Fantasy Football Fixtures Gameweek 12

Fantasy Football Fixtures Gameweek 12

The sharper ones amongst you will have noticed that the picture on the left is not the usual Fixtures one. Well what’s the significance of that then we hear you ask? Upon closer inspection you will see it is actually a snapshot of our first ever article which was exactly 12 months ago today. Happy Birthday FF247! It’s hard to believe that it has come around so fast and 461 articles and 131,395 comments later we are delighted to still be going strong and growing almost daily. We just wanted to take this opportunity to thank all of you for your contributions over the past year and your continued support from all around the world. That’s heartfelt and goes out to everyone – the writers, the contributors, the members, the monkeys and even those who lurk in the shadows who we never actually hear from. Together we have built a fantastic community and long may it continue!

Anyway, back to business…..

Some of you may remember that before we were once more rudely interrupted by yet another international break that GW11 was on the whole an exciting and productive one for many managers. That’s probably a surprising statement when you consider this one – only 1 match produced more than 3 goals in total and no team scored more than 2 in any game. There were 6 clean sheets in total with the likes of Burnley, Southampton and Newcastle boosting the coffers at the back. Combined with the usual suspects such as Costa, Aguero, Siggy, Baines and Sanchez all grabbing goals a lot of managers were actually very happy in the end.

The good news is that there are no more silly breaks in play this side of Christmas and the fixtures come thick and fast from here on in leading up to the festivities. A couple of dates to perhaps bear in mind and put the fixtures into context – GW14 is a midweek schedule taking place on the 2nd and 3rd of December and GW’s 13 and 15 are the weekends directly before and after this so a busy week that one. GW17, which is where the current tracker ends is the 20th December. GW’s 18 to 20 are the Christmas ones and occur over 7 days. We will cover that in greater detail nearer the time but we just felt it was worth pointing out. Not sure why though! So let’s go and take a look at who we feel have good or indifferent fixtures ahead…

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Just before we examine the fixtures ahead, here is a reminder of a couple of essential Fantasy Football tools that you may wish to refer back to.

Mito produced some outstanding and detailed analysis on the best rotation pairs for the season which can be found here –
Rotation Analysis Home and Away and Favourable fixtures

Calvin Clyne devised an ingenious interactive fixture tracker which can be found here –
Fixture Tracker – Fantasy Premier League 2014-15

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And so onto the teams and fixture themselves. Let’s begin with a very straightforward fixture tracker…

We have colour coded the fixtures in a simple fashion to allow you to judge your transfer and team selection plans accordingly:

[highlight_green]Green[/highlight_green] – We deem these to be winnable fixtures for the given team and should, in theory at least (!), harvest good fantasy points for you in the opening games. Aim to have a good nucleus of these players in your squad.

[highlight_yellow]Yellow[/highlight_yellow] – These are the fixtures that could go either way and do not stand out as being either particularly good or poor. If you have a player from a team in this category then do not be afraid to play them but take a considered view that it may or may not not be an explosive week for them.

[highlight_red]Red[/highlight_red]- These are the teams that we consider to have a difficult fixture and as such may be best avoided from a fantasy perspective. Aim to minimise any players that have a run of reds in the opening games.

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FAVOURABLE FIXTURES

Chelsea – West Brom (h), Sunderland (a), Spurs (h)
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[/three_fourth]The only difficult fixture that Chelsea had on their schedule was last weeks visit to Anfield and once more they came through it with flying colours courtesy of goals from Cahill and Costa (who else). One glance at the fixture tracker shows a clean sweep of ‘green’ all the way through to Christmas. The message here is simple and clear, buy Chelsea and buy them with confidence. Costa, Fabregas and Hazard are the obvious ones but given the run then perhaps it may even be time to look at a Chelsea defender again. Certainly three of their regular four defenders all offer a goal threat, particularly from set-pieces. Obviously they won’t all score every game and it’s a bit of a lottery but any of Ivanovic, Terry or Cahill are all sound choices.

It’s probably worth noting that both Costa and Fabregas are now just one booking away from a one game suspension. Make sure you have a strong bench as it’s unlikely you would want to use two transfers and probably lose money in the process of selling one or the other and buying them straight back for this fantastic run of fixtures.

West Brom at home and Sunderland away feel like a given whilst Spurs will be visiting the Bridge for their third game in a week given their Europa commitments the previous Thursday and that coupled with them having a pretty poor record against Chelsea and let’s face it, anyone decent in general, points to this being a walkover too.

