Week 32 – Out with the Old Guard and in with the New?

Right, the games are coming thick and fast now as we enter the home stretch of the season so, with Cup re-scheduled fixtures tonight (City vs Villa) and Wednesday (Arsenal vs Palace) let’s get right into it ! 😊

With two fixtures (with very different outcomes !) Newcastle players dominate the Team of the Week, F. Schar (£3.7m) wins star player on account of being the cheapest but is joined on 15 point hauls by team-mates N. Pope (£4.0m) and H. Barnes (£4.4m) with B. Mbeumo (£3.9m) of Brentford also notching 15 points.

Mbeumo replaces the injured E. Haaland (£8.5m) in the Team of the Season and, due to his far cheaper price, the standard Team of the Season is now also the Available and Affordable Team of the Season for, I think, the first time this season😊 :-

So, as mentioned on previous blogs, a key differentiator for the Telegraph version of the game is the ability to maximise any remaining transfers taking advantage of additional Cup games and League scheduling.

Traditional ‘big name’ players from the likes of United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal (the bottom four in the Fixture Ticker!) may now be worth ‘ditching’….. and instead piling into teams a) still in the FA Cup and b) chasing those Champions League spots, especially with the title and relegation battles already decided!

Rotation and rest for league games will likely continue for the English teams still in Europe, namely Arsenal, United, Spurs and Chelsea…

The Six Week Segmentation Form report – Page 9 on the Player Stats Portal, filtered here for Midfielders and Forwards only :-

highlights nicely the likes of Isak, Fernandes and even Salah?! tailing off in recent form, the likes of Cole Palmer have been out of form for months now.

Instead we can see players from ‘further down the list’ such as new entrant to the Team of the Season B. Mbuemo (£3.9m) and Evanilson (£3.8m) replacing the above in the last couple of months and scrolling down further :-

the likes of J. Murphy (£2.9m) and H. Barnes (£4.4m) of Newcastle, I. Sarr (£3.5m) and E. Eze (£3.9m) of Palace and Mbeumo’s partner in crime at Brentford, Y. Wissa (£3.3m) and O. Marmoush (£4.9m) of City.

These are the names also featuring prominently in the 6 week form rank, with H. Barnes (£4.4m) scoring an amazing 41 points in the last 3 game weeks !! 🔥

Players from Forest are a little lacking on that list, aside from the Team of the Season Goalkeeper M. Sels (£3.2m) :-

we also like the look of fellow Team of the Season defender N. Milenkovic (£2.7m), C. Wood (£3.5m) who’s now back from injury and has been on fine form throughout the season and possibly A. Elanga (£3.5m) and E. Anderson (£2.8m) who’ve been on form very recently, with M. Gibbs-White (£3.4m) of consideration for his earlier season performances.

Aston Villa’s recent rotation has made it hard to identify their best picks but, O. Watkins (£5.7m) seems like a player with a point to prove (perhaps to suitors Arsenal?!) when started:-

with M. Rogers (£2.9m), Y. Tielemans (£4.2m), M. Asensio (£5.0m), E. Konsa (£3.3m) and M. Rashford (£5.7m) perhaps also worthy of consideration…

So, big weekend of Premier League and Cup games coming up! – NB – Week 33 is a Double Game week for City, Palace and Villa….