Luck-o-Meter - 25-26 Gameweek 2

 

We got off to the worst possible start this week, with Cole Palmer, the most owned player in the game (slightly above Salah and Joao Pedro at 55%), being a last-minute omission, after feeling discomfort in his groin during the warm-up. If anything, Chelsea seemed to benefit from the enforced change - which allowed Joao Pedro a freer role in the No. 10 space, while the combative Delap came into the side to take on the central striker's role of giving the West Ham defence a rough ride. Things nearly went amiss early on, though, with a Paqueta drive from 20-odd yards somehow beating Sanchez (the keeper had a clear view of it all the way, and wasn't far from the ball, but seemed to completely misread the flight of it); and then a little later, Fullkrug appeared to have given the home side the lead for a second time - but his effort was ultimately ruled out for a very tight offside in the build-up (which again seemed to take an inordinately long time for VAR to rule on). But after those two early scares, Chelsea took control and powered through to a comfortable win; they could, in fact, have scored more than the 5 they eventually notched (Enzo Fernandez, in particular, spurned a fantastic chance to nab what would have been his second and Chelsea's fourth early in the second half). Graham Potter brought on Callum Wilson for Fullkrug at half-time; not clear if this was for tactical or fitness reasons, but either way, it's not likely to endear him to the player - or perhaps to the fans, who were rushing for the exits very early on, as their team collapsed for the second week running. The unfortunate Potter is now a hot favourite to become the first managerial sacking of the new season. (William Hill are currently quoting 9/4 on that - which is well worth having!)

Manchester City, still worryingly toothless in the midfield duels, were fairly comprehensively outplayed by Thomas Frank's well-organised Spurs (the home side might have had nearly two-thirds of the possession, but they were unable to do very much with it). No major controversies here, although Spurs were a bit hard done-by to have two bad fouls on Porro and Kudus, on the very edge of the opposition penalty area, ignored by the referee within a minute or so of each other: a free-kick in a dangerous position, and an early yellow card for goalkeeper Trafford, might have had a significant impact in the game. It was also a bit mystifying as to how the ref came to add on a further 5 or 6 minutes at the end of the first half, over and above the 7 minutes that had already been calculated. And a fair chunk of that additional time was occasioned by a painfully protracted VAR delay in adjudicating Spurs's first goal (if the 'semi-automated' decision technology was in use for determining offsides, it was not shared on live television; and it was a terrible initial call by the linesman - Richarlison was comfortably onside, and it should really not have taken more than a few seconds to confirm that fact). Richarlison owners are probably a little aggrieved that he was denied a second assist, when Trafford pushed the ball away from his feet - straight to a grateful Palhinha; if the City keeper had parried a shot to another attacker, the assist would have been awarded - I can't see how or why this should be any different. There was yet another FPL injury blow in this one, with 23%-owned Ait-Nouri limping off in the first half with a sprained ankle. (Hopefully not too serious; but one wonders why anyone would want City defenders at the moment....)

Wolves were looking occasionally dangerous, and were still in the game at Bournemouth - until Toti's unfortunate sending-off. That again was a slightly questionable decision, very, very soft: a defender chasing a forward on a breakaway shouldn't take a chance by placing a hand on him - but I think that's all Toti did: he placed his hand on Evanilson's back for a fraction of a second, but it didn't look like any kind of a push. I'd like to see those claims denied a bit more often - to discourage forwards from collapsing like a deckchair as soon as they feel the slightest contact on them. It seemed a bit odd, too, in this instance that the referee took such a very long time before reaching for the red card (it wasn't clear if perhaps VAR was whispering in his ear about the incident, and recommending the card).

Brentford are starting to get their act together, after a worryingly shambolic opening performance last week. They looked like they could have won much more comfortably against a lacklustre Aston Villa, whose star men, Rogers and Watkins, were so anonymous here that they may have played themselves out of an England call-up from the watching Thomas Tuchel. There was another very questionable disallowed goal in this one, with Mikkel Damsgaard lashing a volley into the roof of the net, only for the referee to declare that Emi Martinez had been 'impeded' by Nathan Collins; sure, Collins was trying to get in the way, but that's a legitimate aim for a defender in the opposition box; Martinez ran into him, rather than vice a versa - and should have been strong enough not to be unbalanced by the collision anyway (he was desperately play-acting, feigning an injury from the incident to try to gain sympathy - or forgiveness for an error that appeared to have cost his side a second goal).

For the first half hour, Sunderland looked well on top in their 'relegation six-pointer' away to Burnley, but failed to convert a couple of excellent chances - and then faded out of the game.The loss of last week's goal hero Dan Ballard to an early injury may have been a psychological blow that took some of the wind out of their sails. Burnley utlimately looked well worth the win (although their lead was precarious until Jaidon Anthony's late breakaway). The only slight refereeing controversy here was the disallowing of an initial goal for Burnley's Lyle Foster for a very soft 'foul' on a defender.

Arsenal cruised to a predictably comfortable win against promoted Leeds, but injuries to White before the game, and Odegaard and Saka during it, may be a major setback (although, on the other hand, this might present an excellent opportunity to immediately integrate Eze in the starting line-up, which might not otherwise have happened). Timber, coming in for White at right-back, managed to bundle in a couple of scrappy goals from Declan Rice corners, making him probably the highest-returning FPL player of the week (anyone who had him in their side was astonishingly lucky, as he really wasn't fancied to get more than token minutes off the bench). Arsenal fans will also be relieved that new striker Gyokeres is off and running (it may have been particularly valuable to settle his nerves after an horrendous early miss, when Leeds were caught out in building from the back, and the ball broke perfectly to the Swede, on his own 8 yards out with only the keeper to beat,... and he rushed his effort, screwing it miles wide). Max Dowman, 15-year-old wonderkid, also made an impressive debut for the last 25 minutes, fizzing a left-foot volley just wide, and later winning a penalty to let Gyokeres claim the home sids's fifth goal.

Palace v Forest was a tight game, with no standout incidents. The major disappointment for FPL managers in this one was that two of the stoutest defences in the league, facing each other, both narrowly failed to keep a clean sheet. Forest had rather the better of it in the second half, and might have nicked the win late on when new signing Igor Jesus smashed a shot against the post (that would have been assist for centre-back Murillo; I really fancy him to come up with a few attacking contributions over the season). For the second week running, industrious midfield lynchpin Elliot Anderson appeared to be slightly screwed by the 'defensive points' assessment; he was initially credited with 13 eligible 'contributions' in this game, but that was subsequently downgraded to only 11, without explanation, so he again just missed out on the extra points. (We really could do with a proper explanation from FPL of how this new points system is supposed to be working.)

Oh dear, this just wasn't Brighton's day, was it? They looked the better side for long spells, and had plenty of chances to secure an away win at Everton: Mitoma's superb volley in the opening minutes scudding off the top of the crossbar, Welbeck somehow missing an open goal from four yards out, Van Hecke's deflected shot from distance beating Pickford burt crashing against the post, O'Riley fumbling the chance to convert a suicidal back-pass from Tarkowski,...; and then, in the second half, Welbeck fluffing an unjustly awarded penalty to hand Pickford a fairly easy save. It's a bit strange that Welbeck was even taking it, after O'Riley had despatched such a good one last week. But the decision against Dewsbury-Hall was very, very harsh (I'd be OK with a 'strict liability' rule that a penalty automatically results if a contact with the arm deflects a goal-bound shot; but I don't think that is the case at the moment. If a shot is fired at a defender from close range, and he's turning away from it, trying to keep his hands close to his chest.... under the current framing of the rule, that shouldn't be a penalty.) Poor Fabian Hurzeler must have been tearing his hair out. A good first win for Everton at their new stadium, with excellent performances from Grealish and Ndiaye - but they certainly rode their luck a bit.

