Back Of The Net Boy Season 13/14 Gameweek 2

written by Ronan


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Do you remember Wenger’s face last week; imagine that as a little angel on one shoulder, and the devil is then the frustration of the fans? I don’t know how you should imagine my inner voice, but perhaps someone with an emotional gravitas, Geoffrey Rush say. SCENE SET

Inner voice   - I really have a system, I didn’t just pull it out of the air like,  what happened?

Angel            - Don’t worry, it’s not you fault, you made decisions no one died, you made 

                        them with a good heart.

Devil             - You are a c***

IV                  - woah there Devil, that’s bit harsh.

D                   -  F*** Y**, spend some money you C***

IV                  - I did, 98.5 million

D                   - … oh yeah. Can I change my opening line?

A                   - Ok

D                   - Thanks…. I still don’t like you Angel you know that yeah?

A                   - It’s ok, I forgive you

D                   - F*** you, you C***

IV                  - Ehm, for an inner voice I’m not doing much talking lads?

A                   - Sorry Ronan

D                   -  Sorry you C***….. anyway….. What were you doing game week 1 and the 

                          same mistakes as last season and the season before, you’re a disgrace…

A                   - He does have elements of a point there Ronan.

IV                  - But I said it was going to be different!

D                   - Saying and doing are two different things, like those stairs in your house, you’ve   

                        been saying you will repaint them for ages but have you actually done it?

IV                  - Good point well made. But what does it do for my fantasy team and the 

                         Back Of The Net Boy blog?

A                   - Oh yes, how about some constructive feedback and thoughts of Game week 1 Devil?

D                   - Meh, that’s pretty boring I’ll leave ye do that yerselves.

So here we are, Gameweek 1 came and went, Chelsea, Man City & Man Utd are the current 1,2,3 of the actual premiership and that is how many predict the league will finish at the end of the season too, but in the FPL it’s still all to play for etc.

REVIEW OF MoRoDon’tKnow FC PERFORMANCE IN GAMEWEEK 1

Points earned  - 73

Average           - 63

Place in BOTNB League – 50 (bottom spot of the 1^st page)

5 players got 2 points or less, pffft. The lads at the front led well with 3 goals between RVP and Soldado, and my captaincy of Hazard got me 16 points, and Ivanovic’s goal and NOT sending off earned me 15  - those 4 players earned my 75% of my points. This was a medium return as opposed to mediocre, I will need to shake a few trees (and not obvious big hitter trees to get this ship back on the road), to get to the top. So that means serious study and committed work….

TRANSFERS

There are so many balloons in the air after GM1 regarding transfers and the list of names to come up on radar is a lengthy one. I am going to make no transfers this week, not particularly to have a double for next week, just cos I will stick with my hand and see how it goes. (ie I need to head off)

GAMEWEEK 2 SELECTION

I look at my team and can’t decide what to pull at first; it’s like when you start emptying a cluttered room, where do you start? In my case I usually look, sigh, go off for a coffee and make a list.  As proffered to me on the BOTNB Facebook page I made a mistake with O’Shea, and the one match kneejerk reaction has been that Sunderland are dooooomed.

I have no reason to say that they will pull it together but I’m going to leave him in my team, as I fear more for Liverpool playing at a vexed Aston Villa ergo I leave Touré on the bench. With Anelka not an option this week R.I.P. [yes I know he has apparently retired], I have the question of whom to bench between McAuley, who will be playing at Everton with WBA or Lescott at Cardiff? Right now I will leave Jolien on, even though as I see I have one of those win-lose scenarios since I have Bellamy playing too. Perhaps I will tinker the WBA man on after all.

CAPTAIN

The SlowMotionSequenceInAnAmericanSportsMovie fan in me wants to go with Bellamy, first home game with Cardiff etc etc, but realistically it’s a toss up between my front two of Mister 14 Million and Soldado, and while I don’t think the Swansea defence is porous, I feel pensioners will try and put quite a squeeze on the game in Old Trafford, so I’m erring towards Soldado getting the armband. That might get tinkered with of course.

FUTURE TRANSFERS, ON THE RADAR

Interested in Sinclair switch to WBA (can any Irish FPL player have a single thought about any WBA player without thinking about his effect on Shane Long – I’m thinking Long leading the line and creating space for Sinclair to run into?); also on my radar is Bent at Fulham, and despite my fears at Sunderland, I’m intrigued by Altidore too.

