Captain Picks Fantasy Football Game-week 4 – Fantasy Premier League 2015/16
If you captained Yaya Toure in Gameweek 1, Romelu Lukaku in Gameweek 2, Callum Wilson in Gameweek 3 or Riyad Mahrez in any of these weeks, congratulations! You are succeeding more than most. Some of us are holding on to Rooney’s “assist” in Gameweek 1 as the only time we got it sort of right.
So on to the next chance we have – and I’m writing this off the back of two 4 point captain shows – so you may want to look away now, stick your fingers in your ears and pretend you never caught sight of this.
I jest. Like the most optimistic (or sadistic) FPL players, I’m back for more. And this week I’m going to crack it.
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Gameweek 4 – The Fixtures
Newcastle United v Arsenal
Aston Villa v Sunderland
Bournemouth v Leicester City
Chelsea v Crystal Palace
Liverpool v West Ham United
Manchester City v Watford
Stoke City v West Bromwich Albion
Tottenham Hotspur v Everton
Southampton v Norwich City
Swansea City v Manchester United
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My Five (actually seven):
Callum Wilson
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[/three_fourth]There was a debate pre-season regarding the price of Wilson and his fellow promoted striker – Watford’s Troy Deeney. Each priced at £5.5mln, each playing in the Premier League after brilliant Championship seasons and each with claims for that difficult “third” striker slot. Well the Coventrian has made light work of finding his way to the top of the striker charts, even if it is at a very early stage. OK so his points were mainly hauled in one game at Upton Park where he bagged his first Premier League hat-trick but Wilson owners would happily have taken a goal a game at this stage so three in one, is of no concern.
So his backers or those purchasing him this week might consider that the armband goes to him – the man is in form after all and Bournemouth as a whole are playing some great passing football. They are very incisive and direct and a hallmark of their promotion-winning side from last season.
Leicester have started brilliantly but consider that they are yet to record a clean sheet and even Sunderland stuck two past them and you might just look twice at the Bournemouth penalty taker.
Although, as we’ll come to later, there are superstars with attractive fixtures this week, looking at Rooney, Aguero and Hazard all being two-pointers recently, maybe taking a chance on a lesser light might just be the way to go. And Wilson will hardly be short of confidence.
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Riyad Mahrez
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[/three_fourth]In the same match, the man of the season so far, Algerian Riyad Mahrez, will be aiming to take Charlie Daniels to the cleaners at Dean Court on Saturday.
Three matches, four goals and a clean sweep of all nine bonus points before him, has the winger as the top midfield point scorer. He has also stuck away the Foxes’ only penalty so far and would be lined up again one would assume, should another fall their way.
At the very least, this man should be in your squad, captaining him may take a bit of bottle but maybe that is the way to go. You could hardly be backing him at a better time.
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Pedro
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[/three_fourth]The Spaniard will find his way in to many teams this week and the good news is that his price should be protected until after the deadline. Many will see Hazard to Pedro and banking some £1.9mln as a worry free move and I have to agree. I think if both fit, Pedro might just match Hazard’s point tally this season. He introduced himself to the Blues’ fans with a goal and an assist in his first start to send Chelsea to their first victory of the season at The Hawthorns and send himself to the 3 bonus points – couldn’t have asked for more from his debut.
A home match against Crystal Palace won’t be easy but you would have to expect Chelsea should win even if it is to keep up with Manchester City (and Leicester). The Barcelona academy product has gone for a reported £21mln, which to me could well be the signing of the summer.
I’d add Diego Costa in here as well – Pedro could be the perfect supply line for the granddad of the Chelsea team. Costa scored his first double-digit haul in the West Brom match and that could be him off and running for the season.
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Christian Benteke
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[/three_fourth]Many will argue that the Belgian is still awaiting his first ‘goal’ in front of the Kop due to the clear infringement of the offside rule which should have resulted in his goal being disallowed. Thankfully moral decisions don’t apply in the fantasy world and the £32.5mln summer signing managed to mark his Anfield debut with 9 fantasy points courtesy of his goal and the 3 bonus to leave Monday Night Captainers rejoicing! He also hit the crossbar in the second half so it could have been more.
Truthfully he should also have added another against Arsenal on Monday evening. Where the plaudits will go to Petr Cech for a fine save, Benteke shouldn’t have given him the chance of a save. What is encouraging, however, is the understanding being shown clearly between Benteke and Coutinho. One can see Benteke having many laid on for him by the Brazilian in the coming weeks especially in the matches at home where Liverpool will see lots of the ball. Next up are out-of-sorts West Ham so there is definite scope there for more goals.
