Barclays fantasy premier league “ones to watch” – GK and defenders – Buy Hold and Sell – GW4

Fantasy Premier League, Player Rankings

Here’s the “ones to watch” for GKs and defenders on the Barclays fantasy premier league format.  This will give the best GKs and defensive players at a variety of price ranges.  I’ll also be categorising players as BUY HOLD or SELL from last weeks article.

This week I’ve added in

1.  Minutes per point.  This shows how long it takes for a player to earn a fantasy premier league point.  The lower the better obviously

2.   Clean sheets to date for the team he’s playing in

3.  The fixture ease ranking.  This is the ranking of all teams to see who has the easiest fixtures over the next 6 games.  The team with the best ranking ie 1 will have the easiest next fixtures of any of the fantasy premier league teams over the next 6 games.

4.  For defenders I’ve added in rotation risk.  High medium or low

5.  For defenders, I’ve also put the bonus points to date in so we ca see how they’re faring with the new bonus system

Just to recap on GK strategy.  Skip over if you’ve read this before

There are 2 schools of thought here. The first is to go with an elite keeper and either a cheap playing reserve or even gamble on a cheaper non playing reserve. The second is to rotate home and away with the 2 cheapest playing keepers.

This year the gap between the 2 has lessened with their being value in GKs at the elite level. Additionally, the increased rotation of the elite club defenders means a GK is a way of getting coverage without the juicy easy home games seeing mass defensive rotation. Rotation of GKs in fantasy premier league games doesn’t happen that regularly and it’s mainly focused on the domestic cups.

As far as defenders are concerned, generally in fantasy premier league,  I start of with 3-4-3 but try and have a balanced squad in terms of spend.  This year the new bonus system is suggesting in the data so far  that if your team gets a clean sheet, then virtually every time  that occurs, 2 of the 4 defenders in that team will get some sort of bonus award.   GW2 saw a significant skewing towards CBs getting bonus awards.  I’ve never been a fan of paying premiums for attacking players and this shy’s away from it.  I generally believe in going for the cheapest defender but balanced with gametime security.  Now I’ll be looking towards CBs if the price differential isn’t significant.

GKs

Mignolet (£5.7m) BUY

  • Minutes per point:  9.3    Clean sheets:  3    fixture ease rank:  1

3 clean sheets and by 10 points the highest scoring GK.  With Toure injured also the best value Liverpool defender although Sakho is slightly cheaper.  Great fixures as well

De Gea (£6.0m) BUY

  • Minutes per point:  20.8    Clean sheets:  1    fixture ease rank:  5

United are about to go through a run of good fixtures starting with Crystal Palace at home and the defence is looking reasonably solid.  Gives relative certainty to the United defence where there isn’t any anywhere else without having to pay a premium for doing so.  More of a risk having a non playing GK as a reserve than Mignolet but I think that rotation will probably happen in the domestic cups

Elite team defenders

Clichy (£6.0m) HOLD

  • Minutes per point:  25.7 mins .  Team clean sheets:  2    Rotation risk: High.   fixture ease ranking: 18th     Bonus points to date 0

I picked Clichy as I thought he was the least likely to be rotated in the long term given the lack of pre-season gametime that Kolarov had.  So apologies for those who bought him.  City are about to play away at Stoke where a clean sheet has to be a possibility even with Nastasic and Lescott as CBs.  Kolarov would have played 2 games for Serbia whereas Clichy is unlikely to have played for France with Evra as first choice L.  So I would sell Clichy before GW5 and the fixtures get very difficult starting with Man Utd.  I’m saving City defender for when Kompany is back and the fixtures improve.  He’s down to £6.4m and looking good value.

Koscielny(£5.4m) BUY

  •  Minutes per point:  39.3 mins .  Team clean sheets:  1    Rotation risk: Low.   fixture ease ranking: 3rd     Bonus points to date 0

Got off to a horrible start, hence the handy price drop.  Was the form Arsenal defender towards the end of last year and is currently the best value especially with bonus points focused on CBs.  Good time to buy as Arsenal are away to Sunderland and have good fixtures to come.  Arsenal had the best away defence last year.  Sunderland are looking pretty ordinary going forward and have a real problem at set pieces which gives Koscielny some attacking potential as well.