Fulham again redeemed themselves through their substitutions (though it makes you wonder if some of these players should be starting....). United, apart from a few lively moments from Cunha, really showed nothing - and I suspect the odds on Amorim getting the chop will soon be shortening; their expensive summer signings haven't really done anything to rectify the problems the team had last year, and another bottom-half finish is looking dangerously likely. Another really awful VAR decision here, with the backroom team, after long deliberation, deciding to direct the unfortunate Chris Kavanagh (who's now made two of the worst penalty awards imaginable within the space of six days!) to take a second look at some grappling in the box at a corner. Yes, it did look rather as if the burly Calvin Bassey had executed a neat judo throw on the much more slight Mason Mount - but Mount had been holding him, indeed still had a handful of his shirt even after he'd hit the floor (and another United player next to him was clearly guilty of a blatant holding offence too); and he really just tripped over, as Bassey violently shifted his weight to unbalance him - nowhere near a penalty! Bassey himself was whingeing that United's goal should have been ruled out for a foul on him, but I was less in sympathy there: Yoro placed hands on his back, but there appeared to be absolutely no force in the 'push' at all - the defender just felt contact, and immediately sat down to try to get the foul. The further FPL wrinkle in that opening goal was that it was orginally awarded to Yoro, and the assist thus was given to Mbeumo's corner - though the United defender's weak header was clearly miles off target, and had fotuitously deflected into the goal off Muniz's back. The incident was correctly re-classified as an 'own goal' some time after the end of the game; but it's a bit rough on Mbeumo or Yoro owners (OK, Mbeumo owners - why would anyone own Yoro?) to have FPL points awarded to them and then taken away again. Owners of Bruno Fernandes (who is, bafflingly, the 20th most popular player, with an ownership of over 21%) were dismayed to see him waste the unjustly awarded penalty with one of the worst spot-kicks he has ever taken. (Bizarrely, he allowed himself to be put off by an accidental collision with the referee, who he bumped into as he was backing away from the ball during his pre-kick routine. He probably made things worse for himself by getting into an exasperated exchange with Kavanagh about it, and then taking a long time to re-spot the ball and begin his routine all over again. And then.... all the warning signs were there: completely straight-on initial position, still very straight-on approach position after shuffling a couple of paces to his left, very short run-up, not looking where he meant to place the ball.....  Everyone in the stadium knew he was going to miss a second or two before he struck the ball.)

And oh, dear me, the Monday night game turned out to be the game of the weekend, and of the season so far,... and might well be a leading contender for the overall 'Game of the Season'. Liverpool were once again full of quality, but also full of frailty, and were really astonishingly lucky to win this one: Newcastle were well on top for most of the game, even when reduced to 10 men for slightly more than half of it, and only a couple of very much against-the-run-of-play goals (great strikes from just outside the box from Gravenberch and Ekitike, the first of which, a scudding effort that took a bit of a deflection off a defender and just sneaked inside the post - Pope didn't even appear to see) had given them a lead in the first place. And then, after Newcastle had bravely battled back into the match, they got hit on the counter-attack by teenage substitute Rio Ngumoha, with pretty much the last kick of the game - after some 10 minutes of added-on time (why so much??  does Slot have some 'compromat' on PGMOL???). Even the straight-red sending-off of Anthony Gordon just before half-time wasn't entirely straightforward. He certainly came rushing at Van Dijk from a long way off, and clattered him from behind - but it looked as if he was pulling out of the contact at the last moment, had his studs down, foot on the floor, just smacking the big defender's heel (Van Dijk himself didn't seem that perturbed by it afterwards). The referee apparently saw it that way too at first, just issuing a yellow card - but he was eventually told to go and have another look by VAR, and, of course, that invariably prejudices the referee into thinking that he has only one possible decision. Though the challenge was reckless in its closing speed, there didn't seem to be anything too extreme in the contact itself - although the VAR playback (at least as far as I've been able to see on highlights so far) weirdly didn't seem to show the moment of contact at all. There may be a case that Gordon only got his foot down at the last instant (Van Dijk stepped across him slightly as he closed in, and leaned backwards to try to shield the ball; Gordon, rushing in with his foot initially raised, thinking he could reach the ball, put his foot down very late), and, in doing so, may have raked the back of Van Dijk's leg. Some post-match stills appear to show stud-marks on the Dutchman's calf (but they look very 'Photo-shopped'; and there was no glimpse of that on the original TV coverage). In any case, that might be deemed an unfortunate, 'accidental' contact - and certainly a long way short of the kind of potential 'leg-breaker' we usually expect for a straight red card offence. When a foul divides opinion as sharply as this one did, it's probably a bit of a 50/50; and I'm concerned that the video playback didn't seem to offer a definitive view. For the second week running, Liverpool were riding their luck in this game; but, in the EPL as in FPL, you need to be lucky as well as good to win the title!

It's been a relatively unremarkable week on the officiating, with no really outrageosly awful decisions - although quite a few questionable ones: 2 goals ruled out for non-existent, or very, very soft 'fouls', and a perhaps slightly harsh sending-off on Saturday; a couple of dubious-looking penalty awards (both, remarkably, missed!) on Sunday; a further red card on Monday, and a few suspiciously 'generous' rations of added-on time! The large number of injuries to popular picks is also a major contributor to the 'LUCK' equation, with the late dropping-out of Ben White, the last-second exclusion of Cole Palmer, and the in-game injuries to Rayan Ait-Nouri, Martin Odegaard, and Bukayo Saka all rather eye-watering for some FPL managers. The tallying of 'defensive contributions' for potential extra points this year will probably continue to add to the sense of confusion and injustice we almost invariably feel about the bonus point allocations; though there don't appear to have been any such surprising outcomes from that as we saw in the opening gameweek (though Elliot Anderson may have been slightly shafted...). And I'm still concerned about often awkwardly long delays in deciding offside calls, and an ongoing general lack of transparency about how VAR is operating. And heck, the fact that Jurrien Timber (who wasn't expected to start) produced the most massive haul of the week is worth at least one more 'LUCK' point all on its own! Apart from Joao Pedro and Viktor Gyokeres up front, the 'Team of the Week' is yet again composed entirely of players that just about nobody would have owned. So, it's looking like a fairly average 6 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter' this week (though perhaps very nearly a 7!!).

Early Wildcard?

 

"Oh, damn, six of my players were disappointing this week. But, hey, what, there's a way I could replace them ALL??" 

That seems  to be the attitude of many FPL managers - reeling in pain after a low-scoring opening week, they suddenly 'remember' their Wildcard, as if it were a pleasant surprise, like an unexpectedly generous gift left under their pillow by the Tooth Fairy. And they embrace it as their SALVATION.

It would be less funny and painful if it were only the most naive newbies that fell for this misguided foolishness, but actually an awful lot of long-time players give in to this sort of 'buyers' remorse' at the start of the season and blow a Wildcard after 1 or 2 gameweeks. 

The thing is, you don't really know if someone is a 'bad pick' after one game (or even two or three, most of the time), so it's crazy to make judgements that quickly. Almost all of the best and most fancied players had a fairly subdued opening game this year. That often happens. It doesn't mean they won't start getting into their usual groove this week, or next... And last week's top performers - Ekitike, Reijnders, Gibbs-White - aren't yet in 'hot form'; they've had one good game. They could very easily have a stinker this week,... or not start at all.

This game craps on you so often and so hard that even if you do find yourself with a number of absolutely horrible players in your initial squad that you really need to dump as soon as possible, there will almost certainly be a few occasions over the next four months where you have more players than that suddenly dropped/injured/suspended..... 

Wildcard is for emergencies; a bad GW1 is NOT an emergency.

More on the Sisyphus metaphor

My (becoming) regular likening of the FPL experience to the mythical labour of Sisyphus at the start of each season... just reminded me of this little oddity. I hope it will amuse. It is a story that came to me in a dream, a quarter of a century or so ago. (Really)

I am in a desert environment, a hot, dusty plain - almost completely featureless but for a large hill just in front of me.

Half-way up the hill, I see a brawny man grunting and sweating as he struggles to turn over a large, round-ish boulder.  He eventually succeeds in flipping it over once, pauses for just a few moments, and then sets to trying to do it again.  The stone is clearly enormously heavy, and it is painfully hard work: he is endeavouring to move it uphill.

I approach, fascinated.  I'm tempted to offer to help him move this rock, but feel embarrassed as to how to do this. And the man is anyway too intent on his labours to notice me.

