Fantasy World Cup Live Match Chat Last 16, Day 4
Welcome to the last 16 of the World cup – or the round of 16 as some choose to call it, or the first knockout stage. In fact, call it what you want – either way, it’s sudden death time – lose and you go home, outta here, offski and this will likely mean that your coach resigns or gets the chop or in England’s case receives a pat on the back and a “bad luck old chap”.
The final day of the round sees the Argies back on display as they attempt to neutralise the Swiss – that shouldn’t be tricky. However, with the likes of di Maria and Higuain quiet so far and Aguero injured (obviously), it’s been down to little Leo to carry the Argies through the group. Easy then, mark Messi out the game and you’ll be fine – how many times have we heard that before?! Switzerland’s only chance of course is if Shaqiri turns on the style and his hat-trick vs Honduras will leave him feeling on top of his game.
The round is concluded as Belgium take on the US of A. Could be a tough one to call this as Belgium have hardly set the tournament on fire as yet, while the Yanks have surprised many with their courage and adventure. Klinsmann of course, has been here before and knows what it takes to get through this stage of the tournament and there’ll surely be cries of “Mashed potato” and “You’re the man” if awesome talisman Dempsey can lead America through to the quarters, or quarter finals, or last 8, or the round of 8…..we’ve gone full circle here.
What a brilliant match, best of the tournament so far, for me. Commiserations to the U.S team and fans, if only Wondo or Deuce had their shooting boots on, eh? Three glorious chances whiffed.
Well now the round is over my experiment shows how crap I am at Fantasy Football :sfan:
I was running 3 teams through the round of 16 for an experiment:
1. my main one (alec_k) that is in nearly boys, chosen/agonised over using my skill and judgement,
2. my stats based one, IP1963, based on points/£ analysis and opponents scoring and defensive records from group stages, all stuffed into a spreadsheet
3. my random auto complete team, did it a few times until it used most of the budget (97), resisted the urge to select/pick and mix any changes from the random picks
Well how did they get on?
1.Fortunes Always Hiding (OK alec_k, as it didn’t let you enter a team name), ended up 4-3-3 as had no one left to sub out Slimani only 83 pts
Lloris in goal 10 pts OK, but had 14 pts for Mbolhi on the bench (mah ! was happy with 10 for LLLLLoris, is he part Welsh?)
Defence, spent big on a German, checked physio room to make sure he wasn’t injured, chose Hummels, got flu so left on bench, 0 pts, Doh!
Went Dutch, got D.Blind, who disappointed with only 6 pts
Greece, they can defend, Manolas, only 5 pts, subbed out for Halliche for the same (how did he only get 5!!)
Mesbah, never played left on the bench
Only semi decent scores Zuniga (Col) 8 pts and Roja (Arg) 9 pts (was hoping for more) total of 38 for defs/gk
Midfield, Went for Fernandinho when I saw he was in starting lineup, only 5 pts, subbed out, Herrera 4 pts, subbed out, Cuadrado 9 pts OK. Matuidi 4 pts (had swapped to him from Cabaye), poor was expecting more. Bentaleb never played so left on bench 0 pts. Hazard (sure he’d show something, but not sure enough to move armband from Lionel, turned out to be correct decision) 4 pts. 2 Iranians still in to save money spectating from the stands so only 17 pts from mids.
Forwards
This is where the money went, Van Persie 4 pts, Neymar 5 pts (subbed out for Slimani, too early should have waited until after the Dutch game, but was certain RVP would get more than 5, wouldn’t he?), Messi(C) 22 pts and Slimani 2 pts plus an Iranian spectator. total 28 pts. What a waste of money !!!
2.Stats United, ended up 4-5-1, as fwds were rubbish, 109 pts
GK: 9 pts scored for Cillesen, 14 on bench for Mbohli, along with Karnezis 3 pts
Def: 4 Costas, Gamboa 5 pts, Gonzales 9 pts, subbed out Diaz 4 pts, Duarte 4 pts
Manolas 5 pts, Halliche 5 pts subbed out for Van Buyten 12 pts, for a total of 40 for defs/gk
Mids: subbed out Maniatis 3 pts and Herrera 4 pts, Bentaleb never played, Cuadrado 9 pts, JRod 14 pts (armband moved to Messi Doh!), Costa Rican Tejeda 5 pts, Gago 8 pts, Mascherano 11 pts for a total of 47 pts
Fwds: Subbed Out 4 forwards (ended up 4-5-1) Neymar 5 pts, Musa 4 pts, Muller 7 pts, Slimani 2 pts, leaving Messi(C) alone up front with 22 pts
3.Random Rovers (rejected the first 3 it picked. deleted all players and tried again, as first 3 cost less than 80, this one was 97) ended up 5-3-2, 117 pts:
GK: Started with Muslera 5 pts, missed subbing in Cillesen 9 pts, but this meant I did then sub in Mbolhi for 14 pts (probably would’t have done that if i’d played Cillesen)
Def: Gimenez (Urg) 4 pts and Guardado (Mex) 2 pts subbed out, 5 across the back, Jara (Chi) 7 pts, Fernandez (arg) 15 pts !!, Evra 8 pts, Cholevas (Gre) 8 pts, Belkalem (Alg) a massive 16 pts !!! making a total of 68 pts for the boys at the back.