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Sergio Aguero
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[/three_fourth]Home game. Yep. Home to a promoted team. Yep. City playing well. Yep (three in three with +8 goal difference). Already scored this season. Yep.
All the signs are pointing to an Aguero Armband this weekend.
Depending where you are in the overall standings or your own private mini-league, you’ll know if you can take a chance by moving away from Aguero. Common sense tells you that those with him (28.2%) will make him their man so to either stay with the leaders or hold off those challengers, you really shouldn’t be looking any further than your top striker.
This is also the beginning of six decent fixtures for City, so I’d imagine many will be loading up on their players and it also makes sense to captain one of them being as they are in by far and away, the best attacking team in the league.
This leads me on nicely to David Silva, a differential of sorts owing to the expected Aguero love this weekend. Three assists, three clean sheets and two bonus points so far and he should/could have been on the score sheet at West Brom in Gameweek 1. The first goal is around the corner and could come this weekend. As usual, playing in between the lines of the opposition, the little Spaniard is never far from the attacking points. You could do a lot worse than side with him this weekend.
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As usual, here are the traffic lights . . .
RED (Take a punt if you have him): Callum Wilson
AMBER (Proceed with caution): Christian Benteke
GREEN (If you have him, armband him): Sergio Aguero
A final thought:
This is the last Gameweek before both the transfer window closes and for the hiatus for international football so the next round of matches, Gameweek 5, isn’t until 12 September.
Usually this is the worst time to have a stinker of a Gameweek because you have what seems like an eternity to wait to get back on track. For those of you who have wildcarded, I’d imagine and hope your squad is in good enough shape to bank this week’s free transfer and have two to use come the return in GW5. For those still with the wildcard, then I should imagine many will be activated once this week’s deadline has passed to benefit from that two week period of tinkering and to take advantage of the transfer business still to be completed.
Triple Captain Chip
Just a quick word on the new feature this season. It pretty much does what it says on the tin and trebles your points for your captain on whichever game-week you choose to deploy it. We shall touch on this as and when we feel the opportunity presents itself to use it effectively but this in all likelihood is one to save for when we encounter double game-weeks later on in the season.
For those wishing to use it before such a double Gameweek, I’d imagine that Aguero at home to Watford is as enticing as a single match gets.
Whatever you do, go with your instinct and have a great Gameweek 4!
Enjoy your football.
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Thanks for reading Captain Picks Fantasy Football Game-week 4. This article was written by The Gallant Pioneer
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Excellent, GP. Cheers mate :thumbup:
Thanks for this GP. I currently have the armband on Kolarov, believe it or not.
Yes I do
It’s not a bad idea given how the season has developed
It started just as an idea that I was totally opposed to, but the more I’ve pondered on it, the less stupid it seems. Watford have 3 draws in a row, conceding 2 and scoring 2. This means that one; they’re unlikely to score goals, and two; they’re likely to play defensively. Most likely, they’ll lay low and play very defensive football, the kind that City often struggle against. In such matches, the goals can often come from players like Kolarov and Yaya, who can shoot from a distance or take set pieces, rather than Aguero and Silva, whose main chances come from open play – the kind of play that defensive teams will try to shut down.
I haven’t watched Watford play so I can’t confidently claim that they’ll play this way or another, but the kind of match I described is very common when City face smaller teams. If anyone have watched Watford and would like to weigh in on how you expect them to perform and play against City, that would be welcome.
If City can easily get through Chelsea when they play defensively I think they can crack Watford
Well, I’d say Chelsea underperformed strongly against City. They didn’t really do a good job defensively, not pressing when City had the ball and letting City get plenty of space. Watford could quickly do a better job at that. I would feel a lot more confident saying that if I’d actually seen Watford play though.
Well the retards capping Kompany for the first 3 GW’s are happy as hell. Plus, you’re from Norway. You guys are crazy, period. So go for it.
Lol, how exactly are Norwegians crazy? Though I did make a friend of mine start playing FPL this season, and he capped Cech last round which obviously paid off. Maybe that was a sign? :smiling:
Why would a Norwegian cap a Czech?
Many thanks GP, great little article. Kun for me this week no question. Happy to have Tekkers and I may grab Wilson too but Kun at home to Watford feels like the right place for the armband to me.
