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
We can confirm that @T_Vermaelen05 has agreed to join @FCBarcelona http://arsn.al/P8vExm #GoodLuckThomas
Great! I’m delighted United didn’t sign him.
Bojan & Henderson (or other 6.5 midfielder – already have Siggy)
or
Pelle & Albrighton
TMW – I prefer the Bojan option. How about Snodgrass or Mutch instead of Hendo? Puncheon is an option too.
NIN
How would you change my team:
De Gea – Gilks
Filipe Luis – Mariappa – Ferdinand – Van Aanholt – Coloccini
Sanchez – Mata – Eriksen – Siggurdsson – ????
Rooney – Diego Costa – Bojan
6.5 in the bank for a midfielder
Get a 5mill midfielder like Davis and use the additional funds to improve your defence. Maybe marriappa to debuchy
Really? You have 6.5 left in the bank?! That is nice change there my friend with the squad you have.
Mariappa may need replacing, I be tempted to upgrade him to Ward and change Rio to Caulker, with the leftovers get Davis or JWP for the mid. Possibly even Knocks from Leicester although he be useless for a while, but he does have most set pieces.
Guys a bit of help with this squad. Me thinks this needs a major overhaul defensively so they can add some punch in the midfield. Any help would be appreciated.
My eyes!! My eyes!! Take it away!
Ok, seriously… I could list the swaps needed to make it look the same as most on here, or i’ll assume there’s a genuine desire for the teams used so far, i’d suggest the following:
Mert to Debuchy
Skrtel and Jags to a pair of cheaper ones that rotate nicely and then play 3 at the back. Colo/VanA or maybe a palace/west ham duo. Then play Lovren.
Ditch lukaku for a cheaper option (pretty much all strikers are cheaper than luk). Ha! Maybe Naismith if the mgr is an everton fan or just going against the consensus that Everton will struggle in their opening games.
Then reinvest all of that in upgrading Henderson to Sterling (if keen on liverpool) or maybe switch one of the bench mids to siggy or snodgrass.
I’d keep Rooney and Lloris, possibly Yaya. Other than that…
Mito, what’s with the two Liverpool defenders?
You’d save £0.5m by swapping Mertesacker for Debuchy.
Swap Lovren for Ward from Palace, that’s another £0.5m.
Swap Barkley for Sigurdsson, that’ll save £1.0m, you already have Everton cover in Lukaku (great differential, haven’t seen much of him – although somebody mentioned he may miss first GW?!).
That should allow you to upgrade Henderson to Sterling.
Appreciate that fellas!
Which do you prefer?
.
Between these 2 I’d be backing this one even if the bench is slightly weak.
Thanks. Any changes?
Tough to call, not a lot of value to play with in the bench department and not a lot of better looking options for that kind of money either.
This one leaves 1.0 in the bank for early transfers
I’d probably put .5 of that into Marney for a better just in case back up player for your front 7, Barton or Hoillett look OK from QPR.
Adebayor scored today – anyone going for him or Soldado? Is there validity to the rumours that Soldado will leave?
Soldado also scored. I’ve had Soldado in a few of my mash-ups, I reckon if he does stay he could do quite well. No idea if he’s staying or not, though.
he has at times looked class but only in minutes of games etc more than anything else
Adebayor did me proud with a couple of captaincy punts last year, but he’s not the best long-term option.. could give him a couple of games and see how he does before shipping him out for the trip to Anfield if he’s not in form.
Calvin – Adabayor or Soldado?
Missed this. Hard to say as I haven’t followed how Pocci has been playing them. Unless anything in pre-season suggests Ade isn’t really favoured then I’d go with him.