Fantasy Football Fixtures Gameweek 27

Fantasy Football Fixtures Gameweek 27

GW26 finally came to life at approximately 4.25PM on Saturday after a distinctly lame start to the week when suddenly Nemanja Matic got himself sent off and seemingly sent a tidal wave of activity as Bafetimbi Gomis scored what would prove to be the winner for Swansea, Mee then equalised against Chelsea, N’Doye grabbed a late winner for Hull, Vlaar got himself sent off for conceding a penalty which Moses duly converted for a late winner and Glenn Murray emerged from the bench to score late against Arsenal and ultimately almost cost the Gunners all three points with a shot against the post. It was a breathless twenty minutes which was followed by a much more routine 5-0 rout for Man City as Aguero grabbed a goal and an assist for his many captainer’s but Silva was the star of the show with two goals and an assist. Sunday saw ten goals fly in from ten different players. Harry Kane was probably the most owned of all the scorers and he left it until stoppage time to make his mark but even that was tinged with a bit of a regret as he scored but only after missing the initial penalty to reduce his goal to a two pointer effectively.

GW27 creates it’s own issues for fantasy managers as we enter a rather strange and perplexing couple of weeks with four teams not playing this week and then two teams playing twice in GW28. Chelsea, Leicester, QPR and Spurs all miss out this week and then QPR and Spurs both play twice the week after. Let’s go and take a look at how all of this effects our view on who has decent fixtures and who doesn’t…

Dates for your diary…

GW27 is the dreaded ‘blank GW’ as we say and Chelsea, Leicester, QPR and Spurs all miss this one. This is a usual Saturday deadline at 11.30am GMT.

GW28 then sees our first DGW of the season as the QPR vs Spurs fixture has been moved to here and so sees both teams play twice in GW28 –

Spurs play Swansea (h) & QPR (a)
QPR play Arsenal (h) & Spurs (h)

Please be aware that GW28 is largely a midweek affair and begins on Tuesday 3rd March with a deadline of 19.30pm GMT which means you will at least see the line-ups for the first three games that week prior to it closing.

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And so onto the teams and fixtures 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_blue]Blue[/highlight_blue] – These teams have either a double or a blank game-week to consider.

[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

Arsenal – Everton (h), QPR (a), West Ham (h)
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[/three_fourth]Arsenal were so far into ‘cruise mode’ against Palace that they almost nodded off and nearly conspired to throw away two valuable points. They had the width of a post to thank in the end and so just about managed to limp over the line with a 1-2 victory thanks to goals from Santi Cazorla and Olivier Giroud. Whatever the nature of the victory that’s three wins in a row again in all competitions since the defeat at Spurs and they’d won five in a row prior to that with an average of 2.44 goals per game in those nine fixtures. They have managed five clean sheets in those games as well and Saturday really should have seen the sixth. Clearly Arsenal are in some sort of form even if they aren’t quite sweeping opponents aside, with a mix of decent attacking returns and some much needed solidity at the back.

Next up is Everton at home and the good news for Arsenal here is multi-fold. First off Everton are rubbish! Well they are rubbish in the league at least as they seem to be keeping their best performances under wraps for the Europa League which is where the news gets even better for Arsenal as Everton play this Thursday against Young Boys and seem to be suffering from European hangovers come the weekend’s league games as evidenced this week. A fine 4-1 victory in Switzerland was followed by very nearly being beaten by Leicester at home. We’d expect the Gunners to take this one especially as it is at home and they have won their last six straight at the Emirates.

After this Arsenal go to QPR who are without a win in their last four home games and have just one win in their last ten games in total having lost seven of those. Chalk it up. West Ham at home will be more difficult for sure but even they are without a win in their last six away from home so all in all this is a decent run for Arsenal and should see them continue their recent good form.

Santi continues to make dents into Sanchezs’ early running for best Arsenal midfielder and the last five games make for interesting reading. Ok, granted, Alexis has missed two of these due to injury but even so the facts are this – Alexis 8 points, Santi 45. In fact you have to go back to the January 11th to find when Sanchez last made a meaningful contribution whilst Cazorla has got three goals, three assists and nine bonus points in that time. For nearly £3m less of your budget.

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Man City – Liverpool (a), Leicester (h), Burnley (a)
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[/three_fourth]With Chelsea unexpectedly dropping points earlier in the day City had a chance to close the gap and they surely did with a resounding 5-0 thumping of a sad excuse for a Newcastle team. The only real surprise about the whole affair was that they scored five and Aguero only got one of those. Anyone tuning in after the event would surely have expected to see his name amongst the scorers at least two or three times. He still seems to be feeling his way back into form after his lay off in all fairness and was subbed off after 59 minutes which would indicate that Pellegrini didn’t captain him and has his hand firmly on the fantasy pulse perhaps! With the game done and dusted and a rather important and big Champions League date in midweek this was perhaps inevitable as he will be pivotal to any hopes City have of progressing in that one against the mighty Barcelona.

We have been lampooned for having City away at Liverpool as a ‘green’ fixture for the last few weeks on the tracker and the truth is that when we initially did that it probably was as Liverpool were looking very poor at the time. They’ve picked up somewhat in the meantime and so we have bowed to popular pressure and made it a yellow. Whether they’ve improved enough to halt City in their tracks is another matter. The Citizens are unbeaten in their last eight away games having scored the most away goals (30) of any team in the league. They have the second best away defensive record too with just 13 conceded and the lowest number of away defeats with just the one to their name.