Init for some reason I can’t help but shake the idea that Aguero will only see a bit of the Watford game. Al the pre-season talk of him not being fit enough and him saying so himself before Chelsea, and then with Watford being in theory an easy enough match at home…
Probably am wrong and even if he does just play 20 mins we all know he can grab a couple in that time anyway, but it’s Benteke for me unless someone can talk me out of it
Why’s he only playing 20 minutes?!
It was a worst case scenario!
Me too, Aguero it is. If he gets a 2 pointer, well that’s life. But if he goes into QPR mode and you didn’t captain him, well…
Mind says Aguero, heart says Yaya
Youzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz in love? What does gut say by the way? :p
Awesome article GP. I was thinking a punt on Rooney?
So I activated my wildcard late last night. Long story, won’t explain. Aaah don’t give me the eyes. Okay, well here you go. Had a pissy few days and came home late (tired) and I activated it. Did I really need to? Don’t think so, already had a proper team with a few question marks such as Depay (whom is still in my WC team), Mane, Merte, Defoe, Coates and so on. Anyway.
This is one of my first drafts, I think it’s nearly perfect. Just waiting for a few risers, not all of those players will be in my team. Any suggestions? And yes to Depay. He will get his aim on and when he does he will be gold.
Team here. Was the name too long that the pic wasn’t uploaded? It’s a png file.
Just looked at the price rising at FFF. What the f is up?
Raz, Wilson’s kit clearly don’t match with the other colors. Start over, silly.
Try being serious, just once. :rant:
Okay Raz, I’m sorry. If you could photoshop Targett in place of Wilson, it’d match more.
Okay, seriously. I’m a bit skeptical towards Chelsea’s defense for now. Plenty of people don’t have Costa, so he could be a good differential. I’m not too sure about Depay as United haven’t looked good so far. I think I’d like to see a really expensive midfielder in there – Sanchez makes sense as you don’t have Arsenal coverage. Sure it’s worth having Morrison as 5th mid? Westwood would free up 0.4.
True enough. I think Depay will explode sooner or later. If his finishing was a touch better last game he could’ve bagged a brace easily. Plus right now he seems to be on everything.
Costa will be Benteke and Depay or Yaya will be Sancez.
I can see that you’re not investing much money outside the top teams. You may be right, of course, but I’d rather place a bet on one or two in-form players from Swansea, Stoke, etc in the 6-7m range.
Thanks for answering. Good point. This is just a draft, a few players will go if they get a double rise. Also unsure what I will do with Costa/Depay/Yaya/Gomez/Azpi/Kolarov.
Swansea were impressive against not so impressive sides, sides that were playing with 10 men for the most of the time. Against Sunderland they actually had a harder time. Also not sold on Stoke.
This might be a stupid question but is it a risk taking out Haz for Silva knowing that I have Sterling alreday.
Just as stupid as me expecting a serious reply from this sorry bunch. 😉
hahaha, what would u do Raziel, Pedro or Silva
Depends on what Chelsea coverage you have. At the moment leaning towards Pedro. Both would be awesome though.
Sterling to Pedro and Hazard to Silva? Don’t know the rest of your team.
I only have Azpilicueta in my team and if I trade out out Haz for Silva, I will have 3 city and 1 Chelsea. I was thinking Milner to Ayew and then one more trade
Well you didn’t give a serious reply to him either!
Just taking a piss in the park Teks, no worries. Plus, when have I ever been serious?
Taking Hazard out will always be a risk. One that won’t have hurt anyone that’s done it so far, but when he starts firing again you’ll want him back in again soon. Just depends whether or not you think that will be this GW – he already looked a lot sharper in the last game than in the previous two before that.
I agree with that, it is just that the person who I am playing this week in my Head to head wants me to do -8. One of my trades this week is Milner to Ayew for -4. So I am a bit puzzled Calvin
Well don’t play into your H2H rival’s hands, of course he wants you to do a -8! He’d be even happier with a -12 no doubt
I realise I didn’t really commit to answering your original question, but that’s because I’m really not sure. I really do expect Hazard to come good soon, but there’s at least the caveat that Pedro may keep up with him as GP said in the article. If I were in your shoes then that’s the transfer I would make, given you already have Yaya. It wouldn’t be for another hit though, so would hold off for this GW. Hazard could explode against Palace.
thanks Calvin, won’t do any more trades this week then