Welcome back for another article.
Free hit saved but a triple captain disaster on Haaland. That said a good week considering, 56 points all out and my rank halved to 36K. Really thought that could be the end of the green arrow run but that's 8 in a row from 5.3m to where we are now. Bruno and Thiago saved the gameweek with 13 and 11 points between them.
It was always going to be a very tough week vs the free hit template given I had Bruno vs Munoz, Enzo vs Raya as well. It had to be the first game of the season where Haaland fails to register a big chance, didn't it.
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Van den Berg came in for Rodon which was purely to back the clean sheet odds.
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Frustratingly, it was a very late penalty that ultimately cost Brentford's clean sheet; Burnley had barely threatened. No shot at half time even.
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Van Dijk's clean sheet vs West Ham was welcomed, though again Gakpo's late goal completely knocked Van Dijk from 2 to 0 bonus so that added to the non-free hit agony.
Was it a mistake not to free hit? With hindsight yeah definitely, my free hit draft would've scored about 15 more points, though it was a difficult call because my team was already in a very good place with the likes of Thiago and scope to add free hit picks like Van den Berg. I've been weighing up FH14 vs FH15 and I'm now leaning towards the latter.
In GW15 there are 3 really good games to target: Man City vs Sunderland, Newcastle vs Burnley, and Man Utd away at Wolves. It also gives me a little more protection, since I can do whatever I want this week with 1 transfer, then free hit, then get the 5 free transfers in GW16 if that makes sense. On top of that if Munoz gets suspended in GW14 then I'll free hit him out, if he gets it in GW15 then I wouldn't want to play him vs Man City anyway.
This could be the end of a great run of green arrows though with no chip and a couple of bad fixtures, let's run through the team for GW14 then.
🧤 Goalkeepers
It's of course Raya with the best fixture on paper for a clean sheet. Arsenal are top of the GW14 clean sheet odds with a 52% chance. Then it's Liverpool on 44%, then Palace 40%. So I do at least have the top 3 in my team defensively which is positive.
We'll have to see if Saliba makes the next match, after missing the Chelsea game with a knock in training. He's having a scan today. Arteta said:
"Yesterday in training he was uncomfortable, so we need to explore a little bit more what happened. I don’t think it’s something major, but enough not to be involved in the game.”
🛡️ Defenders
In defence it's Munoz, Van Dijk and Andersen.
Andersen is the best third defender I have which is an issue this week. He's averaging 11.52 defcons per 90 which is second only to Senesi among defenders this season, so there's a good chance of defcons this game. I do have the opportunity to consider selling Van den Berg as soon as I've bought him and start him over Andersen though, which is my current thinking.
Liverpool's 0.3 xG conceded was the best of all teams on the weekend. They're home to Sunderland as well; have they actually turned a corner or was it a blip in a favourite fixture? Sunderland is not an easy fixture.
Massive massive relief that Munoz avoided a fifth yellow against Man Utd, he's really treading the line and 1 more before GW19 will see him miss the next match. If he'd been suspended it might've nudged me into free hitting, instead I think FH15 makes sense, as I say so I've got the insurance against Munoz picking up a fifth yellow and for some potentially better fixtures to target. It's a very team dependent chip and I think I'll be able to get away with it again.