The truth is that the Liverpool game will be the most difficult of the three but things then perk up sharply once more for them as they then face two of the bottom three back to back and many will be eyeing up Leicester at home in GW28 as the perfect excuse to fill up on City attackers once more. Despite GW28 being a double for the Spurs lads you could make a very valid argument that the likes of Aguero and Silva could in fact be better captaincy candidates at home to Leicester. The league’s joint top scorers against the bottom club who have conceded 25 on the road feels like another Newcastle in the making.

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Spurs – NO GAME in GW27, Swansea (h) & QPR (a), Man United (a)
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[/three_fourth]As we have mentioned above, Spurs fixtures ahead are notable for two things – they don’t play this week but then they have two fixtures in GW28. Spurs will most likely be the go to guys for the DGW as they face Swansea and QPR in what feels like two very winnable fixtures as opposed to the other team with a double that week which is QPR as they play Spurs and Arsenal in what feels like two very loseable fixtures. If you choose to load up with three Spurs players then you need to be aware of their fixtures beyond that week which begin with a trip to Old Trafford which could be tricky but we wouldn’t bet against Spurs scoring there. Or anyone for that matter! They then go into three very favourable fixtures with Leicester (h), Burnley (a) and Villa (h) on the bounce so you could be forgiven for keeping your DGW Spurs assets all the way through to mid April. In fact they don’t face a top five side again until GW34 when they have Southampton and then Man City back to back.

One word of caution on Spurs is that their fixture schedule is quite taxing and they actually play four games in ten days beginning with a trip to Fiorentina this Thursday. The Europa is often a chance to rest players but they are finely balanced at 1-1 and will surely want to progress having come this far. They then have the small matter of a League Cup Final on Sunday against Chelsea and then the Swansea game is on the Wednesday followed quickly by the QPR game on the Saturday. Having already seen star man Christian Eriksen handed a rest at the weekend against West Ham we wouldn’t be at all surprised to see some rotation over these games. You have been warned!

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Stoke – Hull (h), Everton (h), West Brom (a)
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[/three_fourth]Any time you see Stoke in the favourable fixtures section you can be sure that we are scraping the barrel! Hear us out though as many will be looking for some cheaper coverage in the next few weeks as the likes of Costa and Yaya returning may see budgets stretched to breaking point and Stoke have three home games in the next four. It’s Hull up first, who despite parking the bus at City for an admirable point, lost their previous three away games and didn’t manage a goal in any of those so you’d have to fancy Stoke’s chances of a clean sheet in that one. Can an ailing Everton cut it on a cold Tuesday night at Stoke? Well we shall find out next Wednesday! After that Stoke go to West Brom where they will fancy their chances before another home game against Palace. A word of warning beyond that though as their decent run of games grinds to a halt in GW31 as they then have to go to Chelsea and then West Ham before facing Southampton at home.

All in all that’s not a bad run really and Hull, Everton and Palace only have 8 away wins between them out of 29 games. Which, if any, Stoke defenders to go for has been a bit of a lottery as of late as the likes of Shawcross, Pieters, Cameron, Wilson and Muniesa have all been in and out due to various reasons. Phil Bardsley looks to have nailed a place now having started the last five games while team-mate Philipp Wollscheid at just £4.5m has started every game since arriving in the January transfer window.

Further up the pitch Stephen Ireland could be a cheeky differential at just £4.7m should he look like holding down a place in the midfield. He’s managed three assists in the last three games he has started. Jonathan Walters at £5.3m is by far and away Stoke’s highest scoring player courtesy of seven goals and four assists. Having been deployed as the main striker recently he played as part of a front three in last weekends win at Villa and is always a threat although he does finally appear to have lost penalty duties which may actually be a blessing in disguise! Those duties seem to have gone to Victor Moses who decided the Villa game from the spot having won the penalty himself. Moses always flatters to deceive but at £5.2m he’s another midfielder playing slightly out of position as part of that three pronged attack.

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LESS FAVOURABLE FIXTURES

Leicester – NO GAME in GW27, Man City (a), Hull (h)
We shall keep our Leicester analysis short and sweet. Any team that is bottom of the league, has won only four games all season, has conceded 42 goals and has no game this week followed by a trip to Man City may just be worth avoiding for a bit!

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Burnley – Swansea (h), Liverpool (a), Man City (h)
Despite somehow managing to snatch a draw at Chelsea, Burnley still find themselves in the bottom three and are without a win in their last six games in all competitions. If visiting Anfield and hosting Man City wasn’t enough to put you off then their next three games after that are Southampton (a), Spurs (h) and Arsenal (h). They could well be in this difficult section for a while yet!

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West Ham – Crystal Palace (h), Chelsea (h), Arsenal (a)
West Ham are another team who went away and earned a creditable draw this weekend as Big Sam and co were unlucky not to take all three points at Spurs. West Ham are a difficult side to predict at the moment. Nobody will particularly fancy playing them but likewise you wouldn’t really back them to win. It’s five games without a win now and they have only scored three goals in those games. Palace at home is perhaps their best chance here as they then face Chelsea and Arsenal on the bounce.

Fixture Fun
There are plenty of games to navigate ahead of GW27 as our European contingent of Arsenal, Everton, Liverpool, Man City and Spurs are all in action this week.

Man City kick things off in the Champions League on Tuesday as they host the mighty Barcelona.
Arsenal are next on Wednesday as they host Monaco.

Thursday then sees the Europa League teams back in action for their second-leg ties with Everton hosting Young Boys while Spurs and Liverpool are at away against Fiorentina and Besiktas respectively.

Be sure to keep an eye out for any injuries that may arise as a result of these.

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Thanks for reading Fantasy Football Fixtures Gameweek 27 – Fantasy Premier League 2014-15. This article was written by Inittowinit

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