FPLZ 2012/13 Season Preview: Queens Park Rangers F.C.

Queens Park Rangers F.C. 

Alejandro Faurlin posing for QPR's 3rd kit.

You can download the full analyzed squad data here.

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

Last Season: Just Enough
It was ironic to see the team who dominated the Championship two seasons ago struggled so much in the Premier League last season, especially when the other two promoters have freed themselves from relegation so early. They are really lucky to still remain in the top-flight league this season thanks to Bolton who failed to win their last game last season.

This Summer: Bigger Cash Splash
Tony Fernandes never stops spending. QPR have already sign a whopping number of 7 players so far, who namely are Samba Diakite, Fabio da Silva (loan), Robert Green, Junior Hoilett, Andrew Johnson, Ryan Nelsen and the best among them all, Park Ji-Sung. Ambitious, but whether these purchases can be converted into results is another story.

Quite a number of players are migrating away from Loftus Road as well, and they are Patrick Agmeyang, Daniel Gabbidon, Fitz Hall, Paddy Kenny and Daniel Shittu.

Upcoming Season: Looking for Improvement
With such a strong financial support from the boss, Mark Hughes simply has to deliver. Though the players can only be classified as second class players at best, they depth that QPR have is tremendous. If the gaffer can use this advantage effectively, things can really turn big at Loftus Road.

Park's historical P90.

No More Parking On the Bench: Park (FI: 0.262)
Park Ji-Sung was wasting one of his greatest attributes at Manchester United, and that is stamina. Nicknamed "Three-Lungs Park", the South Korean never runs out of breath in the game, has immense work rate, and is able to play everywhere on the midfield.

With his decision to join QPR, fantasy managers have the chance to see his full potential, should he start regularly for the whole season. If he can deliver 5 goals in 2006/07 season with Manchester United in just 775 minutes, I see no reason why he cannot achieve 10 goal milestone this season if he can play for more than 2500 minutes.

Revived?: Taarabt (FI: 0.343)
Adel Taarabt (£6.0m) was one of the player whom many pundits expect to shine last season, but for some reason the lad failed to deliver what he seemed to promise.

Nonetheless, the midfield had a fine run during the final quarter of last season, averaging 6.0 points for the last 6 Premier League games he played for QPR. With better crop of players surrounding the Moroccan this season, Taarabt should definitely be included into your fantasy watchlist.

Survived: Hoilett (FI: 0.456)
Relegated with Blackburn, QPR took Junior Hoilett (£6.5m) back to the Premier League after the winger's contract expired this summer.

The Canadian is definitely a talented one, with his name listed in FIFA's 13 Players to Watch in January 2012. If he can improve on his 7 goals and 6 assists tally last season, he can become a really popular fantasy pick.

Overcrowded: Forwards
Bobby Zamora (£6.5m), Djibril Cisse (£6.5m), Jamie Mackie (£5.5m), Heidar Helguson (£5.0m), Andrew Johnson (£5.0m), Jay Bothroyd (£5.0m)...... The long list of forwards goes on.

Rotation policy will certainly be on Hughes' books, so fantasy managers should really avoid them now. I believe Zamora could be the exception though.

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

FPLZ 2012/13 Season Preview: Team Data Summary

Are you the next champion (fantasy) manager?

After a long introduction on the glossaries I will be using in my FPLZ 2012/13 Season Preview, let us first begin to analyse the overall team data first before we go on team by team. Below is the table of top fantasy scorers of respective teams last season, with relegated teams (Bolton, Blackburn Rovers and Wolverhampton Wanderers) being excluded:

Table 1: List of Fantasy Top Scorers by Team.