At last, he manages to get the boulder to the top of the hill, and then, with one last huge heave, he sends it toppling over the crest and rolling - skipping, bouncing, crashing - down the far slope under its own weight, raising a cloud of dust behind it as it goes, scattering smaller stones left and right, smashing the occasional withered tree or cactus that stands in its path.

The man whoops and hollers with delight as he watches the boulder's descent.  Then he trots down the hill after it.

I catch up to him at the foot of the hill, just as he has once again started toiling to roll it back to the top.

"Say, that does look kind of fun," I say, sheepishly.  "Could I have a try?"

And Sisyphus (for it is he) replies, "Get your own f***ing rock!"

In FPL-land, I feel this should remind us to make our own selections, and keep our teams to ourselves. Each of us has his own boulder to push; and we should not seek, or offer, help in that task.

Yes, everything's a potential metaphor for me.

Dilemmas of the Week - Gameweek 2 (25/26)

 

Not too much to take note of, injury-wise, for the second Gameweek of the new season; but ongoing transfer shenanigans are still causing some upheaval - as well as some unwelcome revelations last week about early-season fitness levels and likely minutes-risks due to early substitutions.

I'll try 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 2 of the new season?

Does anybody need to be moved out because of injury?

Kai Havertz reportedly has a knee problem that may keep him out for an extended period, but no details seem to have been released as yet. That's probably not much of a deal for FPL, as nobody was expecting him to get many starts after the arrival of Gyokeres.

Jeremie Frimpong sustained a minor hamstring strain in the opening match, and is expected to be out until at least mid-September. (A blow to many, as he had been selected by over 23% of FPL managers prior to the start of the season. Since his natural replacement, Conor Bradley, has been struggling with a muscle injury for some weeks, and apparently still hasn't been seen in training, this could be an opportunity for Joe Gomez to get some starts - and offer cut-price representation in the Liverpool defence. Although that might not be so enticing, as, on the evidence of their opener against Bournemouth, they might not be keeping many clean sheets this season!)

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

Ezri Konsa is serving a one-match ban, after getting sent off for a 'denial of a goalscoring' opportunity foul against Newcastle last week.

Alexander Isak and Yoane Wissa are still ruled out by ongoing transfer discussions around them. I am somewhat surprised that Ollie Watkins isn't in the same boat; and Nicolas Jackson is also very unlikely to get any minutes at Chelsea, even off the bench, until his future is resolved one way or the other; I'd be very wary of taking either of them, for fear of them suffering a lack of focus on their game - or perhaps suddenly being removed from squad consideration because of a new offer.

Ebere Eze is set to move to Arsenal. That probably wipes out his FPL value anyway, as he's unlikely to enjoy a regular start there, or to be nearly as impactful as he was for Palace even if he does. But he certainly won't be able to turn out for them this week, and probably not until after the early-September international break.

Exciting new striker arrivals, Benjamin Sesko and Viktor Gyokeres, both still look quite a long way off full-match fitness, and might get abbreviated minutes for another week or two at least.

Amad Diallo, although displaced from any likelihood of an outright attacking role by the arrival of Bryan Mbeumo, had been widely expected to become Amorim's preferred starter at right wing-back. However, Diogo Dalot got the nod there last week, and it seems likely that the two of them may rotate that position - making either of them useless for FPL, until one of them becomes the regular starter.

Crystal Palace played a preliminary game in the Europa Conference League on Thursday evening, and they don't have much squad depth - so, they are likely to be suffering a bit of weariness in their Sunday afternoon game at home against Forest.

Did anyone give other cause to consider dropping them?

The early withdrawal - just prior to the 60-minute mark - of several popular FPL picks last week was a major cause of concern. We must hope that this was just a one-off aberration, prompted by early-season concerns about inadequate fitness levels. But if top managers start showing this behaviour frequently - and players don't remember the art of walking off slowly if the board with their number goes up around the start of minute 59 (honestly, this is one of the things I most cherish Erling Haaland for!) - we might have to seriously rethink taking a chance on any players likely to be so affected. (I got burned on Milos Kerkez last week.)

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

Cody Gakpo and Hugo Ekitike, Morgan Gibbs-White, Richarlison, Tijani Reijnders and Rico Lewis produced the only really outstanding performances in a mostly very drab Gameweek 1. However, the latter three of those look fairly unlikely to enjoy invariable starts at their clubs, Ekitike is playing under the shadow of possible imminent replacement by Isak, and Gibbs-White, even at his very best, isn't really quite enough of a goal-threat to merit FPL consideration. Gakpo, on the other hand, was for me an obviously far preferable choice to Wirtz (and even Salah, who's just far too expensive this year) all along, and I can't fathom why people hadn't picked him in the initial squad.

A fairly short roundup this week - but things will doubtless get muddier and muddier in the weeks to come....

BEST OF LUCK, EVERYONE!

A little bit of Zen (56)

 

"If you constantly strive to do your best, if you constantly seek to improve - you can 'succeed' every week."

GW

How the transfer window became such A CESSPOOL

My mate Adam Clery - taking a rare break from his usual output of insightful tactical breakdowns on players and teams - just put out this rather fascinating video about how the transfer market operates in the modern game: not so much about the Isak saga in particular, though that, of course, provides the main illustrative example, but rather about how the evolving media landscape of the last few years has led to this toxic soup of disinformation in which we now find ourselves drowning.

Two of the key takeaways I found in this (which, if I'd been previously 'aware' of them, I'd not fully taken onboard and appreciated their significance) are that this toxic soup has got very much worse just in the last few years since Elon started to monetize Twitter/X; even 'respectable' journalists can't now resist the allure of easy dosh for circulating inflammatory transfer gossip that may garner millions of 'views' and 'shares', while a few ludicrous vultures like the notorious Fabrizio Romano can now manage to make a fat income from peddling this kind of crap 24/7. The second vital point is that whereas players in the past would generally utilize the 'legitimate' means of putting in a formal 'transfer request' if they were really desperate for a move, in recent years that has become almost unheard-of, as modern contracts heavily disincentivize this 'nuclear option' with a range of financial penalties (Isak and Wissa - and others who are known to 'want away' but haven't made such big waves about it - haven't dared to pursue this option, despite their alleged determination to leave their present clubs).

With the effective removal of this key piece of leverage players formerly used to be able to employ to lobby aggressively for a transfer, they - or rather, in the great majority of cases, their management teams - have felt obliged to resort to flame wars via social media instead. We see almost daily dribbles of news about how a player doesn't want to join in pre-season training, feels that his relationship with his present club has irrevocably broken down, that 'trust has been broken', that he couldn't possibly play for them ever again, etc., etc..... just to affirm his eagerness about a possible move and to try to keep some pressure on interested clubs to keep plugging away at the negotiation.

Much of the time, this stuff is at best grossly overstated, at worst entirely bogus. Isak - although he's done terrible damage to his relationship with the Newcastle fans, and possibly with some of his teammates too - would surely continue to play for his present club, and do so quite 'happily', if the mooted transfer to Liverpool were not to be completed in the next 11 days. And if the club are potentially open to such a lucrative transfer going ahead, they probably won't want to jeopardize it by having the player take part in competitive matches, or even in the often intense team training that precedes them; if negotations are ongoing, the prospective buyer typically imposes such a stipulation on keeping the player out of harm's way. So, I'm not convinced that Isak has really 'refused' to join the squad; I doubt if Newcastle would want him taking part while transfer discussions are happening.

A question remains, though, HOW, WHY does any of this nonsense work?? Surely the clubs aren't fooled, football insiders know that this is all smoke-and-mirrors, PR tomfoolery. I suspect that, if it does have any impact (perhaps it doesn't), it operates indirectly through fan pressure. Fans tend to feast on this regular diet of tweet and counter-tweet rather undiscriminatingly, and can become very emotionally invested in their perceptions of an unfolding narrative around a particular player. Perhaps it feels a little harder for the Liverpool leadership to back away from signing Isak now that their fanbase has got so excited about the idea? Just a thought. Perhaps Newcastle are going to be more open to letting him go, now that so many of their fans have turned against him as a Judas? That is perhaps even more likely.