Dawson (£5.0m) HOLD

  •   Minutes per point:  18 mins .  Team clean sheets:  2    Rotation risk: medium.   fixture ease ranking: 2nd     Bonus points to date 1

3 games 2 clean sheets which is not a bad start.  Spurs have shown the defensive improvement in clean sheets this season that their underlying stats from last year hinted.  Good fixtures continue.  The bonus point system at the moment seems to favour Vertonghen and Walker.  They’re considerably more expensive than Dawson though at £7.0m and £6.0m respectively.  I would hold off buying him just to make sure that Chiriches the new Romanian CB doesn’t start for the home game to Norwich

K Toure (£5.0m)  SELL

  • Minutes per point:  13.8 mins .  Team clean sheets:  3    Rotation risk: high.   fixture ease ranking: 1     Bonus points to date 2

Injured with no return date and CB Sakho purchased for £18m probably ends Toures starts at least for now.  Sakho at £5.5m will be a good buy option for GW5 home to Saints.  Away to Swansea maybe a difficult clean sheet

Coleman (£5.4m)HOLD

  • Minutes per point:  10.4 mins .  Team clean sheets:  2    Rotation risk: low.   fixture ease ranking: 11     Bonus points to date 4

The highest scoring defender in fantasy premier league so far.  has also increased in value bu £0.4m on the back of a massive bandwagon.  The defensive performances of Everton have been very impressive so far but they’ve yet to have a real test.  This week they get it home to Chelsea so I would hold off any Everton defensive purchase until after that game.  Personally ‘I’m now looking at Distin.  He’s a CB and got the 3 bonus points in the last game.  Distin is still available at £5.0m but with Alcaraz expected back I’m a little nervous but at the moment after and depending on the result of the Chelsea game  it may be worth the risk.

A Cole (£6.5m) BUY

  • Minutes per point:  15 mins .  Team clean sheets:  2    Rotation risk: medium   fixture ease ranking: 12     Bonus points to date 4

Ivanovic is the favourite fantasy premier league defender and certainly has the best attacking potential of all the Chelsea defence.  Cole though is the less rotatable with only Bertrand as cover who seems completely out of favour as compared to Azpilicueta who at least played consistently last year for Ivanovic when fit.  In addition the early signs are that Cole with 4 bonus points sees to be better suited to the new bonus system than Ivanovic with 2 which came when he scored.   Fixtures aren’t great but good signs defensively based on the United game

Budget defenders

Collins (£4.6m) HOLD

  • Minutes per point:  19.3 mins .  Team clean sheets:  2    Rotation risk: medium.   fixture ease ranking: 16     Bonus points to date 1

One of the better £4.6m  purchases with a very defensive manager.  2 clean sheets from 3 games.   fixtures are getting trickier and GW4 away to saints isnt easy.  West ham will still get clean sheets at home and Collins is the best value.  Unfortunately Collins and West Ham generally don’t seem to be liked by the bonus point system so far.

M Turner (£4.5m) HOLD

  • Minutes per point:  33.8 mins .  Team clean sheets:  1    Rotation risk: high   fixture ease ranking: 13     Bonus points to date 0

Disappointingly no bonus in the win over Southampton.  Cheapie Whittaker held his place as surprisingly it was Martin who lost his place. I’m not sure that’s the end of it though as he is a very good RB.  Anyway its all irrelevant as they’re away to Spurs which isn’t the time to invest in the Norwich defence

Clyne (£4.5m)HOLD

  • Minutes per point:  45 mins .  Team clean sheets:  1    Rotation risk: High   fixture ease ranking: 10    Bonus points to date 0

This is only a hold as Southampton are home to West Ham which has got to be as good a chance of a clean sheet as you could imagine.  I’m not ignoring the fact he didn’t play in the last game it just seems that given his value its worth holding off one more game before selling.  I have to say I don’t really understand whats going on.  There was no injury that I was aware of so he seems dropped.    I’m a big believer in the Saints defence  though.     Fonte is now the BUY in my mind at £4.6m as he seems to have got the CB position and is good value plus has good attacking potential.   Lovren seems to be the bonus darling but £5.0m is a bit steep.

Chester (£4.0m) HOLD   B Turner (£4.0m)HOLD  Baker (£3.9m) HOLD Whittaker (£4.2m) HOLD

Chester and Turner look good holds at this price.  The Villa defence has performed very well so far and Baker is a bargain if he comes back in to the squad in front of Okore although that is far from certain.  I would hold Whittaker to see if he also starts against Spurs.

That’s it.  On to midfielders next

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