Welcome to the GW26 REVIEW – ALWAYS ON MY MIND
Firstly BIG thanks to Matt Reid (47th) for his review last week, a thing of beauty but it didn’t help him this weekend (more on that one later). Unfortunately for you lot I am back in the hot seat this week. Not even what felt like days stranded in Madrid airport due to snow stopped me – until now I didn’t even know it snowed in Spain! I am now back in Blighty and ready to dissect another weekend of fantasy action. Wherever we are in the world, whatever is going on in our lives (good or bad) the one constant is FPL, for better or for worse, you can always check in and see just how your team have fared. With that in mind lets have the classic Pet Shop Boys cover of “Always On My Mind”
Fortunately there were no controversial incidents for me to discuss, especially in the Liverpool – Spurs game on Super Sunday. So I will instead focus on four stunning strikes scored over the weekend (there may have been more on Monday but I have not brought myself to watch that game and have removed all Chelsea players from my side). It’s simpler that way. Coincidentally I received a lot of text messages around 10pm on Monday eve all along similar lines. If I didn’t reply to you I am sure you understand why, I was enjoying the rather luxurious surroundings of Madrid airport. By that point I was feeling like a drunk Tom Hanks in Terminal.
About those goals. Lets start with my favourite of the four. Victor Wanyama (7) was only on the pitch for the last 11 minutes of the game but he hit his strike perfectly and with so much power into the top corner. It was close to perfection. I have a soft spot for Victor and Spurs have missed him this season. He isn’t know for his goals but this was certainly a rocket to remember.
Next up was Brighton’s Jose Isquierdo (8) who bent in a beauty from the corner of the box. This one was more about technique than brute force but the result was the same, it flew into the top corner and the crowd went wild. However if you owned the Colombian you wouldn’t have been happy seeing him remove his shirt and therefore receiving a booking. It’s a stupid rule but its a rule.
My third favourite was someone I owned in GW1 this season but due to Pep’s rotation it didn’t work out very well for me personally. However, despite the unlimited funds of the Cityzens they actually are struggling with injuries in certain positions now. This is weirdly a good thing for us fantasy managers as bargains arise and rotation is not such an easy option. Danilo (10) received a simple ball from his team mate 25 yards out and curled a shot beautifully around the usually impenetrable Pope (5) . Did you know Danilo is actually the 3rd highest scoring City defender this season?
My final pick was a player who has impressed me whenever I have watched him this season and again his side have missed him when he hasn’t been available. Southampton’s Mario Lemina (10) says it wasn’t his best goal scored. That may be so but it still showed considerable technique and poise – I would happily take him alongside Kante at Chelsea (Sorry Saints fan but at least it would be a change not to lose a player to Liverpool!)
None of these aforementioned players are particularly relevant in terms of fantasy assets but sometimes it is important to just sit back and appreciate true beauty when we see it. The beautiful game is really beautiful sometimes (it is also a good way of me ignoring Chelsea’s issues and my own Fantasy troubles).
Enough of that, lets investigate how all the FPL action affected the FFUK league.
THE FFUK TOP 50 AFTER GW26
No change at the top (it’s getting boring saying that now) as our top two continue to set the pace. Our leader Jamie Stewart (1st) managed 58 points and is inside the top 500 in the world and Dan McBrearty (2nd) isnt far behind after scoring 55.
However top scorer in the league this week was Stephen Fielden (43rd) with 78 points. Not a bad score considering he only had 10 men playing! His captain Salah (15 x 2) was the best of the popular picks but Stevie also owned the top scoring player of GW26 in Aaron Ramsey (20) after his rather impressive hatrick unstuck the Toffees in the Saturday evening game. The Welshman could well become a very popular pick in the next couple of weeks.
Being in the top 50 guarantees nothing though Stevie. Just ask last season’s champ Nick Johns (34th)Â who only managed 33 points. Even the best have bad weeks.
Matt Packham (49th) is just about hanging on to the top 50 after scoring the same as Nick. Both of them got their captain picks wrong and as we all know by now this often makes or breaks our gameweek. Check out the FFUK captain picks below from our resident Statto, Steve Cronin (62nd). Aguero was once again the most popular pick, he is someone that is always on my mind!
The number one HERO this week is also top scorer (not always the case) but this man is now up with the big boys in the top 50. Perfectly timed for the run in. Well played Stevie. Let’s see who the other big movers were:
- Stephen Fielden (42rd) rose 31 places from 74th after top scoring with 78 points!
- Jake Drant (160th) rose 22 places from 182nd with 61 points
- Stan Maniak (147th) rose 19 places from 166th with 68 points
- Neil Gordon (148th) also rose 19 places from 167th with 66 points
- Robert Browne (165th) also rose 19 places from 184th with 64 points
Next up let’s quickly check the 3 biggest fallers or ZEROES in the league, don’t worry we wont dwell on this one too long, like taking off a plaster lets get it over with quickly:
- Anthony Pegg (99th) fell 21 places from 78th after scoring just 19 points
- Andrew Coombs (178th) fell 20 places from 158th with 25 points
- Tim Button (179th) fell 18 places from 161st with 24 points
Now it gives me great pleasure for me to hand you over to Pete Cronin (67th) to confirm all the latest from the Conts mini-league:
Well, what a gameweek in the Conts. It was good to see a few coming out with reasonable scores, JDS and Baker were solid with 58, Coxy got 60 off the back of Hegazi’s surprise 7 pointer off the bench, and Big Daz held on for a decent 63. But the Conts is all about the low scores. On Sunday morning 4 of us were in the frame. Mark Turnbull, Sean Colohan, Matt Reid, and myself.
I was the first to be saved by Victor Wanyama (of all people) when he robbed Reidy of Robertson’s clean sheet, leaving me with 39 all out.
The next blow came on Monday night, Alonso’s omission from the Chelsea squad ruling out Mark Turnbull as Reidy could not now overtake him. Reidy would now finish on 36 all out, with Turnbull on a comfortable 44 points.
This meant that Reidy’s fate would come down to Hazard’s performance, as Coolers had Eden as captain, and needing at least 5 points to be safe.
First blood was Reidy’s as Watford nicked the Chelsea clean sheet. This meant that Coolers was sat on 35, one behind Reidy.
But Hazard’s consolation in the 82nd minute was exactly what Coolers needed, rocketing him out of Reidy’s reach, and the game was over. Reidy has gone.
It was brutal. It was low. was dirty. This is the Conts League. 12 remain.
Thanks Pete and thanks everyone for reading. We go again this weekend and things are about to go up a notch with blanks, doubles and chips all set to come into play in the next few weeks. Are you ready? Do you know what you are doing?
Some of us, including myself, could do with help, maybe an article going into detail, there are plenty of permutations for us to mull over. Or how about a piece on VAR? This is a subject that is certainly not going away. If nothing else there are plenty of good potential puntastic title’s such as VAR – What is it good for? or Don’t mention the VAR!
If you are up for writing something and haven’t before then Pete or I can set you up with a WordPress account in seconds or you can just ping us over the words and we can drop it in. Either way come and join the FFUK team, the rewards are endless (yet intangible).
I will be back next week with the GW27 review, always on my mind, until then look after yourselves and each other!
Cheers
Chris
FFUK 