Fixture Tracker – Fantasy Premier League 2014-15
We’ve all seen a few different ways of viewing upcoming fixtures, and the one that has become increasingly popular over the last couple of years is the colour-coded one. With this, you can instantly see each team’s approaching fixtures with an accompanying colour that corresponds to the difficulty of each match. This is very useful for both identifying teams that are potentially about to have a great run due to a kind set of fixtures, and also identifying weaker teams that can rotate well, i.e. when one team has a bad fixture the other will have a decent one, so you swap between the two players. For more info on rotation, check out Mito’s somewhat exceptional article on it 😉 Rotation Analysis Home and Away and Favourable fixtures
Many of these colour-coded tickers only show a few weeks in advance, which is very helpful for short-term plans, but not if you’re planning transfers for the long-term. It is understandable that these tickers are short-term, as teams’ form tends to fluctuate as the season progresses, so if you made a season-long ticker now, it may well not be a good reflection of how difficult a match is come Christmas or Easter. Who knows, maybe Villa will get off to a blinder and win 10 out of 15 (hahaha!), in which case a game against them would no longer be considered easy. Also, sometimes we may even disagree with the colour a certain match has been assigned by the fantasy football gurus that make the tickers! The ticker I have made is designed with both of these points in mind, and can be updated throughout the season as and when you see fit.
Customisable Tracker
Some of you may already have seen my earlier prototype after I posted it on the boards last week (much to init’s dismay :p ) – I have since added all 38 GWs to the tracker, modified the colours used and added a new custom search for individual teams, so even if you had the original please do use this updated version instead.
And it works like this: I have split up all 20 teams into four groups of similar ability, and then given every possible combination (of which there are 32) a difficulty rating of between A and E (5 difficulties as opposed to 3 for greater accuracy). Both of these factors are the variables that you can change, and doing so will automatically update the colours in your fixtures tab. Simply click on the ‘Variables’ tab as shown in fig.1, change any of the values in the cyan-coloured columns shown in fig. 2,
and you will be able to view your very own customised 38 GW fixture tracker as shown in the main image above. This is all explained in more detail in the ‘How It Works’ tab. Finally, I have made a ‘Compare Fixtures’ tab as well – this allows you to select only the teams you wish in order to see just how well they compare and/or rotate, without having the distraction of all 20 teams’ colours present. If you wish to use this tool then select the ‘Compare Fixtures’ tab and then click on the ‘Add Team’ drop-down menu as shown in fig. 3 and choose the team you want. You can do this with as many or as few teams as you wish. Though it seems rather simple, I found this last feature very tricky and would not have been able to make it work as well as it does without the help of Dreamers, so a huge thanks to him!
I have made the link read-only, so as to preserve the template in its original format for everyone in case the formulas stop working. Just save your own version of the file, and you will be able to customise it entirely as you see fit. Please bear in mind that this was made with Google Sheets and is intended to be used in that format so it can be saved in favourites for easy access; if you download it with Excel then the margins and borders will probably be off so will need adjusting. I am always open to suggestions for ways to improve it, so feel free to send me a message or post a comment below to that effect if you have any ideas. And finally, I have double- and triple-checked the fixtures, but there are a lot of them and after a point they all tend to blur together, so if you spot any mistakes please let me know as soon as possible!
Click the link below for the file. Hope it helps a few of you, happy customising.
Fixture Tracker – Fantasy Premier League 2014-15
Thoughts on yet another draft:
De Gea, random
Luis, Debuchy, Ben Davies, Hooiveld, Coloccini
Ramsey, Silva, Sterling, Lamela, Albrighton
Bojan, Rooney, Costa
Hey M&B – Not sure about Hooiveld yet. Luis – who knows with Chelsea. Lamela is pretty interesting choice.
Hey TheDreamers:
Yeah Hooiveld is just my filler, just wanted a starter.
What’s wrong with Luis? Haven’t watched their pre-season, don’t get much coverage here in SA.