I hope you have a great fantasy weekend fellas and fellettesm but not as good as me.

xR

Back Of The Net Boy Season 13/14 - Captain's Corner - Pre GM 1

written by www.twitter.com/darraghFPL 

  

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With the season still in its infancy, statistical analysis inevitably holds less precedence due to small sample sizes and the lack of clear-cut form. With this in mind, the first few weeks of Captain’s choices will unfortunately hold an element of ‘gut’ instincts. These same gut instincts last year led me to twice select an underperforming Chelsea forward, who for slanderous reasons will remain anonymous. Lets just call him “F. Torres”…….or “Fernando T.” Whichever tickles your fancy like. Moving forward, I’ve got a couple of new entries into my top as well as a long time lover who I’ve started developing a disturbing penchant for.

First off the bat, I’m not the kind of guy who’ll recommend captaining RvP. There’s already 14 million reasons to captain that guy. I’m hoping to highlight those who at least offer some differential from the 45% of players who already own the Dutchman. With this in mind, I’m opting straight away from one of the most polarizing teams in Fantasy Football. All preseason the debate raged regarding the role the fullbacks would play in Martinez’s 3-4-3 formation. Also, who would spearhead the attack, especially seeing as Kone was brought in from his former club? However, Nicola Jelavic’s strong pre-season showing coupled with a high tempo showing against Norwich has surely cemented the Croats starting place in Martinez’s starting XI. His ICT threat index rating of 112* was the highest of any player from the opening weekend, just edging out Edin Dzeko and Christian Benteke (more about those later). 

If Jelavic is to succeed, he’ll need adequate service. If only he had a dynamic left back with a high success percentage of crosses. Ahem. If Baines’ natural ability wasn’t enough, West Brom conceded the largest amount of left sided chances last weekend, tied oddly enough with Manchester United on 17 (they must miss Gary Neville). For those who read my last article regarding the knee jerk transfer of Baines to Coleman, just remember that Leighton has been the top scoring defender in Fantasy Football for three, that’s THREE, years straight. Just a lil’ food for thought for those contemplating a Toffees full-back.

Speaking of food, I’m gonna’ spank one way out to leftfield and go for an overweight Scotsman. Despite his Ralf C. Nesbitt physique, Charlie Adam offers huge upside this week. Even though he failed to get the nod against Liverpool last week, that was largely due to Mark Hughes decision to play a 5-4-1 against a possession happy ‘Pool side. This week, The Potters play a Crystal Palace side that will probably have more quality sound-bytes than points come May. 

Already entrenched on set-piece duty, the deep fried Mars bar lovin’ (my last one, I swear) will have plenty of opportunities as Palace have conceded the 3^rd highest amount of big chances from set pieces last weekend. Adam offers a succulent alternative for those of us who were starved of fantasy points on the opening weekend and I predict the game will undoubtedly offer a bucket of attacking potential for a hungry Potters side.

Finally, I’ll give a slight nod to two newly invigorated forwards who could almost be labeled “hipster” picks in the fantasy world. Roberto Soldado and Edin Dzeko had very different opening weekends, but oddly enough, the latter grossly out performed the former despite the disparity in points returns. Dzeko has been covered in my previous article, which can be found at the Back of the Net Boy Facebook page. 

Soldado on the other hand looked “sluggish” according to top top football pundit Jamie Redknapp. Soldado still managed to create the second most scoring chances last weekend (4), just one behind, eh, I’ll have to check these stats again but Iago Aspas who had five. FIVE! Soldado also faces a Swansea side who will have been undoubtedly exerted from their Thursday night Europa League tie against Petrolul. Like I said at the start, I’m going by gut at this early stage so feel free to shoot me down. Torres, he’s still good right?

Captains Choices:

1)   Nicola Jelavic

2)   Edin Dzeko

3)   Leighton Baines

4)   Roberto Soldado

5)   Charlie Adam

Back Of The Net Boy Season 13/14 Post GM 1

written by www.twitter.com/darraghFPL 

 

 

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Well, it’s as if we’ve never been away. The opening weekend highlighted its annual batch of bargain bin assets as well as its overpriced disappointments. We saw players such as Seamus Coleman, Ross Barkley, Luke Shaw and Danny Welbeck emerge while the heavily relied platoon of Hazard, Walcott, Coutinho and Lukaku have all disappointed to date (note: I’m writing this pre Chelsea v Villa). With the majority of us bemoaning poor starts and underperforming big hitters, I hope to create a silver lining for a turbulent week one and prevent any knee jerk reaction from those who may have underperformed.