It is very sad that things have come to this. It is yet another instance of the corrupting influence of the social media, an untrammelled, unfiltered torrent of titillation and provocation gushing into people's brains every hour (if you own a smartphone; I never have!). The blame rests ultimately on the great reading public; if they didn't gobble up this diet of shite so gleefully every day, there wouldn't be the incentives to produce it.

I would also venture that perhaps the game's authorities - either the Premier League or the Football Association, or perhaps, for once, both of them working in concert - should intervene to try to stop this sort of unseemly behaviour before it gets any worse (can it get any worse??). Players who refuse to honour their contracts - or even publicly threaten to do so (and if statements are put out in a player's name, they should be challenged immediately to personally confirm or deny their contents) - should be heavily sanctioned under the rules of the game. It is probably already within the power of the clubs to suspend wages and/or impose fines for such behaviour, but they'll be reluctant to take such extreme action if it might jeopardise their relationship with a player who might yet stay with them. But the game's authorities could surely take action under the umbrella of the 'bringing the game into disrepute' offence - imposing fines, banning someone from playing, perhaps even suspending their registration to effectively block any possible transfer.

That sounds extreme, I know. But if such measures were to be announnced, I'm quite sure they would never need to be used. Players and clubs would simply find a new - and hopefully, more civilized, and perhaps more private - means of working through their disagreements. Well, a man can dream.

[I wonder if the frequent mention of interest from other clubs - 'interest' which often evaporates suspiciously quickly, and is sometimes never corroborated by the club in question - is perhaps one of the most overused and most hollow of these Twitter-wars ploys. Does it really seem plausible that Ebere Eze was on the brink of signing for Spurs today,.... and then only an hour or two later would sign for Arsenal instead??  Hinting at interest from such a hated rival would be a guaranteed means to amplify the emotional temperature of the Arsenal fans, and thus perhaps intensify the pressure on the negotiating team to close the deal quickly....  And Spurs might not feel inclined to deny the story, even if completely unfounded. If there were in fact a chance of Eze being available, they wouldn't want to write themselves out of contention for him, would they? And even if they weren't interested, they wouldn't want to rouse their fans' ire by stating as much publicly - that might suggest poor judgement on their part, or a lack of ambition, or a shortage of funds. If Eze's agents say he nearly signed for Spurs, that's quite flattering and exciting for Spurs - even if it came to nothing. And it adds that little bit more fuel to the fire of their implacable enmity towards their North London rivals. All good.  I really don't think Spurs were ever in talks with him; though they might have wished they had been...] 

Don't take a chance on uncertain starters (or new arrivals)

 

As I noted last week, I have often been guilty of taking a few too many risks in my own initial squad, and this has no doubt played its part in the fact that I have generally suffered a rather poor start to the FPL season.

With me, it's a rather specific foible of getting tempted to gamble on a fringe pick, a promising up-and-comer who isn't yet quite established as a regular starter at his club, or not at any rate as a significant force in FPL. Last year, for instance, I fancied that Jarrell Quansah was likely to get a few starts, because of a minor injury problem with Konate, and that he might prove good enough in that spell to earn a regular place; instead, Slot grew disillusioned with him very quickly, and took the almost unheard-of step of yanking him off at half-time in the very first game - wrecking the youngster's confidence, and effectively ending his Liverpool career. (Though I can understand why he did it in terms of the tactical situation on the pitch, I still feel that was a mistake on the Dutchman's part: possibly gaining a marginal advantage in the immediate game-state does not outweigh the damage done by potentially ruining a young player's career and thereby depleting the club's back-up resources in central defence.)  A year or so before that, I'd been bullish about Rico Lewis's prospects with City: and indeed, he was a regular starter, and playing very well, early in the season - but, of course, Pep being Pep, that didn't last very long. Going back a bit further, I was a huge fan of the talent of Norwich's elegant No. 10, Todd Cantwell, and was convinced he could become one of the best budget midfield picks for the season - but he too fell out of favour with his manager, and his career mysteriously tanked from that moment. (Yes, I could begin to worry that I am some kind of jinx....)

A bit later in the season, you can get away with taking one or two chances like this; bringing in a player who's not yet a proven points-provider, perhaps not even an absolutely certain starter; buying them early to get them at a low price, and carrying them on the bench for a few weeks until they start to confirm the promise you saw in them.

But in the opening weeks,... there are so many other uncertainties: players who might be displaced by new arrivals at the club, players who might be dropped because of an imminent transfer away, players who might not start or might only get short minutes because they're still short of full match-fitness, players who might go down with a last-minute injury....  Yep, at this time of year, you're quite likely to suffer at least one unexpected drop-out - perhaps even two or three, if you're a bit unlucky - from your squad every week, even among the players that you'd normally expect to be certain starters. (This is one of the key reasons why it's INSANE to consider playing a Bench Boost this early in the season.)

So, you really can't afford to load the odds against yourself by including any picks who are obviously in one of those most 'at risk' categories. We knew Isak was going to be mired in a transfer wrangle - and unable to play for anyone - for weeks. We knew Eze was likely to move this week - surely too late to have any chance of turning out for his new club this weekend. We knew Sesko and Gyokeres were relatively late arrivals, and hadn't trained much over the summer, and were thus likely to get quite limited minutes over the first two or three weeks. We knew that with Marmoush, Foden, Cherki, Reijnders, Silva, Gonzalez, Kovacic and Gundogan all competing for a small number of places in the City midfield, we couldn't count on any of them being invariable starters.

It was really not smart to pick ANY of these players in the initial squad this year.

Even if new arrivals at a club do appear to be more-or-less fully fit, and have had just about enough time to start bedding in with their new teammates, they remain unknown quantities: it is likely that they may take quite a while to fully settle in to a new style of play, and it might be weeks or months before they start producing their best; some, perhaps, if they're arriving from a lower tier in England or from an overseas league, may never successfully make the step up to this most physically intense and competitive of leagues. How soon - if ever - will Eze become a starter at Arsenal, what kind of role will he play there, and can he ever have the kind of impact for them that he had for Palace?? We just don't know. Will Cunha and Mbeumo gel together at United, or are their styles and personalities too different - will they end up in fractious competition with each other rather than synergistic cooperation?? And will one of them assume the penalty-taking duties?? We just don't know. How long will it take Gyokeres, or Sesko, or Wirtz to start producing their best form in the Premier League?? We just don't know.

Players like these are watch-and-wait options. They'll probably come good at some point, maybe soon;... but they're just not good bets at the very start of the season.

Dear FPL - how about a little 'demo'?

As I mentioned in my round-up of the week's action the other day, the perennial doubt and confusion over how bonus points get allocated has been added to this year by the similar lack of transparency regarding the new 'defensive points'.

So.....

Dear FPL,

Could you possibly put together some highlights reels for a few top players each week - demonstrating just HOW these 'defensive contributions' are being counted?

There are already a lot of weird things going on,... like Ait-Nouri getting a massive 'defensive contributions' tally despite not having an obviously super-busy game, and half the Bournemouth side also racking up big numbers on this new metric, while other players, like the excellent - and very industrious - Elliot Anderson, somehow just missed out on qualifying for the extra points. 

At the moment, we don't know exactly how all the eligible actions are defined, or quite what they look like in practice,... or why some incidents might be counted as one rather than another, or not counted at all. 

Really, the release of this kind of demonstration video should have happened LAST SEASON, to properly explain the idea before it was introduced. 

But it definitely needs to happen now.

Please, Dear FPL - pretty-please-with-sugar-on-top, please give us some more clarity on what's going on with this new rule.

EVERYBODY has an AWFUL Gameweek 1

Well, almost everyone.... who's any good at the game.  

I've just done a quick survey of my long-time reference points in the game, people who strike me as making consistently smart decisions, and who - most of the time - get pretty high overall finishes as a result. Quite a lot of them are below the gameweek average this week!!!

There are all kinds of reasons why Gameweek 1 tends to be even more RANDOM - and unpredictable, and unfair - than most other weeks of the season: 

1)  A lot of people are so desperate to pull out an early lead that they'll blow one of the bonus chips right at the start of the year. (With the unnecessary extra bonus chips being thrown at us this year, that's likely to be even more common.)  These premature chip plays don't generally work out all that well (especially with a Bench Boost: my national league leader wasted his this week, only got a 10-point lift from it, with two non-starters), but they do give some extra points - and those briefly inflate the ranking of the managers who made such a foolish play.