Team	Top Scorer	Points	Team %
Arsenal	Van Persie	269	16.5%
Man Utd	Rooney	230	12.7%
Man City	Aguero	211	11.0%
Fulham	Dempsey	209	15.5%
Tottenham	Bale	195	11.4%
Newcastle	Ba	165	11.0%
Chelsea	Mata	162	10.8%
Sunderland	Sessegnon	161	12.2%
Swansea	Vorm	158	10.5%
Everton	Howard	151	11.2%
Stoke City	Walters	140	11.3%
Wigan	Moses	140	11.0%
West Brom	Foster	140	10.7%
Norwich	Holt	138	11.9%
Liverpool	Suarez	136	9.9%
Aston Villa	Agbonlahor	112	10.0%
QPR	Kenny	102	10.0%

For your information, Bobby Zamora, who scored 119 points last season, was not credited as the top fantasy scorer of Queens Park Rangers because he scored more points for Fulham than for QPR last season. The team percentages are calculated by dividing the top scorers' points (for example Van Persie) over their respective teams' top 15 highest fantasy scorers.

Unsurprisingly, Robin Van Persie topped the list with 269 points which was 16.5% of his team's best 15, much higher than the rest of the pack apart from Fulham's Clinton Dempsey (209 points, 15.5%). Liverpool, which have gone through a poor season last term, have their best fantasy scorer (Suarez, 136 points) only managed to get 9.9% of the team's aggregate share. Can Brendan Rodgers turn that around? God knows.

And now let's go through the more useful statistics, which are the aggregate scores of the top 3 scorers of each team and their aggregate team percentages:

Table 2: List of Top 3 Fantasy Scorers by Team

Team	Top 1	Top 2	Top 3	Total Pts	Team %
Arsenal	Van Persie	Walcott	Szczesny	577	35.3%
Man City	Aguero	D. Silva	Hart	561	29.3%
Tottenham	Bale	Adebayor	Van der Vaart	556	32.6%
Man Utd	Rooney	Evra	Nani	546	30.1%
Newcastle	Ba	Krul	Cabaye	450	30.0%
Swansea	Vorm	Sinclair	Graham	447	29.8%
Fulham	Dempsey	Zamora	J. Riise	445	32.9%
Chelsea	Mata	Terry	Lampard	438	29.1%
Sunderland	Sessegnon	Larsson	Mignolet	410	31.1%
Everton	Howard	Baines	Heitinga	400	29.7%
Stoke City	Walters	Crouch	Etherington	391	31.6%
Wigan	Moses	Al-Habsi	Caldwell	381	29.9%
Liverpool	Suarez	Reina	J. Enrique	374	27.1%
West Brom	Foster	Odemwingie	McAuley	364	27.9%
Norwich	Holt	Pilkington	Morrison	359	31.0%
Aston Villa	Agbonlahor	Warnock	Given	306	27.3%
QPR	Kenny	Mackie	Barton	297	29.0%

The reason to measure the top 3 scorers of each team is due to the fact that you can only pick at most 3 players from the same team. This will approximately show you the maximum scoring potential of each teams.

Based on the results, you can clearly split the teams into 4 tiers. The first tier consists of the super productive fantasy teams, namely Arsenal, Manchester duo (City and United), and Tottenham Hotspur. Not really surprising though, as all of the tier 1 teams have been so prolific in offence last season.

Tier 2 meanwhile consists of Newcastle, Swansea, Fulham, and Chelsea. Newcastle and Swansea have some great crop of value to money fantasy players anyway, so that was not surprising. Chelsea's performance weren't up to par given their players' fantasy price, while Fulham's position in tier 2 was largely driven by Dempsey's astounding season.

The third tier has Sunderland, Everton, Stoke City, Wigan, Liverpool, West Brom and Norwich within. All lacked of productive and consistent fantasy scorers, though Liverpool have again disappointed fantasy managers the most with numerous big names but poor scores.

Tier 4, the super unproductive teams, has Aston Villa and QPR accompanying each other. Not even any considerable fantasy assets here last season. Your season must have been pretty miserable if you have these players for quite some gameweeks last term.