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Everton – West Ham (h), Spurs (a), Hull (h)
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[/three_fourth]And so last week saw yet another game where they had 145% of possession and very little to show for it all come the end. A late Leighton Baines penalty courtesy of a Seamus Coleman ‘assist’ spared their blushes last time out at Sunderland and appeased their fantasy owners as that also saw the pair pick up a handy 3 and 2 bonus points respectively. Beyond those two it really is difficult to recommend any other Everton players at present as Romelu Lukaku really isn’t showing much form and the emergence of Samuel Eto’o has dented the appeal of Steven Naismith with the Scot being shifted around to accommodate him. The Baines Machine has picked up a hamstring injury on England duty though so monitor that one.

As for the fixtures themselves West Ham and Hull at home both look winnable and even Spurs away is not what it once was as (even) Stoke proved last week, which was Spurs’ fourth defeat in six home games this season. Both Everton and Spurs will go into that one having played on the Thursday prior in the Europa though so perhaps don’t expect too much from either in that game. If someone can step up to the mantle for Everton other than just the two full backs then surely these games are there for the taking but as we said you’re probably as well just sticking to those two for now.

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Manchester United – Arsenal (a), Hull (h), Stoke (h)
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[/three_fourth]We all expected a lot from a game against Palace at home for Man Utd and got very little in return for our faith but that maybe summed Utd up from a fantasy perspective so far this season. A quiet 1 – 0 win with a Mata goal did anyone little favours except perhaps some ghost teams that retained the Spaniard and the odd Utd defender by default. Di Maria was perhaps the only bright spark for those that are actually paying attention as he popped up with his fifth assist in nine games. He meant this one as well which is an added bonus! Add in three goals to that tally and it is difficult to justify dropping him. ‘Drop him?’ we hear you cry. Well yes, as that’s been a topic of conversation this week due to the emergence of a certain Alexis Sanchez. It’s difficult to justify dropping anyone with the aforementioned stats but due to his price-tag the reality is that if you want to maintain the likes of Costa and Aguero in attack the decision will have to be made and he along with Fabregas are the likely fall guys.

So what are the arguments for keeping him fixture wise then? Well, Utd have a traditionally tough journey to Arsenal this weekend in what may be the highlight fixture of the week despite it having the rare distinction of being an Arsenal v Utd fixture that is in fact just 6th v 7th with both chasing West Ham and Swansea! It’s early days though we suppose. Given Arsenals Anderlecht collapse and the way they were exposed at Swansea so easily you’d have to expect Utd could score well there with the likes of ADM, Rooney and of course ex- Gooner RvP. The next two are the real reason they are in this section though. Two home games on the bounce against perceivably weaker opposition cannot be overlooked. Hull are in free-fall as we shall explore later. Stoke may put up more of a fight but Utd should have enough for Bojan and co!

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Manchester City – Swansea (h), Southampton (a), Sunderland (a)
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[/three_fourth]City themselves are making it difficult to include them in the ‘favourable’ bracket. A draw at QPR, a home defeat to CSKA Moscow in the CL, a 0 -2 loss to Newcastle at home in the Rumbelows Cup and a loss at West Ham in four of the last five isn’t the best indication of any sort of form let’s be honest! As a team that actually looks quite shocking but they do have one shining light and you wouldn’t bet against him scoring versus anyone. In fact he usually does. He’s got five in his last six appearances overall, nine in his last six Premier League games and twelve in total for the season in FPL. You know exactly who we mean and actually if you don’t then you really haven’t been paying attention and may be a ‘ghost ship’ as mentioned earlier.

So given all that it really is a question of whether you would bet against ‘him’ scoring something like 3-5 goals in the next few games and we doubt many would. Swansea won’t lie down this week and will fancy their chances but we also fancy ‘his’ chances to pick them off. Likewise Southampton away will be a test but regardless we would expect our man to be amongst the goals. The easiest fixture of the lot is Sunderland away in GW14. The message is whether City do well or not as a team ‘he’ probably will regardless. The big surprise is that’he’ has zero assists so far. Then again if ‘he’ hasn’t got anyone to pass to, which he clearly hasn’t, then we are quite happy for ‘him’ to keep just passing it into the net.

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Liverpool – Crystal Palace (a), Stoke (h), Leicester (a)
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[/three_fourth]A bit like City it’s difficult to make a case for a team in apparent turmoil or at least not living up to high expectations but on paper Liverpool have a good run ahead of them. They need Daniel Sturridge back, fit and firing given the lack of pace and movement that was so evident last season as they literally blew opponents away from the kick off. Difficult to do that when your spearhead is Mario ‘Literally, can’t be arsed’ Balotelli. The hope is that the presence of Sturridge may also re-ignite Raheem Sterling who has looked lack lustre to say the least in his last few outings.