2)  Team and individual form is extremely unpredictable at the start of the season, as players and coaches haven't had much preparation time together - and the pre-season games rarely give us any useful guide to how things are likely to go in the Premier League. There are usually a lot of surprising - and disappointing - performances on the first weekend. This time, we've seen rampant-in-pre-season Chelsea, greatly strengthened Manchester United, and always sprightly Newcastle completely dominate their opening matches - without managing to generate a really good scoring chance between the three of them! Liverpool and City, while managing to win fairly comfortably, didn't really play very well, and looked defensively vulnerable (against probably lower-half sides!). Arsenal and Villa were extremely poor. Only the Spurs and Forest games really turned out as expected: and even there, Forest's performance was a massive step up from their worryingly goal-shy pre-season.

3)  Even the refereeing is sometimes a little extra-dodgy too!  It's natural enough for match officials to feel a bit of extra nerves for their first match of the season; and they are inevitably just a little bit ring-rusty after the summer break. Mistakes are, unfortunately, that bit more likely. (Chris Kavanagh's penalty award against James Tarkowski might be one of the worst decisions we see all season. And VAR - just as guilty, just as inept - apparently did nothing to query it.)

4)  The ongoing transfer window causes so much disruption. Some players are excluded from selection altogether. Others (Eze, perhaps? Watkins?) might be somewhat distracted by thoughts of an imminent move away from a long-time home club. And most new arrivals probably haven't yet spent enough time training with teammates to be considered for extended minutes. Lineups, tactics, and team balance can all be thrown up in the air by all this uncertainty. And we have a few more weeks of it to suffer, before teams finally start to settle down into the sort of shape we can expect from them for most of the coming season.

5)  Almost no-one's at their best yet. Pre-season is too short, and the practice matches too uncompetitive, to really get anyone back up to peak physical condition or mental sharpness for regular top-flight games. Some players haven't trained while waiting on imminent transfers. Others have joined a new club too recently to get fully integrated and up-to-speed yet. Even the earliest summer transfers - like Joao Pedro and Ait-Nouri - probably aren't yet completely familiar with the style of their new teammates and their new coach. And it might prove to be an additional problem for Chelsea and City that they were still playing in the Club World Cup just over a month prior to the new season. As players push themselves that little bit too hard when still not yet 100% fit, injuries (even - especially - in training) tend to be more common early in the season. Rotation and early substitutions to manage fitness worries are also far more common. And very few players or teams come out of the blocks in Gameweek 1 already at their very best. (A few might: we've seen magnificent performances this weekend from Gibbs-White, Reijnders, Ekitike... But they are just a handful of outliers. Most players - most of the most fancied FPL players - had pretty subdued first games.)

6)  There is no 'template' as yet. Well, there never is, as it is popularly misconceived - an obvious and incontestable 'Best 11' that almost everyone at least has heavy representation from!  But what we do often see later in the season is a common pool of perhaps 20-30 clearly superior players, from which the vast majority of FPL picks are taken, and perhaps relatively few good 'fringe' options outside of that core 'most popular' group. This results in most of the better FPL teams usually having 6 or 7 or 8 members of their starting eleven in common (not all the same 7 or 8 players, but selections from that common pool matching up in several places). At the beginning of the season, this 'pool' of justifiable selections is far wider: there are 21 players with an initial ownership of 20% or higher, a further 36 with an ownership above 7.5%; a total of 70 options with an ownership at 5% and above! And the 'fringe' of possible left-field picks for the last couple of spots in a squad or starting eleven extends quite a bit further than that. 

This far greater variety in the composition of FPL teams allows for a far greater spread of points returns - with far more room for a big return from an unexpected source to have a massive impact on the initial rankings.

In this opening week, for example, Tijani Reijnders was one of the standout performers; but a goal from him is likely to be a relatively rare event, as he's most likely to start as one of the pair of central pivots who play a mainly defensive role. And he wasn't even a guaranteed starter; and probably won't be a guaranteed starter in every game, given how many other midfielders City have to choose from (and that Rodri, when fit again, will surely always be one of the two selected for these central roles). Even at his temptingly low price-point, a 25% initial ownershp was way too high: he was a 'sheep pick' that paid off (in the opening week, with a bit of good fortune; but perhaps not in the long-term....). He's certainly a great player, and might turn out to be a great FPL pick this season; but he was a wildly risky pick for the initial squad, given the significant uncertainties about his goal potential or his starting role or the regularity of his selection by Pep.

Likewise with Antoine Semenyo, while he is often dangerous in attack, he's also been very inconsistent. I've followed him closely over the last couple of seasons, and have usually managed to have him in my side when he's hit a little patch of goalscoring; but his returns overall have been rather disappointing. There are lots of other tempting - probably better - attacking midfielders in the mid-price segment, even at his own club, and certainly across the rest of the league. And Bournemouth, reeling from the loss of so many key players over the summer, are not expected to have a great season; nor were they expected to get anything in an evening game away against the defending champions. Semenyo didn't even have a particularly good game overall; he just happened to score two excellent breakaway goals - in quick succession, mid-way through the second half. Again, 10% ownership was absurdly high for such an unpromising prospect; but that 10% got off to a very good start. (68 FPL managers apparently played their first Triple Captain chip on him - which was utterly, utterly daft, but paid off ridiculously well for them! There is no justice in this game. Or very, very little...)

Or Riccardo Calafiori, widely expected to lose out to Myles Lewis-Skelly or Jurrien Timber at left-back in this game (and very unsure of a regular start in this slot for the season) - he was extraordinarily lucky even to be on the field. But the United keeper spooned a corner into his own net (after being jostled - possibly unfairly - on the line by Saliba) in the opening minutes, and the Italian happened to be able to get his forehead to it as it crossed the line... for the only goal of the match. Arsenal somehow hung on to a clean sheet, despite being absolutely overrun by the home side for most of the rest of the game. Thus, a player who wasn't even expected to start wound up with a massive 13 points, the joint third best score of the week. Only 2% of people owned him this week - but that's at least 1.5% more than should have owned him. And that 2% got off to a flying start!

How did these players do so well, when widely - and rightly - fancied prospects like Palmer and Enzo Fernandez, Eze and Sarr, Mbeumo and Cunha, Ndiaye and Grealish and McNeil, Wirtz and Frimpong, Saka and Rice all somehow came up blank, and a few like Marmoush and Cherki and Amad Diallo weren't even given a start? How did the forwards who'd looked so good in pre-season, Joao Pedro and Watkins and Bowen, all disappoint, while the one who most definitely hadn't, Chris Wood, suddenly came good again?  That's just the luck of the draw. You can never foresee clearly what the FPL outcomes are going to be for any given week. But in the early weeks of the season, the element of unknowability and devastating surprise is even stronger than usual.

You should not be too disheartened if you had A DREADFUL START to the season.

The opening Gameweek is especially unpredictable, and a lot of weird shit happens. There is much more scope in this week than in most following ones for LUCK to run absolutely rampant.

But LUCK - for most people - has a way of balancing out over time. Better results lie ahead for shrewd and well-informed FPL managers!!

Luck-o-Meter - 25-26 Gameweek 1

The new season got off to a fairly smooth start, with Anthony Taylor having a mostly pretty solid game at Anfield on Friday night. Well, apart from the bizarre incident where Marcos Senesi committed a very obvious and deliberate handball to interrupt a Liverpool breakaway just inside his own half, which surely should have been a 'denial of a goalscoring opportunity' red card (and quite early in the game), but both Taylor and VAR somehow seemed to feel that it was 'accidental'. There were no big surprises in the starting selections. Arne Slot, however, has earned the enmity of large numbers of FPL enthusiasts by committing the cardinal sin of replacing both of his exciting new wing-backs, Frimpong and Kerkez, just shy of the hour - not only robbing them of full appearance points, but also of the clean-sheet bonus they were sitting on at that point. Boo!! If there is any danger of this being a regular tactic, we may immediately have to rethink whether we want to take a chance on having either of these two players. Kerkez had picked up a fairly soft yellow card, so wound up with nul points, despite having a very good game - ain't no justice! Gakpo and Ekitike had superb games, but Wirtz and Salah made fairly little impression, and Liverpool as a whole were a little disjointed, lacking the composure and solidity they usually showed last year - an inevitable consequence, no doubt, of changing so many personnel all at once. Bournemouth often looked well in the game, and after tieing the scoreline with a brace of breakaway goals from Semenyo just after the hour, might for a while have become favourites to steal an upset win. But the home side reasserted themselves and grabbed two more very late goals. The nearly 60% of FPL managers who'd trusted their captaincy to Salah must have been mightily relieved when he finally broke his duck after nearly 94 minutes!! The other 40% were gutted....

