Newcastle 0-2 Man City
In the early Sunday game sponsored by “Specsavers” Newcastle will feel rightly aggrieved after losing this engrossing encounter that saw City move to the top of the Premier League. Edin Dzeko gave the away side the lead in the 8th minute when the brilliant Aleksander Kolarov broke down the left and sent in a fine cross that was met by the Bosnian striker who tucked the ball into the net beyond Tim Krul. But the main talking point, and yet another diabolical refereeing decision, occurred in the 33rd minute when Cheick Tiote scored what should have been a thumping 30 yard goal, Yoan Gouffran was contentiously ruled to be off-side when the ball was struck but clearly he did not touch the ball. The officials deemed him to have been in Joe Harts’s line of sight but, as Alan Pardew argued at length later, the keeper would have had no chance anyway such was the ferocity of the strike. The resulting melee saw Cabaye and Sissoko booked for dissent and it was clear that the Newcastle players were affected by the decision. Having had 80% of the possession after City’s first goal the home side were right to be annoyed. The half time whistle couldn’t come soon enough for both managers as yellow cards were issued to players from both sides for needless misdemeanours. The second half could have gone either way, Cabaye threatening from distance for Newcastle and Negredo and Nasri coming close for City. Loic Remy was the villain this time for the Toon as he wasted the hosts’ best chance, firing straight into Hart’s legs as the City defence were caught napping. The match had eight minutes of injury time mainly due to a cynical foul by Yanga-Mbiwa who brought down Samir Nasri and he was forced to leave the game on a stretcher close to tears. Initial reports are that it could be a serious knee injury. City now started to push forward in an attempt to kill the game off and after Fernandinho had hit the bar with a header and Steven Taylor had cleared off the line, Negredo finished the game off by rolling the ball in after a rebound from Tim Krul in the final seconds. The City juggernaut keeps rolling on and if they can win ugly away from home consistently they will be very difficult to stop in the march towards another Premier Title.
Bonus Points: Kolarov (3), Dzeko (2), Demichelis & Silva (1)
Stoke 3-5 Liverpool
Sundays other match was a torrid and boring affair and not worthy of a mention!! Good grief, we were treated to a fantastic spectacle that had everything you could want on a Sunday afternoon. Liverpool emerged the winners after a quite remarkable game and looked to be walking it having raced into a two goal lead within 32 minutes following a Ryan Shawcross own goal and a Luis Suarez strike. But the Britannia Stadium is a difficult place to get a result and having only lost one of their last ten at home Stoke were not going to roll over and lie down. Mark Hughes has instilled some fight in this team and two ex-Liverpool players did their damndest to get Stoke back into the game, first Peter Crouch’s header pulled one back before Charlie Adam thumped in the second from the edge of the area to pull Stoke level.
Steven Gerrard on his 650th Liverpool appearance, restored Liverpool’s lead on 51 minutes with a penalty after Raheem Sterling drew Marc Wilson into a foul and then Suarez fired in an angled shot to make it 4-2 to the visitors, following some wonderful play from Daniel Sturridge who cut inside from the left to set him up. Jonathan Walters looked to have set up a tense finish by reducing the deficit in the 85th minute, but Sturridge celebrated his return from an ankle injury by scoring Liverpool’s fifth, having seen his initial effort saved by Jack Butland he was able to find the net on the second attempt. A great game to watch and more interestingly for us FPL Managers, “S & S” could be back!
Bonus Points: Suarez (3), Gerrard (2), Sturridge (1)
This article was written by Eddy
Morning Lads, hope you are all well and your fantasy teams are doing better than my pile of poop! Hope my Sunday Review was up to standard. Quick question to you all, as well as FPL i’ll be running some other fantasy games like this Summers World Cup One. First though we have the Six Nations Fantasy Game coming up so if any of you fantasy nutters are up for it the league code and site details will be up shortly.
Hi Sgt Eddy,
Firstly…you have 2 men to play tonight but all you did wrong was Captain Adey.
So chin up Brucey.
Fantasy Ruggers??
Potty will be in as really fancy getting close to you Groin area.
Potty
Potty, took a gamble on Ade and it backfired. 6 Nations details will be released as soon as i get the restraining order out on you.
Thanks eddy,great review as always.I don’t like Rugby but i’ll play the World Cup game for sure…
Nin, no worries, an Irishman that doesnt like Rugby? Thats just………… well Irish!
hoping to defend 13 points with kosielny versus metasaker and ozil…..
