Kick-Off: Gameweek 18 Fantasy Preview

Total ownage: Chelsea progressed to the semi-finals of League Cup after giving Leeds a five-goal-demolition.

It's certainly a roller-coaster month for Chelsea as they finished off Leeds United in style after a shock Club World Cup defeat to Corinthians. Can they kick-start a good league run with such form?

GAMEWEEK 17 HIGHLIGHTS

• Manchester United maintained their six-point lead after a solid victory over Sunderland. Robin Van Persie (£13.8m, 12 pts) was the hero again with a goal and an assist.
• Santi Cazorla (£9.7m, 23 pts) scored his first Premier League hat-trick as Arsenal recorded an emphatic away win at Madejski Stadium.
• Queens Park Rangers finally got their first victory of the season as Adel Taarabt (£5.6m, 14 pts) scored a both goals for Harry Redknapp's side.
• Marouane Fellaini (£7.7m, 2 pts) is suspended for four games after a Zidane-esque headbutt effort against Ryan Shawcross (£5.8m, 5 pts).

GAMEWEEK 17 TOP SCORERS

1. Santi Cazorla (£9.7m, 23 pts): A hat-trick is always wonderful. Class.
2. Christian Benteke (£6.6m, 15 pts): Killed Liverpool with 2 goals as the striker continues to cement his starting position for Villa.
3. Jan Vertonghen (£6.3m, 15 pts): Scored his second goal of the season as the shows some very good offensive potential.
4. Adel Taarabt (£5.6m, 14 pts): Should play an important role for QPR's defiance against relegation.
5. Lukas Podolski (£8.2m, 14 pts): Played the supportive role in Cazorla's heroic show. Decent.

FEATURED: Swansea v Manchester United @ Liberty
League leaders Manchester United will travel to Swansea in their attempt to at least retain their lead against second-placed City by six points.

Michu (£8.0m, 2 pts) is the man on form now for the home side as he scored 5 goals in the last 4 league games. A big man to mark for Nemanja Vidic (£6.6m, 1 pt), who has just recovered from a long-term injury, and co.

Nonetheless, the Swans have not been doing well defensively so it presents a fair opportunity for Robin Van Persie to take the lead against Michu in the Golden Boot race. Expect the star striker to induce some fear into the home side's defence with Wayne Rooney (£12.0m, 7 pts) pulling the strings from behind.

Should be a quite challenging match, but I think the Red Devils should go through.

Prediction: SWA 0-2 MUN

TEAM FOCUS: Manchester City
City certainly don't want to see their derby rivals Manchester United to extend the lead against them, and should really seize Reading totally.

Yaya Toure (£8.0m, 10 pts), the African player of the year for two successive year, is the hot man this gameweek with more than 130,000 gameweek transfers in currently, and should play a major role in tearing the Royals' defence, while David Silva (£9.4m, 6 pts) will play the supportive role as usual.

Up front it should be Carlos Tevez (£9.5m, 2 pts) partnering Sergio Aguero (£11.0m, 5 pts) once again and you can expect them to tap in some goals.

Prediction: MCI 3-0 RDG

PLAYER FOCUS: Mata
Juan Mata (£9.5m, - pts) has been very integral in Benitez's offensive tactics, so expect him to deliver some magic against Aston Villa this Sunday.

GAMEWEEK 18 DREAM TEAM

Reina

Zabaleta — Ivanovic — Walker

 Snodgrass — Taarabt — Mata (C) — Yaya Toure

Van Persie — Tevez — Suarez (VC)

Subs: Jaaskelainen — Sterling —  Demel — Fonte

Can't wait to get more? Like FPLZ official Facebook page to get the latest updates regularly!

Sundat Aftermath: What's the MATA?

Juan Mata is responding after Eden Hazard's marvel earlier this season.

Interesting Saturday fixtures as we saw Chelsea bagging-in 3 points from Emirates Stadium while Tottenham Hotspur got their first win at Old Trafford since 1989. Here are some notes:

• Juan Mata (£8.8m, 13 pts) returned in style. 1 goal + 1 assist + 3 bonus points made the Spaniard one of the top scorers of the week in Chelsea's victory over Arsenal. With Eden Hazard (£10.3m, 2 pts) totally out of form, fantasy managers may get tempted to switch to Mata and use the extra money elsewhere.
• And just when people are jumping on the sell bandwagon of Fernando Torres (£9.9m, 11 pts), the striker came back with a tough goal and an assist. He is the only available forward that Chelsea have currently, so he should still give you at least some consistent returns, if not spectacular.
• At the back of the Blues defence Petr Cech (£6.6m, 3 pts) had a wonderful performance and is definitely the only luxury-line keeper I would recommend at the moment.
• On the other side, Yao Gervinho (£7.4m, 8 pts) scored another goal and seems to secure one of the starting position at the moment with his fine form.
• Laurent Koscielny (£5.4m, 1 pt) on the other hand was disastrous at the back and was the main culprit for the Gunners' home defeat.
• At Old Trafford, Gareth Bale (£9.3m, 16 pts) was involved in all the 3 goals as Tottenham won 3-2 against Manchester United.
• Jan Vertonghen (£6.4m, 9 pts) scored a beautiful opener for Spurs, while Clint Dempsey (£9.2m, 7 pts) wasted no time to show his skills by tapping in the third goal of his side.
• Wayne Rooney (£11.7m, 4 pts) made an influential return for the Red Devils, but the defence was really too calamitous for them to earn a victory. They have at least 1 legitimate penalty claim denied though.
• A tough game for Manchester City but they eventually overcame it with a comeback victory at Craven's Cottage. Carlos Tevez (£9.8m, 4 pts) continued to be under-productive this time, but nonetheless got 2 bonus points for his performance.
• Meanwhile, captain Vincent Kompany (£7.4m, 1 pt) struggled a lot during that game as City still fail to capture their first clean sheet.
• 7 goals were scored at Carrow Road as it has become Luis Suarez's (£9.4m, 20 pts) most favourite ground, as he completed 2 hat-tricks in as many games there. Superb one-man show.
• Another man on fire for Liverpool was Nuri Sahin (£6.7m, 15 pts), who seems to click into Liverpool system already.
• Interestingly the Reds' young revolution are beginning to take shape with Raheem Sterling (£4.7m, 17 years old), Andre Wisdom (£4.5m, 19 years old) and Fernandez Saez (£5.0m, 18 years old) all on the starting line-up against Norwich.
• 5 goals in 3 games for Demba Ba (£8.1m, 13 pts) as Newcastle took 1 point away from Madejski Stadium. What an incredible form for the Senegalese forward.
• Also scoring a brace on Saturday were Everton's Nikica Jelavic (£8.4m, 16 pts) and Stoke City's Peter Crouch (£6.6m, 13 pts) in their respective wins over Southampton and Swansea.
• Another man on fire was Steven Fletcher (£7.4m, 8 pts) as he scored all of Sunderland's Premier League goals since his arrival. A cautious trend for Martin O'Neill, but that is really a happy signal for Fletcher's fantasy managers.
• Shane Long (£6.0m, 9 pts) scored a fine opener for West Brom only to be equalised by Darren Bent (£8.2m, 5 pts) from the bench as points were shared at Villa Park.