The more important question: will the trend continues to be the same this term? In general, it should be more or less the same, except for those teams which have undergone some big operations this summer. At Arsenal, Van Persie's desire to leave the Emirates will be pivotal to the Gunners fantasy potential this season; at White Hart Lane, the managerial change from Harry Redknapp to Andre Villas-Boas will certainly give rise to a lot of uncertainties; at Liverpool, the same can be said under the coaching of Brendan Rodgers; at Loftus Road, QPR's continuous effort in transfers can mean a very different season for them.

Nonetheless, I believe the fluctuations will not be very dramatic from one season to another. We can expect some of the teams to move one tier above and others one tier below, but I am certainly not so fancy about the possibility of a major ranking reshuffling next season.

Hope this little piece of information has provided you something and do stay tuned for the upcoming team by team previews!

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

Park Ji-Sung to QPR: Great Prospect Awaits?

Park with his new boss Tony Fernandes.

Queens Park Rangers continue their revolution under the ownership of Tony Fernandes as the ambitious boss has made yet another big move by taking in Manchester United's Asian superstar, Park Ji-Sung.

In fact the 31-year-old South Korean is expected to take over the captain armband of the team soon with Joey Barton, the ex-captain, being stripped off his captaincy earlier due to his disciplinary problems.

So what can we expect from Park in the fantasy world? Based on Park's previous statistics, he has scored 27 goals and 22 assists for Manchester United in 205 appearances - an average of 1 goal in every 7.6 games and 1 assist in every 9.3 games. Not very productive to be honest.

However, if we take into account the fact that Park featured quite frequently as a sub and further consider that he has to make way stars like C. Ronaldo, Rooney and Nani during his career at Old Trafford, we can believe that he will better the figure at Loftus road.

But can he improve his production to a level that it is profitable to get him in Fantasy Premier League? Time will tell.

News Update: 9 Jan 2012

Why always me?

A summary of highlights occurred over the past few weeks:

• Neil Warnock has been sacked by QPR after a series of terrible results see them only a point above the relegation zone currently.
• Scholes "retired" his retirement and plays again as Manchester United looks short of central midfielder. A signal of no transfer funds available anyone?
• Manchester United led Manchester City 3-0 at half time but conceded two in the next half with one man up for around 80 minutes of the game. I don't know how you guys feel, but to park the bus with one man up is a humiliation for me.
• Manchester United will face Liverpool in the next round of the FA Cup anyway, with the latter just thrashed Oldham 5-1.
• Thierry Henry to have a two-month return to Arsenal. He's one of the most expensive fantasy premier league player of all time. Let's see how he does this time.
• Also coming from MLS is Landon Donovan, who plays for Everton for the second time. Can he improve the goals stat of the Liverpool club? It seems to be a yes currently.
• Multiple foreign clubs are targeting Liverpool star Luis Suarez to steer his way out of the 8-match ban.
• Meanwhile, Liverpool are leading the race to sign Newcastle's ace Demba Ba. It is understood that the Senegal international has a £10m release clause in his contract.

Gameweek 13 Fantasy Preview

The man in deep shit: Andre Villas-Boas

Overview
Arsenal was the only team that has made it through the knock-out stage this week in the Champions League, with the other three still on doubt of progressing the group stage especially for Manchester City. Bad year for English clubs on the European tournament?

Gameweek 12 Mini Review on the Top 7
Manchester City: Still unmatched upfront, but defence has slightly deteriorated.
Manchester United: Earned 3 points in ugly style. Either they wake up or expect poor run of results coming in.
Tottenham: As long as Adebayor and Van der Vaart take turns to hit form, Champions League is highly probable.
Newcastle: Hatem Ben Arfa should be a major fantasy force soon after a great performance against City.
Chelsea: Get rid of them. Terrible defence. Not looking sharp upfront neither.
Liverpool: Hard to pick them as they are not consistent enough. Defence is reliable though.
Arsenal: You can never go wrong with Van Persie.