I need to catch 6 points with Ozil agianst his Kos and Szc…
Im thinking 3-1 to Arsenal with Ozil scoring 2 and assisting the other…
I’d be happy with that as i’ve only really got Ozil to play
with Barkely out for a few weeks I made my move to offload him for a cheap sunderland midfielder so my team is as follows:
Mignolet/(Boruc)
Sagna/Coleman/Dawson/(Collins)/(Vlaar)
Ozil/Hazard/Sterling/Ramsey/(Ki-seung)
Remy/Rooney/Suarez
I still have my wildcard, 0FT and 0.5mil in the bank.
I haven’t taken a hit yet this season but im starting to get hit badly with the injuries…..I always intended to wait til after GW23 to play the WC, would appreciate peoples thoughts….
Daboyo if you aren’t planning on WCing then that team looks fine to me. Rooney is expected back this GW, and if not then Ki can definitely fill in for 1 GW – that’s what he’s there for.
Do you have your WC planned out for GW23? If so, is it considerably different to one you would pick now? Or are you just holding off until Aguero and Ramsey are back fit? If so then you may want to just use it now and have a contingency for bringing them both in using your next two FTs.
cheers Calvin, Aguero and Ramsey are holding me alright tbh.
I am looking at something like the following
Mannone/Boruc
Dawson/Sagna/Coleman/Whittaker/Collins
Lallana/Eriksen/Hazard/Ramsey/Ki seung
Sturridge/Suarez/Aguero
Gents if you could give me your thoughts on my best way of bringing in Aguero I’d really appreciate it. I WCed just before the last GW to give me this current team:
Mannone (Marshall)
Coleman, Azpil, Kos (Ward, Chester)
Silva, Ozil, Hazard, Gerrard, Eriksen
Suarez, Ade (JRod)
I have 1.4 in the bank, and can see 4 main options that either include 343 or 352:
A) JRod -> Aguero, Gerrard -> Parker – 0.0 remaining
B) JRod -> Aguero, Gerrard -> Lallana/Cabaye, Ade -> Berahino – 0.1 remaining
C) JRod -> Aguero, Ade -> Berahino/Chamakh, Kos -> Olsson/Whittaker – 0.1 remaining
D) Ade -> Aguero, Gerrard -> Parker – 1.5 remaining so could also get in Baines for Coleman, though I did bring in Coleman for 5.0 so that’s a massive price hike for me – think it’s worth it?
Really appreciated once again.
CC – Would Ozil&Adebayor >> Ramsey&Kun work? When both are back fit again i think they’ll be a very strong pairing.
NIN it would work leaving 0.0! It’s another possibility, I just didn’t list it as I sold Ramsey a few weeks ago for a considerable loss and told myself that I wouldn’t be bringing him back for the rest of the season. That’s stupid pride talking I know, but I’ll at least keep an eye on Ozil tonight and see how he does. You really think Ramsey will recapture his earlier form? Didn’t return so well from injury last time (obviously it was waaaay worse though).
Also if I do your suggestion I still end up wasting JRod on the bench so do you think it would be worth upgrading another defender to Baines then?
CC – Ramsey isn’t far away from dropping in value,Ozil is on a steady enough rise too,we’ll see with Ramsey,if he shows the signs of kicking off then he’s straight in for me.I wouldn’t be against the Baines move,25 points in 3 games is pretty good!!
See post below, could replace Ward with Parr and have 0.3 extra in the bank.
Ah cheers Ritz. I got Ward in for 4.0 so would be an extra 0.2 for me. Still not to be sniffed at, but I already used my WC and think I will have more pressing transfers over the next 2-3 GWs at least.
I think Gerrard to Lallana is a good shout, as is Ozil to Ramsey (depending on his gametime). This should leave you plenty room to upgrade the strikers.
No need to do it all in one week though….
For you who are looking for a cheap Palace defender with your WCs I would consider Jonatan Parr, he has just recovered from injury recently and is available for 3.9m. The left-back was one of their best players last season, and is a much better player then Moxey imo. So I`m sure he will start regularly for them from now on.
thanks for that.
did anyone see the Tottenham game? i read somewhere that Pulis is playing Ward in midfield now which if true, would add to his value
But if Ward’s a holding midfielder he may score less bonus pts than in defence. I may trade Ward in for Parr when I use up my WC – who knows when the extra 0.2m will come in handy?!
Seriously?
Ward has only earned 3 bonus points so far. You really think your decision would change by points as low as 3?
Playing as holding midfielder won’t be likely to get him goals or assists either.