Villa are a team I seem to rate much lower than most; I think they've massively over-performed for the last three seasons under Emery, but I see that momentum now fizzling out. Even with the huge lift they get from their vocal home supporters, and the pleasant last-minute bonus of the talismanic Morgan Rogers being deemed fit to start, after missing training all week with a sore ankle (though one worries that perhaps he was rushed back into service before he was quite ready), they were fairly abysmal in the lunchtime kick-off against Newcastle: they couldn't muster an effort on goal in the first half, and didn't produce a good one in the entire game. The visitors completely dominated, even before Konsa's sending-off (in the common paradox, the 10-man side actually proved more compact and effective in defence), but predictably lacked something of a cutting-edge, without Isak - and hence we got a fairly drab scoreless bore-draw.

Brighton v Fulham, though, probably took the prize as the day's dullest game. Both these clubs have managed to punch massively above their weight in recent seasons, but I suspect this time neither of them will have the class or the consistency to stay out of the bottom third. The visitors probably just about deserved a draw on the balance of play, although they left it very, very late, with substitute Muniz bundling home a corner with the last kick of the game, nearly six minutes into added-on time. In the last moments of regular time, there had been near-misses at either end, with Brajan Gruda and Kenny Tete spurning gilt-edged chances in quick succession - so, the match really might have gone either way (although Brighton really need to do something about their unfortunate habit of not being able to hang on to a lead, if they don't want to get sucked into the relegation struggle). Fulham felt hard done-by, as they'd had two half-decent penalty shouts rejected by VAR. The first, with Iwobi being toppled by Baleba, was rather similar to Porro's indiscretion against Burnley; although here, Iwobi definitely went down much too easily, and there was more of a suggestion of the two players running into each other, rather than the defender being the sole initiator. They had more of a claim on the second incident, where Ayari clipped King's heel as he cleared a ball; but it was a case of the Fulham forward interposing his leg/foot at the last second, when Ayari had already begun his kicking action; in some cases, that can be a deliberate fishing-for-a-foul (or even, occasionally, a foul itself), and in almost all, I think, it can be fairly dismissed as an 'accidental coming together'; one of those where we've seen them given, but it would have seemed a very harsh call.

Spurs might have been expected to be a bit 'leggy' after their physically and psychologically gruelling defeat by PSG in the UEFA Super Cup in midweek, but miraculously there seemed to be no signs of such, and they were again sharp, eager, and confident - and plenty good enough to breeze past a Burnley side who are already looking very likely to finish dead last. Richarlison and Kudus, in particular, were very impressive; the Brazilian notching an excellent brace, the second being an early 'Goal of the Month' contender. The one moment of controversy in the game came when Porro sent Burnley forward Jaidon Anthony sprawling with an unnecessary nudge in the back at the end of a fast break by the visiting side; the move had broken down with an overhit square pass beyond Anthony, so there was no possible reason for Porro to charge him in the back - other than cheeky petulance: it was a relatively 'light' contact, perhaps, but blatant and clearly deliberate, the weekend's only clearcut missed penalty award (so far); yet again, VAR seemingly didn't even 'look' at it. It's also a bit of a mystery as to how Spurs keeper Vicario, who really didn't have that much to do in the game, was given 2 bonus points. WTF???  The BPS is so broken.....

Sunderland got off to a dream start in front of a jumping home crowd, and might already be confirming my hunch that they will probably prove to be the best of this year's three promoted sides (after some very canny summer transfer business to bolster their squad: Adingra and Xhaka are looking like they could be major difference-makers down at the bottom end of the table). But they were only playing West Ham, who, after a moderately lively start and few dangerous moments from Bowen early on, were really pretty abject. (Their utterly superfluous new goalkeeper signing, Mads Hermansen, was arguably slightly at fault for all three goals.) I think I will (in a few weeks, after the transfer window has closed) venture a set of projections on how each club's season seems likely to pan out, and where they'll finish. West Ham, I feel, are very likely to be relegated; and Graham Potter has to be a strong favourite for the first managerial sacking of the year (heck, I was saying that even before the end of last season....).

City cruised to the top of the table with a fairly comfortable first win away to Wolves. But the scoreline flattered them: Wolves had their moments, often looking hungrier for the ball in the middle of the park, and occasionally embarrassing their illustrious visitors on the break. They weren't too far behind City on stats like goal attempts, corners won, and touches in the final third; and they could - should - in fact have been a couple of goals up inside the first 25 minutes, if only their Marshall Munetsi had bothered to learn the offside rule. City benefitted chiefly from three excellent finishes, with their final tally of 4 goals far exceeding their xG figure for this game. And even Pep gloomily observed that they looked quite poor in the second half. There were a couple of standout performances from Reijnders and Lewis - but everybody else looked pretty pedestrian; and you wonder if players like Doku, Bobb, and Gonzalez will get many more starts. The major upset in FPL terms was that unsettled keeper Ederson was a last-minute omission due to an alleged 'illness' (probably a 'headache' from having to read such a lot of contract offers from foreign clubs), and that new arrival Jamie Trafford suddenly got the nod to replace him, rather than long-time back-up Stefan Ortega. Anyone who'd punted on Trafford for the start of the season got an undeserved points windfall here! (Although, at 5.0 million, I still doubt if he'd be a great goalkeeper pick for FPL.) It was also a bit of a headscratcher as to why Marmoush didn't start...  And as to how Rayan Ait-Nouri was deemed to have done so well on the new 'defensive contributions' metric. His improbably huge tally on that meant that he edged the excellent Reijnders - every neutrals' choice for 'Man of the Match', by a country mile - out of the bonus points places. I say again, the BPS is broken. The Moroccan certainly put in a very decent shift; but Wolves weren't attacking much down his side of the pitch, you didn't 'notice'such a huge welter of blocks and tackles happening.... [It would be nice if the League would soothe FPL enthusiasts' ire and anxiety about this rule-change by putting out a few example highlights reels 'counting' some top players' 'defensive contributions' tally for the gameweek - to give us a clearer understanding of what counts as what, and to reassure us that the counts are being done carefully, accurately, consistently. At the moment, I have zero confidence on that.]

Another opening match, another superb free-kick goal from Ebere Eze denied in bizarre circumstances! That really is a most unfortunate habit to fall into...  This one was at least ultimately fairly uncontroversial (though it did seem to take rather a long time for VAR to adjudicate on it); but nevertheless baffling to just about everyone watching it. We learn that there is a rule that an attacking player may not be within 1 yard of the defensive wall (if more than 2 defending players in the wall); there is apparently no clarification as to whether this means 1 yard in any direction, or only laterally... It's apparently been on the books for 6 years; but I don't recall there being any fanfare about its introduction (perhaps it just got eclipsed by the rather bigger news of Covid starting to unfold half-way through that season); and I'm pretty sure I've never seen it invoked before (although it continues to be pretty common practice for attacking teams to try to put a man in the wall, and this is never penalised; so, I rather suspect that the League and/or PGMOL happens to have just put out a memo 'reminding' officials of this super-obscure, never-enforced rule for the start of the new season...).  That was the only real point of excitement in a thoroughly lacklustre match. Crystal Palace - especially their admirably compact defensive unit - deserve a lot of credit for completely stifling the Chelsea attack: the home side had most of the ball, and created a lot of half-chances, but didn't really have a decent attempt on goal all game (the recently superlative Joao Pedro was so ineffectual in this one that I actually had to check a match report to discover if he'd even been playing); players were getting impatient, trying potshots from distance, or snatching at a chance straight away, before there was really an opening in front of them. The best of these chances fell to holding midfielder Andrey Santos near the end, but, receiving the ball in tons of space near the edge of the box, and with only the keeper to beat, he anxiously tried to turn the ball towards goal straight away and only succeeded in scooping it harmlessly into Row Z. There was also another potential penalty decision when Sanchez appeared to miss an attempt to punch the ball clear and thumped Guehi across the back of the head instead; he was very close to getting the ball, and TV replays perhaps weren't absolutely definitive as to whether he had or not (so, perhaps VAR was giving him the benefit of the doubt?); but this was another incident where there was enough in it to deserve a long hard look from VAR - which it didn't seem to receive.