Mids: Started with 2 Greeks Maniatis 3 pts Katsouranis 3 pts, both subbed out, Beausejour never played and Davis (USA) and Dzemali (Swi) 1 pt didn’t start. So ended with 3 across the middle Herrera (Mex) 4 pts, Gago (Arg) 8 pts and Oezil 11 pts for 23 pts
Fwds: Mitroglou (Gre) 3 pts was subbed out, 2 Algerians Ghilas and Mahrez didn’t start so stayed on the bench, so the 2 who ended up front were Odemwingie 4 pts and Messi(C) 22 pts for 26 pts
I was surprised that so many of these random picks played, might have been less fun to manage if more were non-starters
Actually had fun managing all 3 teams over the 8 games, though it did get a bit hectic trying to shuffle all 3 once team starting lineups were announced
Changing formation worked fine every time (did it a lot!) just make sure you sub out unplayed players first, so it doesn’t have to pick who to remove
So obviously neither judgement or stats work, you might just as well use a random pick :cuckoo:
Alec
Started doing Fantasy Footy way back, ran a league myself for the West Ham United mailing list (we did have e-mail but no internet as it is today) by reading all the newspaper reports (used to buy 4 or 5 different papers on a Sunday, most games were still on a Saturday then) to get teams assist goals etc (pre proper internet) rather than waiting for the Telegraph weekly points updates in the paper, did 4 years in League at Marconi Beeston where we had a real auction down the pub and if you got a player only you had him (used to love the strategy involved in who you put up for auction when, as you took it in turns to name a player and tried to keep back your hidden gems until the others had filled up their slots so they couldn’t bid) and watched every episode of Skinner/Baddiel/Statto (R.I.P Jeff Astle)
Am loving all the free FF games around now on the net, looking forward to the Premier League starting again, Come on you Irons!
Entertaining read
So basically next season we should all just hit the random button and save ourselves countless hours of wasted pondering :big-lol:
You mean you didn’t do that last season Calvin? 😉
Chin….
Is it over…plz tell me it’s done….Carnt take anymore…..
How did it go my friend…?
It’s over Biggie.
Well played mate. Beat me by 5 points.
Good luck in the next round.
That’s what my experiment shows I should do, for the rest of you how much did you beat 117 by ?
I failed abysmally, might do the same experiment again for the quarters to see if I can overcome Radom Rovers
Alec
Beat it by 3 B)
By 10 B)
By 6.
. *
* Lost by
Transfer market back open in 8 mins, for anyone that fancys a late night tinker….
:turtle:
Excellent, I have my finger ready on the auto select button. ( Per Alec ) 😉
Just tried first go at Random Rovers and it only spent £74m, will remove them all and try again until it gets one worth over £95m
OK got one worth £97m, had to auto-select a team, then bin all the strikers, select Messi and auto complete for the remaining 4 as it kept only spending about £70-80m. Maybe thats what I had to do last time?
Need to fire up my bash scripts and spreadsheet tomorrow for working out Stats United
Full squads lads?
Mbholi (14)
Blind (5), Van Buyten (11), Rojo (9)
J Rod (14), Cuadrado (9), Lahm (10), KDB (17)
Messi (C – 22), Mueller (7), Djabou (7)
Karnezis (3), Ochoa (4)
Marquez (3), Halliche (5), Manolas (5), Duarte (4)
Bentaleb (0), Beikzadeh (*0), Maniatis (3), Shaqiri (6)
Martinez (*0), Neymar (5)
As you can see from my bench, I wasn’t having the best time of it up until yesterday, but today’s matches saved my GW. What did you all have?
Oh go on then…
111 pts. 435 overall.
Jasper CILLESSEN 9 Pts
Konstantinos MANOLAS 5 Pts ,Marcos ROJO 9 Pts ,Daniel VAN BUYTEN 11 Pts ,
LUIZ GUSTAVO 6 Pts ,James RODRIGUEZ 14 Pts ,Fernando GAGO 8 Pts ,Mathieu VALBUENA 10 Pts, Medhi LACEN 10 Pts
Lionel MESSI 22 Pts ,Thomas MUELLER 7 Pts
Subs:
Goalkeepers
Orestis KARNEZIS 3 Pts , Rais MBOLHI 14 Pts
Defenders
Junior DIAZ 4 Pts ,Oscar DUARTE 4 Pts ,Rafik HALLICHE 5 Pts ,Daryl JANMAAT 0 Pts
Midfielders
Nabil BENTALEB 0 Pts, Yeltsin TEJEDA 5 Pts , Blaise MATUIDI 4 Pts
Forwards
Abdelmoumene DJABOU 7 Pts , NEYMAR 5 Pts , Teofilo GUTIERREZ 4 Pts
Am I the only one struggling with getting a deep squad? Seems like the players left are too expensive?
No, no limit, reach for the sky,
No squad too deep, no mountain too hiiiigh.
Tekno tekno tekno.
But yeah, it will probably need a few cheeky Algerians in the team mate. Can’t see it being mathematically possible to have a playing 23 from here on.
Hahaha, nice one chins!
In the last round I already had 3 Iranians in to enable me to choose the sort of players I wanted (for all the good it did me!)
Nope not a problem at all. But that could be because I haven’t looked at it.
I’m really struggling with getting more than 1 keeper in my squad. Currently I only have Cillessen, but I can upgrade him to Cesar or Ospina. Any advice?
Navas is also an option.
Tekno – It’s not that bad. I have a squad together that i’m pretty happy with. Feck all to choose from. 7 blank players (Algerians and the like).
None yet mate. I’ll have a proper look later. Probably just go with 2 playing.
Here’s mine…
Round 116 overal 447
Cilla 9pts
De virj 12pts / Rojo 9pts / Cholevas 8pts / F.Rodriguez 8pts
Vabuena 10pts / J.Rod 28pts / Lahm 10pts / Oscar 6pts
Neymar 5pts / Messi 11pts
Subs..
Gk. M’Bolhi 14 / Kernezis 3pts
Def. Hallache 5pts / Monalas 5pts / Duarte 4pts
Mids. Bentalebs 0 / Gustavo 6pts / maniatis 3pts / Tejeda 5pts
Fwds. Benzema 4 / Slimani 2 / Djabou 7
Phew…!