Game of the Week: LIVERPOOL v MANCHESTER CITY

Charlie Adam has shown
great vision on the game
against Chelsea.

Wealthy City will travel to neighbouring city Liverpool as they try to demolish Anfield with Sheikh's money.

With annual losses of  £194.9m, City owns one of the highest wage bill across Europe with the likes of Silva, Aguero, Nasri and more. With that kind of money, City has the ability to challenge for titles this season, and has topped the Premier League table currently with a comfortable 5-point lead. Massive, massive season for them.

The Blues travelled to Naples for a Champions League tie against Napoli and that definitely took away some of their fitness, so do not be surprised by rotation. Silva should start though, as he had only played for 30 minutes in the game against Newcastle and less than 45 minutes for two international games before that - might be a strategy that Mancini prepares to play him against both Napoli and Liverpool.

On the other side, Liverpool will have no fitness problems when they host City, and Dalglish had clearly stated that Premier League is their top priority despite having a League Cup tie with Chelsea two days after that. However, Suarez trouble over racism allegations will make their chances of winning this game gloomy, especially if his match ban penalty starts from that game. Big doubts.

Manchester City might just be too tough for the Reds so I'll go for an away win. A narrow one though.

Prediction: LIV 1-2 MCI
Pick: Silva, Aguero


Fantasy Game of the Week: NORWICH v QUEEN'S PARK RANGERS

Heidar Helguson has picked
up 39 fantasy points from
his last 5 games.

With all the big clubs having European tie and League Cup tie before and after this week's game, let's focus on the battle between two promoters of the league.

Both teams are poor in defence, so offensively I can see a big scoreline.

Expect the likes like Pilkington, Holt and Morison to battle all out against Helguson, Barton, Wright-Phillips and Taarabt to grab three points from the tie.

Helguson might be worthy for your captain armband with his spectacular run of form currently.


Prediction: NOR 3-2 QPR
Pick and Captain: Helguson
Pick: Pilkington, Holt, Morison, Barton, SWP, Taarabt
Drop: NOR and QPR defence

Pick and Drop
Pick and captain:

1. Van Persie - Might play only half of the game, but still too good to refuse.
2. Walters - Blackburn should be leaky enough for him to perform.
3. Van der Vaart/ Adebayor - West Brom's defensive qualities won't be enough to stop them.

Pick:

1. MUN defence - Should be formidable with captain Vidic leading the line.
2. SUN defence - Solid and cheap. Against Wigan it's highly possible for another clean sheet.
3. Agbonlahor - If he can get enough chances, he should defeat Vorm.

Drop:

1. NEW defence - A clean sheet at Old Trafford? Negative for me.
2. FUL defence - RvP is unstoppable.

Transfer Traffic

Green light (buy):

1. Van Persie - Simply too good.
2. Hoilett - Cheap. Solid.
3. Walters - Ultimate influence.
4. Richards - Seems to outperform Kompany at the moment.
5. SUN defence - Some good fixtures ahead.
6. MUN defence - Showing great resolution.
7. Ben Arfa - Extremely threatening.

Yellow light (hold):

1. Ramsey/ Arteta - See if something develops to make one of them more superior than the other.

Red light (sell):

1. Suarez - Should be match banned soon.
2. MUN offence - Shaping into a 1-0 team.
3. NEW defence - Collapsing against big teams.

Gameweek 13 Dream Team

De Gea

Shawcross -- Brown -- Walker

Van der Vaart -- Walters -- Pilkington -- Barton

Helguson -- Van Persie (C) -- Holt

Subs: Vorm -- Taarabt -- Hutton -- Weather

Barton to QPR: How Will He Affect Taarabt?

Joey Barton is the first move by the ambitious Tony Fernandes.

The most important signing by QPR in my opinion. The bad boy, Joey Barton, has joined QPR for a lucrative £80,000 a week contract.

Barton had been a strong fantasy force last season with his precision crosses. His skill and experience will definitely help QPR in their survival battle?