Many of us had feared that this might happen to Chelsea, that their summer renascence might prove to have shallow roots, and that they might easily revert to the dreadful form they showed for most of the second half of the last league season. At the moment, it's just one poor performance, and we can try to blame it on fatigue or limited preparation after their rather truncated pre-season. But if they're this lacking in threat in the final third again next week, there's likely to be a huge FPL sell-off on all initially fancied Chelsea 'assets'.

Nottingham Forest did the exact opposite of Chelsea, While their pre-season performances had been severely unconvincing, and they'd struggled to score a goal against anyone, they suddenly seemed to start getting their mojo back against Brentford, with Gibbs-White absolutely on fire for them. They took their foot off the gas a bit in the second half, allowing the visitors to see a bit more of the ball and create a few chances; but it took a rather fortunate late penalty to give Thiago the chance to claw back a consolattion goal. Brentford have a number of new signings waiting to be integrated, and perhaps a few more in prospect before the closing of the window; but on that performance, they unfortunately look like favourites for relegation.

Arsenal nicked a goal from a set-piece early on at Old Trafford (surprise, surprise), but were barely in the game after that. United, however, although they frequently broke forward at pace, looked completely disjointed and rarely threatened any real danger. Sesko wasn't deemed ready to start, only coming on for the last 25 minutes (during which he made no impression at all), Cunha (rather than the much more physical Mbeumo) was nominally given the central striker role - which he never likes, and, on this occasion, never really inhabited, constantly drifting into his preferred left channel instead; Mount, nominally the left-sided 10, at least added some bite to the press, but didn't link up with the two new forwards at all; in fact, none of them linked up with each other. It wasn't very clear what Amorim's instructions for the game had been; or indeed, if there had been any, they seemed not to have been well understood or implemented. This looked to me like a classic example of a team who haven't yet spent enough time together, and were thus all playing as individuals instead of as a unit: players broke forward on their own, head down, advancing as quickly as possible - not knowing or trusting which of their teammates might be busting a lung to join them; then, by the time they got to within 25 or 20 yards of the goal, they'd finally look up quickly, and still not sensing anyone in the same shirt nearby to give them options, they'd have a hopeful punt from distance (Chelsea had been very guilty of this too, in their dreadful bore-draw with Palace).... which all ended up tamely in Row G. United fans and pundits have been taking a lot of encouragement that at least the 'Attack, attack, attack!' mentality seemed to be returning - and that they managed to make Arsenal look so ordinary - but, for me, it was really still a pretty dire performance; this match gave me no optimism that United, without some very big improvements, can finish in the Top Ten this year.

The goal had a slight whiff of controversy about it. Saliba pushed his marker, Mount, out of the way, and then leant into Bayindir, bundling him off-balance so that he stumbled back into his net and flapped ineffectually at Rice's corner. The general consensus is - reasonably enough - that the keeper (and Mount, and the other United defenders) should have been able to stand up more strongly against this fairly routine argey-bargey. However, Saliba did give the United keeper a shove in the ribs at the crucial moment, and that is probably straying over the line, I think; certainly enough of a potential infraction, in a moment of such huge import for the match, that VAR should have given it rather more than the very cursory review it appeared to receive. Saliba, in fact, was pushing his luck all match, committing several fouls which risked a yellow card, but were all overlooked or pardoned. The worst was when Cunha fired off a low cross-shot from an acute angle - forcing Raya to divert it past the far-post with a fingertip save; the best chance of the match - and the quality of the goal attempt probably got the Arsenal defender out of jail: Cunha was aggrieved that he'd been off-balance, overstretched as he got the shot off because Saliba had handfuls of his shirt. But the VAR attitude these days seems to be "If the attacker was able to take a shot, any interference with him cannot amount to a penalty foul" (I don't think that has any basis in the rules; it just seems to be the prevailing interpretational prejudice being applied by the game's officials). Calafiori was also a bit fortunate to be credited with the goal, since he was rather needlessly helping home a ball that the keeper had inadvertently diverted into his own net; and he didn't appear to get his head on it until it was already at least half or three-quarters of the way over the goal-line (the goal-line technology really ought to be invoked in such instances, to verify if the attacker's 'finish' has been applied before the ball has crossed the line; but it did not appear to have been here - and I don't think that is yet enshrined as the standard practice). Rice was also lucky to get the assist; last year, he surely would not have done - he appears to be the first player this season to benefit from the new more lenient approach to ascribing 'assists' (allowing them, even if the ball has been substantially diverted by a defender's touch).

Mikel Arteta joined Arne Slot in the opprobrium of FPL managers by yanking off Gyokeres and Martinelli seconds shy of the hour mark. We must hope that such early substitutions are just a fleeting aberration early in the season, necessitated by the less-than-100% match fitness still affecting many players. But if this is going to be a common trend in the Premier League this season, we'll have to radically reassess many of our selections. Amorim put some noses out of joint as well, in failing to start Sesko or Amad Diallo (who had been widely expected to be the nailed preference at right wing-back this season, but was initially displaced by Diogo Dalot on this occasion). The beginning of the season can be a real horror show when it comes to anticipating selections and form.....

And then, oh dear, Everton are playing out a turgid Monday evening draw away at Leeds (like a lot of clubs this weekend, they seemed to be mostly dominating possession, but failing to conjure any decent openings), when referee Chris Kavanagh made what might well be one of the worst penalty awards we'll see all season. Poor James Tarkowski had his arm in a perfectly 'natural position' (pretty much nailed to his side; in fact, it had been well away from his side as the ball was struck towards him, and he clearly moved it away from the ball); it wasn't easy to see on the TV replays, but it looked very much as if the shot had struck his ribcage - or ribs-and-arm, at least - rather than just his arm anyway. There was NO WAY that was a penalty; though, yet again, VAR seemed reluctant to appear 'critical' of the referee and devoted very little time to their reconsideration of the incident. And then Pickford guessed right and very nearly stopped the spot-kick... But promoted Leeds walked away with an undeserved win. (And in FPL-land, the greater significance was the impact on Tarkowski's points, and the fact that Pickford too, and other Everton players [Ndiaye and Grealish also quite popular early picks] were thus unjustly denied a clean-sheet bonus).

There were 5 or 6 other potential penalties, before the Tarkowski fiasco on Monday; all of those were perhaps fairly 50/50 incidents - but I feel VAR should have been giving them a careful review, and that didn't seem to happen. I would have awarded spot-kicks against Porro for his gratuitous shoulder-charge in Anthony's back, and Saliba for shirt-grabbing on Cunha as he was shaping to shoot. And Senesi should surely have been sent off for an egregiously deliberate handball on Friday night. By the atrocious refereeing standards we've suffered over the past couple of seasons, that would actually have counted as a pretty good gameweek - though still a long way off ideal. But the Tarkowski decision was just ludicrously AWFUL. On top of these game-turning potential errors, we've had a lot of the typical early season curve-balls of unexpected selections, early substitutions, and teams/players just not playing very well. And the tallying of 'defensive contributions' for potential extra points this year is adding to the sense of confusion and injustice we almost invariably feel about the bonus point allocations. A pretty random 'Team of the Week' this time as well, with very few of the most fancied players gaining inclusion (and who, really, would have picked Semenyo or Riley or Lewis or Calafiori or Ballard, or even Raya for the opening week??). I was originally inclined to rate this gameweek only a 4 (very nearly a 5!) for the 'LUCK' factor, but if David Moyes protests that it was generally "a bad weekend for referees", then who am I disagree? The Tarkowski incident unfortunately bumps it up to a 7 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'.

