Euro 2016 Fantasy Football – Group B

Euro 2016 Fantasy Football – Group B

Welcome to Group D. Oh no, sorry E. Oh hang on no it’s D and E. Yeah? No?! B?!?!?! But I’d prepped D and E… Hey, ok, no worries. Gun for hire and all that. B it is then I guess… Let’s get the important info out of the way here (the only info I actually know about B as I sit down to write this. I can tell you all you’d ever need to know about D and E if you like though!). Apparently Group B comprises of England, Russia, Slovakia and Wales. That’s where I’m at. Let’s write this ‘live’ then and see how that goes and you can join me on my journey of discovery as I research the article and literally write what I find!

As ever I’ll go a bit stat heavy here but it comes with a warning, as do other groups analysis as we go through each one, as all we really have to base the conclusions on here are the competitive games, which are of course the recent qualifying groups for this particular tournament. And therein lies the problem because clearly not every nation is created equal in footballing terms so any strong team who had say a Faroe Islands or a Gibraltar in their group may fare much better in the goals scored column than they would have done had they had a tougher and more competitive group. It’s just something to bear in mind as it’s very different to when we lay on Premier League stats over a period of time as pretty much most games in that (not you Villa) are at least competitive.

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Engerland
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[/three_fourth]Full disclosure on this one – I’m very English. Which probably isn’t much of a revelation. What may be is the fact that I actually don’t watch us play that much. I’m an avid fan, don’t get me wrong, but really only in tournaments these days. You see, I’m way past the point of watching pointless friendlies and in all honesty the majority of qualifiers these days are pretty much just glorified versions of those, with the same inevitable outcomes, and so my interest in those has dimmed too as the years have gone by. So in truth my knowledge of the team is thorough enough in that I know the players because I see them in the Premier League every week and I see and hear all the coverage of them in the media day in and day out. In terms of actually watching them though I can honestly say I’ve seen as many full Slovakia games since the World Cup as I have England ones…

So a quick google search on Engerland’s chances has revealed that we are definitely going to win this / we may make the semis / we’ll be lucky to make the quarters / we have no chance of even qualifying from the group / this is a new golden generation… And that’s the trouble with England – you just never know. Personally I feel we have a good chance if Woy just puts out the likes of Vardy, Kane and Alli and says ‘no pressure’, just go do what you do week in, week out. Let them cut loose and go at it like they do for their club sides and who knows. The elephant in the room is of course the defence. Which looks as suspect as can be and will be found out for sure. Two very attacking full backs doesn’t really help when you have at least one centre half who isn’t interested in defending (Stones) or one who is but is too slow to do actually do so (Cahill). Good luck holding that lot together Mike! Well at least until you get sent off yourself anyway and then God help us.

Their qualifying stats looked like this –

Played 10, W10, D0, L0
Goals For: 31
Goals Against: 3

So as we can see England are pretty much just about the best team in the world on the basis of this. Well ok, Europe maybe. Well ok, a reduced Europe then. One with say just the likes of powerhouses Estonia, Lithuania and San Marino in it. You’re starting to see why I don’t even bother to watch this nonsense any more now aren’t you!

On the face of it then England are both potent in attack and miserly in defence. Only Poland scored more goals in the qualifying campaign and England averaged 3.1 per game. Likewise only Romania conceded less with just 2 past them. Can we trust these stats and actually put any weight behind them? No not really. See the teams listed above and consider that I missed out the main two opponents in the form of…. Slovenia and Switzerland. Enough said.

Player Picks

Lies, damn and statistics then. As strong as that defence looks statistically, in reality it isn’t, and their opponents look pretty capable at the goal getting thing as they’ve scored 49 between them all in qualifying games. Hart may arguably be the best keeper in the tournament but with that lot in front of him as we described above then it’s difficult to pick him.

As for the forward players then it all depends if they click and don’t freeze. Their opponents all boast admirable defensive records (5, 8 and 4 conceded) and so none will be a rollover in theory. Kane would be my main England pick if anyone. Maybe a small punt on Alli but that’s only if he’s given an advanced role like he is for Spurs and Rooney could yet ruin that, which would be a shame. Beyond that we wouldn’t go for much else really despite actually fancying them to do well. If they do then we feel the points could be well spread as the likes of Vardy and Lallana may well fill the other forward roles and play a significant part also.

Given as I’m writing this ‘live’, as such, then it’s maybe worth noting that Rashford scored the other night as did Rooney. Rashford is irrelevant really as even if he gets on the plane he won’t be first choice. Rooney is more so given that he will on both counts. It’d be a brave man that relies on him though as his explosive days are behind him. Will he grab the odd goal in the tournament? Yeah, most likely. Is he likely to supplement that with another one or two and assists to boot? Probably not. Would you pick him ahead of say Ronaldo, Lewandowski or Bale who are all more likely to do so? No.