When it comes to Fantasy Football, there have always been those polarising players throughout the history of the game. The ‘is he worth it’ slogan has perennially been attached to such wunderkinds such as skinny Ronaldo, Didier Drogba, Christian Gareth Bale and this season it has climaxed with the undecided essentialness of a certain Dutchman. However, these arguments rarely if ever focus around a defender. 

That is until the past two years when fantasy stataholics fell head over heels for Leighton Baines. His price tag of £7.5 million has justifiably deterred over 75% of us thus far and given his ‘un’ point showing against the Canaries coupled with Seamus Coleman going points crazy, its easy to begin the chorus of ‘I told ya so’s’ earlier than usual. That is however, until you break the game down through the beautiful practice of statistics. Despite his low points haul, Baines touched the ball 104 times, a whopping 46 times more than his full back counterpart. This included 57 touches in the opponents half compared to Coleman’s 37 touches in the same area. Baines created 6 key scoring opportunities against the Irishman’s 2. 

Whilst many may argue this is a small sample size, it may be worth noting that 187 touches went down Everton’s left flank compared with just 104 down the right. This follows on from the Moyes era where on average 54% of Everton’s attacks came from the same flank, leaving just 46% to be divided between the centre and right areas. While Coleman’s £5 million price tag will correctly attract new suitors looking to hop on the Everton fullback’s success, it’s worth noting for us Baines owners that not too much has changed just yet.

Another fantasy protagonist this week emerged in the form of Edin Dzeko. Following in the footsteps of pre-season greats such as Mauro Boselli, Sylvan Ebanks-Blake and Danny Graham, Dzeko carved up preseason opponents with such gusto as to warrant a 12% ownership in the game, 6% more than Sergio Aguero. After the 4-0 tonking of Noveauchâteau, many will jump ship from the modestly priced Bosnian in favor of the proven yet vastly more expensive Argentine. Like an inexperienced teen, this premature shift could hurt you further down the line. Despite Dzeko’s 4 points being dwarfed by Aguero’s 12 beans, the former’s 14 penalty area touches was the most of any player this weekend, 6 more than Van Persie and 3 more than penalty box dweller Christian Benteke. Furthermore, he only had to wait every 11.6 mins per chance. That’s a blink of an eye compared to Aguero’s 20.7 mins per scoring opportunity. In fact, only two forwards come within 4 minutes of Dzeko’s timeframe and that’s the bourgeoisie owned Van Persie (12.3 minutes) and the cameo appearance from Laudrup’s Boy Child, Bony M (12.5 minutes). 

Before you exclaim that this merely highlights Dzeko’s profligacy in front of goal, his goal to shot conversion rating last season (14.9%) was a full percent higher than his Argentine teammate. Last but not least, Dzeko played a full pitch quadrant higher than any other forward this weekend. If he can avoid rotation with Negredo for another two weeks, and that’s a big “if”, he should average 3.2 goals if he continues with his chance per minute ratio. Just remember to tell your inner teenager, it’s a marathon, not a sprint.  

Back Of The Net Boy Season 13/14 Gameweek 1

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Hello everybody, after all that waiting it's finally back, phew I was running out of things to talk about - luckily we'll have the World Cup next summer.

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This week's blog won't follow the usual format as there's nothing to really react to.

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Right, let’s get rid of all this (Ronan wipes all his never read notes to self off his hard drive; puts never rethumbed notebooks in bin)… this year it’s going to be all about this (Ronan taps roughly where his heart is [some of exes could spit that he never knew where it was]) and this (Ronan taps the side of his nose twice and then his temple once, to those who don’t know what that sign means, it implies an innate insight).

Benjamin Franklin said that “only a fool does the same thing and expect different results”, and a greater fool than I once said “fool me once shame on me, shame on you… fool me and I won’t get fooledagain…”. 5 or 6 seasons ago I had two tremendously great seasons and I was not spending that much actual time researching my decisions whereas the last 4 seasons (about when I started this blog) I’ve spent too much time ‘half-thinking’ about it if you will. 

So with that in mind, my foolish decisions over last few years have had to be tweaked my pre season for FPL has been minimal, I haven’t checked any of the other blogs (not out of any snobbishness or competitive streak, just that hiatus I was taking) and barely looked at the Fantasy Football Scout site, just enough to get the gist of the opening fixtures really. I got to sit down with @DarraghFPL for a coffee a few days ago and that’s the first chat I had with anyone at all re this year.