M&B – Im just not totally sure Luis is nailed yet
is hooiveld really gonna start? thats an absolute bargain then in my book?
+1. I’d also rather one of the 5.5m United defenders ahead of Debuchy meaning you could save a bit in the GK’s and upgrade Hooiveld or Albrighton a bit.
NIN, don’t you rate the Arsenal defense? They were the top CS scorers last season..
Milky – They defo have a good defence but it’s the fixtures mate. United’s first 6 is shockingly handy. If the Arsenal/United fixtures were very similar then i’d go with Debuchy, no doubt.
NiN I see 2 of the opening 6 are bad – Everton and Man City.. The problem with the GK conundrum, is who to use? I was even considering a MUFC GK and defender!
M&B – 2 rotating 4.5’s which would likely be Krul&Man Pants (Not my GK pairing). Throw Spurs and Chelsea in there too mate and i don’t think it’s a banker that they’ll steamroll Palace either. Remember Villa last season? Actually, including Chelsea there would make it the first 7 games. United have Everton at home on the 7th gwk. I fancy United defenders over Arsenal defenders for that run mate.
Fair point, fair point! I’ll have a look. Shot NiN!
Yeah mate, have a look and see what you make of it.
Have changed my team so often I no longer know who I fancy. I guess my dilemmas are mainly related to the use of Mannone, Cameron, and Giroud. Also, Is my bench too expensive? Maybe I’d be better off with a more expensive first XI and drop the all round team?
Hi dimitri, it’s actually a very well rounded squad but yeah totally get your point on that. Maybe switch one of them down if it allows a small upgrade somewhere if it’s worth it. You’ll certainly have some selection dilemmas each week with this!
Appreciate the feedback. I guess the only area I would have some flexibility is to get rid of Arnautovic or Siggy depending on who I think will score most pts. The head says to go for Siggy, but the gut tells me Arnautovic is going to have a field day with Sidwell and Bojan added to Stoke’s firepower.
Totally mate, I’d be tempted to leave the pair of them in there. Giroud or Lukaku up to Costa would be where I would be looking personally but hey that’s a toss up as any of those can do well.
no diego costa could hurt you, badly
Any thoughts? Thinking of downgrading Pellé to Bojan and bring in Costa for Lukaku. Or bring Sanchez in instead of Ramsey.
Hi daphned, no right or wrong on any of those decisions. Without looking in guessing Davies over Vert for Spurs def coverage would give you some money to play with elsewhere.
what formation is everyone going to play i’ve seen alot of people playing 3-5-2 on here am going for 3-4-3 but which formation is best ?
Hi Jeet. I’ve settled on a 3-4-3 after putting serious thought into a 3-5-2.
I’m a 3-4-3 guy, but a lot of it is just guess work as to which is the best, I prefer the 3-4-3 as with 3 forwards up top I think you’ve a better chance of one of them having a high scoring GW, I think the dream team on the opening day of last season was a 5-3-2 though with Mignolet? as the highest scorer.
Should I start Chester (away QPR) or van Aanholt (away Brom)?
Don’t have any other Rs or Brom players.
Sorry, I do have Wisdom at the back. So a 0-0 would do me nicely if I went with van Aanholt and Wisdom!
webstar87 – Close call that. I’d say van Aanholt.
Is van Aanholt nailed on to start for sunderland with them signing Vergini on loan Again ?
Jeet – Yeah i think so mate. There’s still some preseason games to go so we’ll know a bit more come season start but for now, i reckon he’s first 11.
I would have assumed so but may just take the risk out of it and bring in O’Shea.
Sooooo,
The team is looking like
Mannone (Krul)
Luis, Cameron, jones (Ward, Coloccini) *not sure which united defender.
Ramsey, Sterling, Mata, Henderson (Siggy)
Diego Costa, Rooney, Long
Im if’ing and but’ing about everyone really, lack of chelsea midfield etc…
Any thoughts?
P.s Liverpool for Falcao (beer) haha