enjoy this additional thrill of uncertainty, and would be loath to give it up.

At least these chips are still tied to the regular points-scoring structure of the game, still rewarding shrewd choices of players for the current fixtures. This season the game's controllers are threatening us with a further novelty, an as yet undefined 'Mystery Chip'. There has been much speculation online about what this new chip will turn out to be. There are a number of possibilities that aren't too wacky, such as additional points for one week for defenders or for forwards (encouraging you to switch to a different formation for that week). And I'm quite fond of the Super-Captain chip they have in Fantasy World Cup, which retroactively assigns your double-points captain bonus to your highest-returning player in the Gameweek (a rare example of a de-randomising chip; I like that!). Even the 'Limitless' chip they usually have in the international competitions (a Free Hit with the additional benefit of an unlimited budget) is harmless fun.

But I have a foreboding that the FPL overlords may be plotting something far more extreme for this new chip - something far more randomising, and far more remote from the normal structure of the game. I do hope I'm wrong; but I get a sinking feeling in my stomach every time I think about it. They're supposed to be announcing it just before it becomes available for use in the second half of the season, so we'll find out in a month or so. Let's keep our fingers crossed!

It is obviously too much to hope for that FPL would scrap the Triple Captain and Bench Boost chips. But we really don't need ANY MORE 'bonus chips' like this added to the game.

A little bit of Zen (16)

 

“What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in others.”

Kong Qiu (Confucius)

What is Trent FOR....?

I'm an admirer of the Trent Alexander-Arnold. Well, I used to be much more so, a few years ago. I acknowledge the case that he is a 'generational talent' - but I think he also has some serious shortcomings; shortcomings that have become more apparent in recent years. I rather fear that he has not developed much, if at all, as a player in that time. His gifts are still extraordinary, but they have not grown further; while his failings... perhaps have.

And, unfortunately, particularly from the point of view of the national team, I have become a bit of a sceptic about whether Trent really has a place in it. 

It is a common error - unfortunately shared by many England managers over the years - to suppose that in order to produce the best team, one must simply strive to incorporate all the most egregiously talented players. But I learned many years ago (I think this was the great secret of Brian Clough's extraordinary success in the 1970s) that creating a successful team is in fact a matter of finding an optimum balance between players with different skills profiles, different playing styles, different on-pitch 'personalities' - and that may often involve sacrificing some players who might in isolation appear much 'better' than those you might choose in their stead, because they just don't 'gel' with other players you want or need to make use of. (The great problem with the Gerrard/Lampard incompatibility which plagued the English national team through the Noughties was not that they were too similar in style [they really weren't!] or that they both wanted to play in the same position [it would have been perfectly possible to play them alongside each other in central midfield], but that they both expected to be the capo carismatico, the dominant personality on the pitch, the emotional heartbeat of the team - and there wasn't space for them both to be that. Successive England managers were afraid to leave out such popular and talented players, and so persisted in including them both - even though they evidently didn't function at their best when playing together. Thomas Tuchel, I think, is going to face a number of similar dilemmas; and I hope he will be braver in accepting that some talented players need to be omitted....)

The problem with Trent is that he is not really a full-back. He's not terrible at the role, he's got most of the attributes you need for it. But he's also lacking a few: most notably, pace. He gets skinned far too easily by nippy wingers up against him. And also.... I worry that he may be somewhat lacking in stamina, or desire to even try to get up and down the flank; he often just doesn't seem to be that bothered about recovering his defensive position quickly when he's pusheed a long way forward and his team have then suffered a turnover. And he has been encouraged in this weakness by having the Liverpool team built around this foible of his for the past several years: he hasn't needed to worry so much about the defensive part of his duties when he has such pacey central defenders as Van Dijk, Matip, and Konate alongside him, shoring things up. Indeed, for a long time the Liverpool approach was founded on having a very vigorous high-press which would often prevent turnovers in the opposition final third from leading to counter-attacks, and on having super-hardoworking midfielders - Fabinho, Wijnaldum, Henderson, Milner - who would stifle counter-attacks in the middle of the park,.... and move out wide to cover the space behind Trent or Robbo when they'd gone high up the pitch (sometimes even dropping back into the defensive line and temporarily taking over as the full-back). Trent, I fear, has been somewhat spoiled by this treatment. And it is rather unlikely that he'll find any other team - whether Real Madrid, where it seems certain he's bound next season, or England - who will be so extravagantly accommodating towards him.