This week Liverpool will be looking for revenge against the team that derailed their title campaign last season with that ridiculous 3-3 draw and you wouldn’t bet against them getting it as Palace are on the rocks at present and haven’t won since GW6. The Reds follow that with a home game against Stoke and an away trip to Leicester. All in all that should in theory be a decent run for Liverpool but it just depends which version turns up. Clearly last seasons can’t, given the Suarez departure, but if last season Lite does then you never know, maybe Sterling and Sturridge will be the talk of the boards once more….

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LESS FAVOURABLE FIXTURES

Hull – Spurs (h), Man Utd (a), Everton (a)
A limp showing in a hugely unimpressive 1-0 defeat to bottom club Burnley just about summed up Hull’s recent woes. That’s three games in a row now without a goal. They aren’t getting hammered by any means as they’ve also only conceded two in those three but it still resulted in two losses on the bounce and a point at Anfield prior to that.

The next three games look a bit daunting given their form, certainly on paper. Spurs at home you could make an argument for them having a chance in but then two games away in the North West at Utd and Everton could see Hull in deep trouble. Bearing in mind they also have Chelsea and Swansea on the horizon it’s fair to say that they may be best avoided for quite some time.

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Stoke Burnley (h), Liverpool (a), Man Utd (a)
A fantastic three points away at Spurs last time out will certainly boost their confidence ahead of the visit of Burnley which is by no means a poor fixture and actually you could say one of the best of the week! Why are they in this section then? Well partly because they have Liverpool and Man Utd away after that but also partly because we need to alert you to the fact that beyond that they also face Arsenal and Chelsea in two of the proceeding three. All in all that’s a poor run by anybody’s standards.

The message here is that if you own Stoke players then play them and enjoy them this week by all means but then look to sell or at least bench them ahead of that horrific run. Apart from Bojan of course. Play him every week and twice on a Sunday, We jest. Just in case anyone didn’t realise!

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West Brom – Chelsea (a), Arsenal (h), West Ham (h)
Getting beat at home is never good but when it’s by Newcastle then it’s verging on shameful! In West Brom’s favour is that two of the next three are actually at home but they are without a win in three games now at the Hawthorns and you would expect Arsenal to at least score a few there whilst West Ham are bang in form and will fancy taking the three points there. They begin this week with an away game and it just doesn’t come any tougher than a trip to Chelsea.

We doubt many managers have much in the way of West Brom cover anyway other than perhaps a defender or maybe Foster in goal. If you do we would probably bench them for the next two weeks at least.

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Southampton – Aston Villa (a), Man City (h), Arsenal (a)
This one’s more of a cautionary tale. Much has been written and debated about on the site regarding Southampton this week, and rightly so. Many of us own at least a couple of Southampton players if indeed not the full compliment of three in some combination or other. The debate has been over whether to keep them or not given the run of fixtures that they are about to embark on. Well excuse us if we just pop off to B&Q to buy a massive fence to sit on as the truth is we just don’t know! The proof will be in the pudding on this one as Southampton have been exemplary so far but the truth is they have had an extremely fortunate run of fixtures. Other than the opening game at Liverpool (which they lost) they haven’t faced any of last seasons top 5 since. The nearest they got was Spurs (6th). Which they lost. They did go to Arsenal in the Milk Cup and they won, for what it’s worth.

Monday’s game at Villa should allow some breathing space as to the decision over what to do with the likes of Clyne, Bertrand, Tadic and Pelle as we would expect you would play them in that one but it’s then City away where the serious questions will start to be asked. Arsenal away is next but as we say they went there and won albeit against a team that wasn’t exactly Arsenals first choice to be fair to them. They then have Man Utd at home, Burnley away and Everton at home so it’s a mixed run to give the fuller picture. Whatever you decide it will be fun to watch as the next few games will surely define whether they can actually keep this ridiculously good form up and go all the way this season to their ultimate goal of a top four finish.

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FIXTURE FUN

We are obviously in the midst of an International break and as such there are a myriad of fixtures scattered around the next few days which will involve some or many of your fantasy players in some capacity or other. We have already seen some unfortunate injuries on duty from the likes of Baines, Balotelli and Blind. There may be a trend developing there and some nervous managers who own the likes of Begovic, Bertrand, Berahino and Bony!

Be sure to check out the availability of your fantasy players once this weeks games  are over and everybody has returned home, hopefully in full health.

Good luck to 99.9% of you this week. Hi Bry

Thanks for reading Fantasy Football Fixtures Gameweek 12 – Fantasy Premier League 2014-15. This article was written by Inittowinit

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