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Russia
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[/three_fourth]Oh dear, that’s my actual real knowledge out of the way then. Hellooooo Mr Google. Looks like Russia qualified in 2nd place here. Behind Austria. Now as recommendations go that doesn’t sound too promising for starters. They did however finish above Zlatan who sneaked in in 3rd. Digging deeper though it seems that a certain Fabio Capello did his best to see that they weren’t going to actually qualify initially with him guiding them to just 8 points from their first 6 games. So what to do? Well of course, bring in a slut. And no we don’t mean the legendary Lothario Sven. Leonid Slutsky guided them to 12 points from their remaining 4 games and so they are here with us. Maybe not with the best Russian team we have seen recently but certainly with a functional one who are capable of qualifying from the group and certainly one who will make life difficult for their opponents.

Their qualifying stats looked like this –

Played 10, W6, D2, L2
Goals For: 21
Goals Against: 5

As per above it’s worth pointing out that 11 of those 21 goals came against Liechtenstein alone. Which basically means they managed just 10 in the other 8 games. And that includes games against the likes of Montenegro and Moldova. Hmmm… Not really fancying their attack much then. Defensively it’s a goal against every other game which looks ok in theory. So basically they’ll be out for keeping things tight and nicking a win if they can.

Player Picks

In all honesty I wouldn’t really bother with Russia other than maybe considering either Shatov or Dzyuba. With the likes of old fantasy favourite Dzagoev being injured then midfielder Shatov will be the main man charged with providing the chances to Dzubya and he comes in form having got 6 assists and 8 goals in his domestic campaign. And the striker himself is lethal to be fair to him as 8 goals in qualifying would suggest and many will have picked him for their CL teams too so will be familiar with him from there and he got 6 goals in that campaign too ending the season for Zenit with 23 goals in 43 appearances in total.

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Slovakia

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[/three_fourth]The Slovaks qualified here in 2nd place behind Spain from a group which included Ukraine but beyond that they weren’t really pushed as the others were Belarus, Luxembourg and Macedonia who only managed 20 goals between the lot of them in 30 games. It looks like it was a relatively straight forward qualifying campaign for them then and did actually include a win over Spain themselves which isn’t to be sniffed at.

Their qualifying stats looked like this –

Played 10, W7, D1, L2
Goals For: 17
Goals Against: 8
A pretty decent 1.7 goals per game but as we say the opposition wasn’t exactly much of a barometer here and they really are hampered by the lack of any star strikers.It looks like they did manage 4 clean shhets in their 10 games but in the latter stages they did somehow concede 2 to Luxembourg who’d only scoted 4 prior to that in 9 games so we wouldn’t be overly confident on them keeping out their group opponents here.

Player Picks
As we just said there’s no real striker to hang your hat on and the defence doesn’t really interest us given the opposition. The only real one to consider here is midfielder Marik Hamsik who got 5 goals in qualifying. He’s a consistent scorer at club level and is now vastly experienced, boasting over 400 appearances for Napoli and 98 goals in that time.

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Wales

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[/three_fourth]Wales will fancy their chances here despite it being their first ever appearance at the Euro’s and their first major finals appearance since back in the 50’s. A lot will rest on the shoulders of a certain Real Madrid star but don’t be fooled into thinking that he is their only weapon. He’s their main one of course, and more often than not their match winner, but he comes backed up with plenty of experience and a solid spine behind him.

Their qualifying stats looked like this –

Played 10, W6, D3, L1
Goals For: 11
Goals Against: 4

They qualified in 2nd behind Belgium and for once from a relatively tough group with the likes of Bosnia and Israel providing some genuine opposition. Quite how they managed to qualify by scoring just 11 goals though is another matter! Only Andorra managed to score less than them in that group. And they finished bottom. Their qualifying then seems to have hinged on keeping games tight, as only 4 goals against would suggest, and then hoping Bale would somehow push them over the line which he invariably did.

Player Picks
With such a strong showing defensively in qualifying then maybe the likes of Collins or Williams could come into your thinking here as we’d expect them to run Slovakia and Russia close in probably low scoring affairs. Other than that though it’s all about Bale as he scored 7 of those 11 qualifying goals and if they are to progress then it’ll be courtesy of him really. Ramsey may also pitch in as he’s their one other player with star quality but we’d like to have seen more from him in an Aresnal shirt to convince us that he’s a worthy pick.

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Thanks for reading Euro 2016 Fantasy Football – Group B. This article was written by Inittowinit

Follow @AdamalcockFF247

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Courtesy of Jamie @fplbet

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