What's more, it has become increasingly evident that Trent himself doesn't see himself as a full-back. Over the past year or so, he's done a number of interviews (like this one for the FourFourTwo channel) where he's suggested that he wants to play in areas of the pitch where he can "affect the play" more, where he can have a more decisive creative impact. He aspires to be a midfielder, probably a deep-lying playmaker in the mode of Andrea Pirlo or the later Toni Kroos. And he was transitioning to something of the sort last season under Klopp, when the sudden loss of the protective midfield screen necessitated some major tweaks in Liverpool's playing style - and it became too risky to allow Trent to maraud into the opposition half very often; instead, he started loitering in his own half, 'inverting' into midfield, playing just in front of his centre-backs and by-passing any attempt at a mid-block with his trademark long chipped balls over the top.

That's all fine when you're playing with Liverpool, who are a dominant team, almost always enjoy the majority of possession: Trent wasn't often put under pressure in that position - and would revert to the conventional full-back slot whenever the opposition did mount an attack. But if he wants to play in midfield permanently, he needs to add more elements to his game. He is excellent in his distribution, yes - one of the best long-passers in the world, no question. But a deep midifielder also has to take on defensive respoinsibilities: he needs to read the game well when the opposition are coming at him, he needs to be an incisive tackler, he needs to have a high workrate. Trent, alas, is rather lacking in those areas. When Southgate tried him out as a midfielder in the Euros this summer, it was a pretty unmitigated disaster. (That might have been largely a coaching failure - both in the specific game instructions, and in preparing him for the role. But still, he didn't cover himself in glory there.) I might question also whether he yet has the full range of attributes for the purely creative side of the job. Superlative long passing isn't enough; you need to excel in shorter passing options too; you need to be capable of dictating the tempo of the game by knowing when to play the ball early and when to hang on to it for a moment, by knowing when to play long and when to play short, by knowing when to play a risky forward pass and when to play it safe and keep possesion with a simple sideways or backwards pass.

Furthermore, even the sublime long-passing is very dependent on team context for its success. Trent has been able to forge a highly productive partnership down Liverpool's right flank with Mo Salah - who still has after-burners even in his thirties (and superb antiicpation, and a magical first touch!); and the Reds are also blessed with more similarly pacey and skillful players across the front line: Luis Diaz, usually on the other side, Diogo Jota, when he's fit, and Darwin Nunez, when he's on his game. Those early balls pinged over the opposing defenders' heads aren't going to work without such receivers racing in behind to get on the end of them (even Liverpool seem to be using that tactic much more seldom this year; perhaps because Slot regards it as too risky, preferring more patient progression through the middle). Certainly for England, Harry Kane just hasn't got the legs to chase balls like that any more (if he ever did; probably not...); Watkins might, but he's hardly a speed-demon either. So, for the national team, I fear that Trent's one supreme - just about sole - asset becomes largely worthless at the moment.

Trent, I feel, still has quite a bit to learn about the game - at least, if he is going to successfully transition to being an out-and-out midfielder. And I'm not convinced that he's got the right attitude to learn those lessons. One of the things that's alarmed me most about him in the last year or two is a suggestion of complacency, even sometimes of arrogance about him; he is starting to talk about himself as if he is one of the greatest players in the world - without having yet quite earned that status. And when - occasionally - he has a bad game, it can be very, very bad: it's as if his concentration deserts him entirely, or his motivation; sometimes, just once in a while, he really looks like he just can't be bothered to, as the pundits like to say these days, put in a shift.

Trent has some breathtaking skills: his long passing, his early crossing, and his deadball delivery are amongst the best in the world. But that's about it: he doesn't have that much else going for him - pace, stamina, workrate, adaptability. He's not really a full-back - not a great full-back, anyway. And he's not yet a great midfielder. He falls uncomfortably between the two stools.

I'm unsure how well he'll settle into the Real Madrid side next year. I suspect he might find himself used as an impact player in certain parts of certain games, but not be favoured as an automatic starter. And since neither England football fans nor the England manager watch very much of La Liga, I think there's a danger that - however well or otherwise he does there - he will drop off the radar of the national team.

I really hope I'm wrong about this. I would love to see Trent enhance the defensive aspects of his game, and start to look like a convincing world-class full-back.... or a world-class deep playmaker. And it would be a crying shame not to be able to make use of his talents in the national team. But at the moment, I just don't see where he fits. You can't select a player just because he does a few things supremely well (how I've rolled my eyes over the last year or two at the ludicrous suggestions that James Ward-Prowse ought to be in the England squad just for his free-kicks, or Ivan Toney for his penalties...!); you need him to be able to do an all-around job in his given position - and I'm not sure that Trent can.