So nice to have it back...

Sometimes - even with a summer tournament to fill part of the gap - the break between football seasons can seem to drag on an awfully long time.

There is something reassuringly familiar and nostalgically warming about having football to look forward to on our Saturdays.

That feeling is beautifully encapsulated in this wistful monologue by 'Ron Manager', an elegiac reverie on Saturday afternoon football that is almost poetic in its evocation of nostalgia for England, the BBC, my long-lost 1970s childhood. (It was indeed my weekly ritual to huddle in front of the TV at 4.40 on a Saturday, ready to record the day's results in a newspaper so that my dad could check his Football Pools - when he got back from watching our local team.)

Ron, one of many wonderful characters created by legendary comic actor Paul Whitehouse for the '90s BBC skit comedy The Fast Show, was a kind of quintessential 'old school' English football manager, scratching a living in his dotage from TV punditry; although borderline senile and rarely at all coherent in his meandering pronouncements, his patent love of the game was nevertheless powerfully endearing. Here's another great little snippet of his, expressing his appreciation of Ryan Giggs.

Saturday afternoon is football. Isn't it? Mmmm?

Back home, we'd be just getting ready to watch a game about now. But where I live, we still have three-and-a-half hours until the lunchtime kick-off.  (Must try to resist temptation and not start drinking beers just yet....)

IT BEGINS again....

 

The first game of the new season should kick off back in England in just under 12 hours.

That means we've got barely 10 hours to get our Fantasy squads sorted out before the first deadline. (And since the FPL website has been glitchy-as-all-hell all this week, I really wouldn't take too many chances by leaving your submission until right before the cut-off; the site can get overwhelmed by peak traffic volumes and will occasionally stop working altogether at a crucial moment. Not a good way to start your season!)

Now, at last, it is reasonable to start compiling that INITIAL SQUAD.

I generally like to do mine late on Friday afternoon, with a tranquil river view to relax my mind, and a cold beer or two to keep me refreshed.

BEST OF LUCK, EVERYONE!

My greatest WEAKNESS

 

Although I generally do pretty well at this game of FPL,.... I never do quite as well as I'd like.

Many of the factors that clip my performance are external handicaps which I can't do much about. [I live in a distant timezone, with limited availability of coverage of the games (often none with English commentary); and usually a slow and unreliable Internet connection, to boot! Also, I spend a lot of time travelling, which throws all attempts to maintain any regular routines out of the window, and occasionally even makes me miss an FPL deadline altogether. And I really think it's a huge disadvantage simply to be living anywhere outside the UK; there is such a rich immersion environment over there - it's almost impossible not to be aware of every little snippet of breaking football-related news, by a simple osmosis. Anywhere overseas, trying to root out that sort of information can be very effortful.]

But, yes, of course, there are occasional faults in my decision-making too. 

And I think the worst of them is that I tend to take a few too many chances in my initial squad.

I almost always have a pretty poor start to the season; and often, a very, very, very poor - 'Might as well give up now...' - kind of start!

 

And while a large part of that can be attributed to simple BAD LUCK, I do acknowledge that often I'm partly bringing it on myself. 

I like to take chances on players that I rate highly, but are perhaps not yet fully established in their team set-up - only recently elevated to the first team from the reserves or youth ranks, or just joined a bigger club,... perhaps haven't previously shown any sustained FPL form.

Now, I think one of my greatest strengths in the game is that I am in fact a very astute judge of a player. Almost always these more speculative picks of mine do come good in the end; just not quite as emphatically, and almost never quite as promptly as I'd hoped.

I think probably the core of the 'problem' here - the reason why this innocent little foible of mine seems to have become more and more damaging to my results in recent years - is that modern football managers are usually far more conservative than they were in the past; most of them do not like to 'take risks' on emerging talents,... when they know exactly what they're going to get from their veteran warhorses. (Pep Guardiola didn't think Cole Palmer was going to cut it in the Premier League??!! Ethan Nwaneri will probably be in his mid-20s before Mikel Arteta will give him more than 1,000 minutes in a season...)

And perhaps that excess of caution is partly driven by the extraordinary physical demands of the modern game. Selections now are often made for reasons which are completely opaque to the outside world - reasons that probably have far more to do with 'fitness' than a player's raw talent or game intelligence. 

Not that many years ago, my assessments of young players' ability usually accorded very closely with when they were about to break through on the big stage. These days, they rarely do. And it's not just the disappointment of my FPL hopes that saddens me about that....

So, I probably should try to curtail my predilection for including two or three such optimistic selections in my opening-week squad.

Or should I???

This game of ours is essentially a kind of gambling. Each week with our selections we are placing bets on unknown - and unknowable - outcomes. And sometimes you have to bet big to win big.

One day, perhaps, all of my 'emerging star' punts will play in the first game, and will all have blinders!! And I'll be off to a scorching-hot start for once!!

Maybe you have to be prepared to endure several years of mediocre starts, in order to enjoy one really good one? And maybe you have to endure several mediocre seasons, before you get a really successful one?

Maybe.  I'm not sure about this...  Ask me in another ten years or so!

[And, yes, my other great weakness is Vietnamese coconut coffee. Whenever I spend a month in Vietnam, I pile on a couple of kilogrammes through overindulging in these bad boys! It's really a blessing-in-disguise that this is still almost impossible to find anywhere else in Asia.]

The Sisyphean labour begins again...

 

"We must imagine Sisyphus happy."

Albert Camus

This game we so love and hate does seem very like the famous mythical punishment in Hell: endless toil, constant setback... ultimate futility.

We must learn to value the effort expended for its own sake, to celebrate the endeavour to achieve, rather than achievement itself.

Only about 14 hours to go now until the first kick-off of the new season:

 Liverpool v Bournemouth - at 8 pm, UK time. 

Stand by your boulders....

[Yes, this is a re-post from this time last year. But it is so inescapably appropriate that I'm probably going to use it every year.]

A little bit of Zen (55)

"If you compare yourself to others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself."

Max Ehrman  (from his poem 'Desiderata')

EVERYTHING you always wanted to know....

 

.... about FPL.  (But were afraid to ask??!!)

I've been quite busy over the past couple of weeks compiling content that - I hope - might be helpful in selecting a first Fantasy Premier League squad for the new season, about to commence tomorrow.

Here's a list of links to all the resources I've so far assembled (including a handful of key 'How to....' posts from earlier in the blog's history):

How to choose the INITIAL SQUAD

A fairly comprehensive guide to all the principles you need to keep in mind for squad building.

And a checklist you could run over that squad afterwards: How should you judge if your squad is any GOOD?

Possible Picks [Pt. 1]

My roundup of the most promising options this year among the goalkeepers and defenders.

Possible Picks [Pt. 2]

The companion piece on the most tempting possibilities in the midfielder and forward categories.

A few HINTS & TIPS

A helpful catalogue to my 'In a Nutshell...' series: a collection of 'shorter' posts on key points about the game of FPL that I've learned over the past several years.

And.... This year's EARLY 'Sheep Picks'

A warning against some of the most popular picks among the premature drafters - tempting selections that might be better avoided...

The shape of things to come...?

A heads-up on some of the less expected changes we need to watch out for in the new season!

The ONES you should be watching...

Some recommendations for the tactical analysts (NOT 'FPL experts'!!) I find most helpful in improving my understanding of the game.

From longer ago....

Pounds EQUAL Points

An explanation of how BUDGET works (amazingly, very few people seem to properly grasp this!).

Goal setting

Some thoughts on the kind of 'targets' you can set for yourself to gauge your FPL performance. (Subsequently revisited, and somewhat expanded, in this post.)

And a brief rundown on typical 'levels of achievement':  What counts as A GOOD SCORE?

A couple of key early posts: Why people are BAD at FPL...  and  How to get better...

A warning about all the ways that LUCK can impact your FPL outcomes: What's LUCK got to do with it?

And finally...  my ultimate guide to how to get better at the game:

Are you a good FPL manager?

BEST OF LUCK FOR THE SEASON AHEAD!