Can't wait to get more? Like FPLZ official Facebook page to get the latest updates regularly!

FPLZ 2012/13 Season Preview: Tottenham Hotspur F.C.

TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR F.C.

Spurs with their new home and away kit for 2012/13 season.

You can download the full analyzed squad data here.

Password: http://p-fplz.blogspot.com/

Last Season: Unlucky
They got the fourth place, but without the qualification for Champions League. Tottenham Hotspur can consider themselves unlucky as Chelsea won UEFA Champions League for the first time, which effectively blocked their way to the top-flight European tournament this season. It was still a good season anyway, as they had gone very close to the leading duo at one point, showing great competitiveness and potential as title contenders.

This Summer: Massive Changes
Harry Redknapp was sacked for some unknown reason and replaced by Andre Villas-Boas, who failed a big time at Chelsea. A very questionable move by Daniel Levy seriously.

Swansea's successful loanee Gylfi Sigurdsson and former Ajax captain Jan Vertonghen are the ones who have joined the club currently, with players such as Vedran Corluka, Niko Kranjcar, Louis Saha, Ryan Nelsen and Steven Pienaar all heading the opposite direction.

Upcoming Season: Insecure
With such a big change in the management, it is hard to predict Tottenham's new season. The change in manager will certainly bring in a lot of uncertainty, especially when Redknapp had brought so much of stability and achievement at White Hart Lane. The first month will surely give us an indication whether Villas-Boas will succeed or flop for the second time in Premier League.

Bale's stats last
season.

Speedy Speed Boy: Bale (FI: 0.699)
Aged 23, Gareth Bale (£9.5m) is definitely one of the best talent across the European continent right now, thanks to his excellent speed and explosiveness, precise ball delivery, and his decent aerial threat.

Having played 3216 minutes last season, Bale managed to record his best fantasy record so far with 195 points. Don't be surprised if he breaks the 200 point milestone this season - he still has plenty of room to grow.

The bad news unfortunately for Bale is that he limped off during the pre-season game with Liverpool, after a dangerous tackle from Charlie Adam, who is renowned for his sloppy defence.

Van der Vaart's historical P90.

Super Poacher: Van der Vaart (FI: 0.547)
Rafael Van der Vaart (£9.0m) actually has the ability to achive a 200-point season easily, but his injuries were limiting his potential to do so.

The Dutch has P90 of 6.50 last season which ranked first among his teammates, but playing minutes of only 2314 meant that he only ranked third in terms of aggregate scores. During the season before the last one he played 2222 minutes, which was even lesser.

I have no doubts about Van der Vaart's flair and goal poaching ability, so let's hope that he can be less injury-plagued this season and score more fantasy points. His price tag of £9.0m resembles a good bargain when compared to his scoring ability.

On Fire: Sigurdsson (FI: 1.240)
It was just half a good season, and Glyfi Sigurdsson (£9.0m) has become freaking expensive at the price of £9.0m, on par with his new teammate Rafael Van der Vaart.

However, the Icelandic is on sublime form during Tottenham's pre-season tour, scoring 2 goals and 3 assists in his first 4 games for the North London club. His set piece ability is a marvelous addition to Andre Villas-Boas's squad, and that really justifies his high price tag.

Defoe's FPL historical data.

Affordable: Defoe (FI: 0.340)
Jermaine Defoe (£7.5m) spent more time on the bench than on the pitch last season, but with Villas-Boas struggling to find a new forward for the team, he should become the team's first choice forward this season.

His best fantasy season record is 150 points - not too great, but good enough for his price, as long as he doesn't injure that often. Tottenham's offensive approach will definitely help him to rack up a good amount of points.

Super Budget Prospect: Kane (FI: N/A)
Tottenham manager is struggling to find a new striker for the team, but that may become a great fortune to fantasy managers as he will need to deploy Harry Kane (£4.5m) more often than not in this coming season.

The 19-year-old English scored 8 goals for Milwall last season, and can be a hit this season with his ludicrous price of £4.5m.

Can't wait to get more? Like FPLZ official Facebook page to get the latest updates regularly!