Week 5: IEFSA Fantasy League Preview

It’s barely been four days and the next round of fixtures in the IEFSA Fantasy League on Fantrax comes around again. An agonising loss last week saw my side slip from ninth to twelfth with a .500 win percentage. @BenDinnery might be the go to guy for Premier League injury news, but how long to recover from a broken heart Ben, how long?? I thought I had done enough on Saturday to keep my side in front, before Diego Costa popped up with two goals to crush my dreams, as Ben’s team streaked off into the distance. Everton’s emphatic win on Monday night only served to fill me with false hope as a late rally from Baines left me short by a soul crushing 1.85 points. An interception or a blocked shot and some accurate passes away from the victory. Heart breaking stuff.

This week the IEFSA fixture bias against my team continues, as I’m to face 3-1 (fifth place) @RotoZdroik. He has won his last two games and is the fourth highest scorer in the league. His Forward line has also contributed five goals to his team, while my Forward line has provided the grand total of zero.

@RotoZdroik’s Team

That Forward line is led by Romelu Lukaku. The Belgian hit a hat trick last time out and will be home to Middlesbrough on Saturday evening. His back-ups are more than capable too. Jermain Defoe returns to old side Tottenham on Sunday. Wilfried Bony will try to open his Stoke City account against Crystal Palace, while Fernando Llorente heads with his Swansea teammates to Southampton. Adam’s Midfield is full of real work horses who love hoovering up points around the pitch. Idrissa Gueye averages over twenty points a game for Everton. Granit Xhaka will be part of the Arsenal squad that travels to Hull on the back of some good recent form. Gylfi Sigurdsson adds some guile to his midfield; and if any of those three are not fit to start, he has Aaron Ramsey and Leroy Sane waiting in reserve.

Lukaku won't get everything his own way against Middlesbrough

His star in defence has been Kyle Naughton. Averaging over 19 points a game, he wins his fair share of aerial duels, as well as putting in a number of accurate crosses. His three other defenders are playing at home though, so he may be tempted to rotate them in to one of his three defensive slots. Cahill will be kept busy by Liverpool. Zabaleta might get to raid forward when Man City entertain Bournemouth. Damien Delaney plays on Sunday in the clash of Palace and Stoke. Finally in goals will be Hull’s Jakupovic. In the opening four games the Bosnian has made 16 saves to three goals conceded.

What I Need To Happen

If Arsenal could put a few past Hull at three o’clock on Saturday that would be good for my squad, which includes Bellerin and Cazorla. Before that game though, perhaps it would be good (if not a minor miracle) on Friday night if Pedro were to actually start a game for Chelsea.  He hasn’t done a great deal since joining the Blues and faces stiff competition to break into their starting eleven. More than likely joining him on the bench will be my two Manchester United ‘stars’ Lingard and Mkhitaryan. Playing these two last week more than likely cost me any chance of victory, but the chances of them starting this weekend against Watford are pretty remote. Although we will know more after the dust has settled on Man Utd’s Europa League game.

This will leave the rest of my squad to pick up the slack. Burnley holding champions Leicester to a clean sheet would benefit my goalkeeper, and defender Michael Keane. Two Stoke players, Arnautovic and Allen, need to help the Potters off the foot of the table, and any win away to Palace will surely hurt Delaney’s points tally. My ace in the hole though is tricky Jack Wilshire, who is due a goal when Bournemouth head to Man City. No clean sheets yet for The Citizens means a brace or more is not out of the question.

Predictions

It’s proving really difficult to predict winners in this league. @cjradune overcame @TomSunderland_ by only 0.2 points in Week 4's top of the table clash for instance. A respectable six correct and three wrong from last week’s predictions though. As usual, to keep track of all the games from this week, make sure you are following @THE_IEFSA on Twitter.

Here are this week’s predictions. Good luck everyone.

@DFS_Hambazaza over @BenDinnery

@EPL_MOstadamus over @FantasyYIRMA

@RotoWireAndrew over @nealjthurman

@nikarg over @SmokeyLoogy

@jwl_15 over @SportsByGotti

@jasonuk17 over @TAMc10

@cjradune over @TRKingston

@FuzzyWarbles over @jforquer11

@wrigavin over @TomSunderland_

IEFSA Fantasy League Week 23 Preview

Last weekend my side was unable to topple @wrigavin from the summit of the IEFSA Fantasy League, and he remains three points clear of his nearest rival coming into Gameweek 23. My team struggled to an almighty 36.3 points as a goal and assist for @wrigavin’s RobertoFirmino put the gloss on an easy victory. An immediate reaction will be required from my players this week as they face a @SportsByGotti side which sits six points and only three places below them.

A number of his most dependable starters are red flagged to be missing this week, most notably Kevin De Bruyne, but he still has some more than capable reserves in which to call upon. My reserves on the other hand have usually been hugely disappointing when they have had to be thrown into the deep end of competitive Premier League action. None more so than Memphis Depay, who has developed some sort of bizarre footballing version of a reverse Midas touch. If he hadn’t been signed for so much money, he surely would have been loaded out to Preston North End or somewhere by now!

@SportsByGotti’s Team

Mike’s team could almost boast a whole starting eight of players who have gained over 100 points for the season. My side on the other hand would have to make do with only four such players. Recently he has been picking up more defensive points through the efforts of his goalkeeper, Swansea’s Fabianski, and his Southampton defender Cedric Soares. Arsenal’s Laurent Koscielny has been his star at the back though, with three goals and nine clean sheets. In a normal season you would expect the Gunners to shutout the Foxes this Sunday lunchtime, but this has been anything but a normal season.

At the other end of the pitch, @SportsByGotti has mainly been relying on De Bruyne to get the goals (yet he still only has five). If we look around the fixtures this weekend in search of where the goals should come from, you would perhaps pick out Oscar at home as Chelsea host Newcastle, or if Nathan Redmond can find his way back into the Norwich starting 11, (and if you can’t get into the current Canaries side you should really be taking a look at your career!) perhaps their home game with West Ham will supply some goals.

Redmond & Gueye met on the pitch last weekend, but will battle on Fantasy turf this gameweek.

 

What I Need To Happen

If Newcastle can keep Chelsea quiet at Stamford Bridge it would be a bonus, as @SportsByGotti will have both Oscar and Willian looking to get on the scoresheet. But I wouldn’t want the Magpies getting too cocky, as I have Courtois in between the sticks and he’s due a much needed clean sheet. Only Courtois and Rangel will be playing at home this week for my defence, therefore clean sheet points will perhaps be thin on the ground.

As the old mantra goes, ‘Goals win games’. Now, I’ll be honest, I can’t even remember the last time one of my players found the old onion bag. In Wijnaldum, Arnautovic and Ayew, I had three players who were finding the net regularly up until the New Year. They each face tricky defences this weekend, so perhaps my best hope is that Idrissa Gueye scores his first goal of the season against Liverpool on Sunday. Although three shots on goal in 22 games means I won’t be rushing down to the bookies to put the house on it.

Predictions

Five from seven last time, out as both @TomSunderland_ and @DFS_hambazaza enjoyed highscoring weekends to gain victories against opponents far above them in the table. If you want to see a larger preview of these predictions, then please head over to FantasyYIRMA. And as always, follow myself @GarryIrwin and @THE_IEFSA on Twitter.

@BenDinnery over @nikarg

@cjradune over @DanRiccio590

@FantasyYIRMA over @TomSunderland_

@wrigavin over @FuzzyWarbles

@nealjthurman over @RotoWireAndrew

@RotoZdroik over @GalinDragiev

@DFS_hambazaza over @Smokey_Loogy

Good Luck Everyone.