So I will just go through my team/squad selection, I know there’s a lot of clarifying sentences that are just redundant of a FPL blog, since anyone reading it already has more than a passing interest it might feel even patronising, but your squad for GM 1 this is the one selection you can make to truly cover 2/3 weeks of line ups, so with that in mind….

Goalkeepers

A simple decision, proven record, favourable fixture, and an ok price - I start with Jaaskelainen, whose name you’d think I’d have learned to spell by now. Since I wouldn’t be surprised if I played him for the opening 5 fixtures, I decided to save a few squid for my Number 12 by bringing in a potential points getter in GM 4&6 – step on up Allen McGregor at Hull. If the Tiger’s opening fixtures go badly I have a plan B in bringing in Vorm for GM 4. [Potential bite in arse, I hope McGregor will be their Number 1 keeper, he is squad number 1 for them and FFS site lists him as their number one, but perhaps Steve Harper will squeeze ahead of him.

Defenders

For this decision I looked at fixtures, then clubs, then defenders that seem like they will defo play (once again I know that is a pretty redundant explanation), hopefully I can successfully shuffle that deck of 5 with no transfers needed for a few GMs . I’m anticipating midfield and one striker in particular might be in for chippy-choppy time in the short term.

I’ve gone for O’Shea (Sunderland), McCauley (WBA), Ivanovic (Chelsea), Lescott (Man City) and Coleman (Everton). The perceived wisdom is that Lescott will be filling in as first choice CB while Nastastic is out, the rest seem pretty nailed on. While I’m now middy influenced by home games being better for selection in the 11 (I used to be obsessed with it) and as you will see in my selection, the 4 defenders I will be using are all at home this week, that is purely a coincidence.

Midfielders

I’ve gone for a selection of

Redemption – Downing at West Ham

Irish pride/green tinted glasses - Brady at Hull

Hometown Hero, Bellamy at Cardiff [funnily enough his opening two fixtures are both against clubs he played for before – West Ham and Man City, the latter fixture in a home game for Cardiff and perhaps that’s where there’ll be dramatic POSITIVE performance by the Craigster]

A proven big hitter - Hazard at Chelsea (yes danger of him only getting 120 minutes or less, but fuck it – I can’t decide on Man City midfield yet and Bale is INJURED at moment – the other big money option was Walcott, and I’m not averse to bringing him in GM 2 or 3.

And finally a he-was-good-last-season-and-is-a-good-priced-midfielder-to-give-me-a-million-in-the-kitty-to-give-wriggle-room-for-transfers - Snodgrass at Norwich, at home to Everton is good enough this week and assuming Martinez is bringing in a gigantesque change in style, this will open up the midfield space and perhaps Snodgrass will gain from their transitional play (in both soccer parlance and in bedding in of a new system terms).

To backtrack a little, Everton’s expected new style is one of the reasons I brought in Coleman - for his potential attacking use than clean sheets; I would not be surprised if he is brought further up the pitch, or indeed played as a wing back. The other players hovering under that place in my squad are Taarabt (who knows what will happen there, but I am certainly intrigued) and Miralles at Everton, who might also become more of an attacking player with WigErton.

Forwards

I hovered for a few moments and decided to go with RVP, mainly cos of the ‘he’ll only get too expensive if he does well’ theory. No need to even discuss him really, we all have processed that option by now.

I’ve gone out slightly on a limb with Soldado, yeah he’s in a new league (don’t know much about the lad etc etc) and Spurs seems somewhat in disarray with BaleGate and also the new players being brought in, could be as much as 3 new first XI players now and as ever that takes a little bit of time to bed in, and if memory serves Spurs had an awful start last season, but time as ever will tell. He’s got my vote anyway.

And then pretty much everyone’s punt; if hecan light up Turners Cross then he’ll do well at FPL, Anelka (am I right in thinking, once he scores for WBA he’ll have scored for the most premier league clubs with 6?)

So there we have it, 14 men, 3 of them older than me, 3 slightly younger than me and then another 8 who probably listen to post dubstep and don’t even remember AltaVista.

Here is my selection and I hope you all have a good FPL weekend, but not as good as mine.

#mightchange

-       well like everyone on GM1 eve, I might change everything (I even have kept tonight free to have time to change it! But Rob Heffernan is having an official homecoming ceremony on Patrick Street, so if I’m happy with my team, I’ll go to that.)

- but a potential swap within my squad is Bellamy in at expense of MacCauley, but then I’d have that trade off of points between a Cardiff scorer and a West Ham keeper, hence the selection staying the way it is for now.