He will compete with Taarabt for the ace position. Will Barton's addition make Taarabt more competitive? We shall see.

Tony Fernandes Takes Over QPR As AirAsia Continues to Make Its Name In Premier League

Now we fly in Premier League.

Say hi to Tony Fernandes. The Malaysian tycoon of low-cost carrier airline AirAsia has bought all Bernie Ecclestone's 66% stake in Queens Park Rangers, effectively making him the owner of the newly promoted Premier League club.

The director of AirAsia has been constantly involved in Premier League since years ago through sponsoring the flight of Manchester United and also sponsoring the English referees.

Now he is ready to involve in a bigger scale through the acquisition of the club which grounded at Loftus Road. Will QPR get a good transfer kitty immediately? We shall see.

Full-Time: Gameweek 1 Fantasy Review

Sebastian Larsson (no. 7) punished Liverpool's chance wastages with a wonderful  bicycle kick.

Liverpool 1-1 Sunderland
LIV: A lot of upside potential, as we can see from first half. Suarez's superb interception and run to earn a penalty (he missed it!), Adam's £10m worth of set piece which helped Suarez to score Premier League's first goal of the season, and Downing's fantastic 40-50 yards run before finding his shot rattling the bar have all shown how dynamic and unstoppable Liverpool's attack can become.

Unfortunately, Dalglish have gone all wrong about his tactics in this game. Henderson is awful playing at the right side. With Flanagan playing, Kuyt should play at the right to provide defensive cover for the young right back. Because of that mistake, 2 points gone.


Pick: Suarez, Downing, Adam, Enrique
Potential Pick: Carroll
Drop: Henderson (if you somehow picked him)


SUN: The Black Cats are pretty shaky in the first half, but fortunately Steve Bruce fixed the problem during half-time. Brown had done a good job in locking Carroll, making the latter hardly able to make a good shot.

Offensively it's all about the almighty Seb Larsson. A very, very solid performance by the ex-Birmingham player. A good direct replacement for Taarabt if you are fed up about the latter's performance against Bolton.


Pick: Larsson, Brown


Blackburn 1-2 Wolves
BLA: Debutant Formica scored a good first goal for the Rovers, but that was not enough for them to claim any points. The defeat is quite a good indication for them - they will be roaming at the bottom third of the league for most part of the season.

Potential Pick: Roberts, Formica, Dunn


WOL: Doyle missed a penalty which in no way was good. Ward's goal was brilliant, but you don't expect a defender to score beautiful goal week-in and week-out.

Potential Pick: Fletcher


Fulham 0-0 Aston Villa
FUL: Pretty football by Martin Jol. Good stream of passes and chance creations makes Fulham players good fantasy options upfront. Still look solid in back despite more offensive approach. Could have won if not for Given's great performance.

Pick: Andy Johnson, Hughes
Potential Pick: John Riise


AVL: Created some good chances but failed to capitalise any. Was surprised to see Hesky start by sacrificing Albrighton. N'Zogbia and Bent didn't look too impressive. Given was superb - pick him.

Pick: Given


QPR 0-4 Bolton
QPR: Nightmare start for them. The Rs pretty much lost themselves after conceding the first goal. Nevertheless, it's better to lose 4-0 in your first game and realise how tough Premier League is rather than later when the season goes into the decisive part.

Drop: QPR defenders


BOL: Klasnic looks incredible in his first game of the season. He is more like a playmaker rather than a striker. Gary Cahill scored a goal, but you shouldn't be fooled to buy him - look at Bolton's fixtures!

Potential Pick: Klasnic (fixtures are too bad to consider)


Wigan 1-1 Norwich
WIG: The departure of N'Zogbia has given rise to two players - Watson and Moses. Both are decent picks considering the next two games Wigan are playing.

Pick: Moses, Watson


NOR: Good rebound by Hoolahan. They didn't look too bad at this game, but it's still too early to conclude about them.

Potential Pick: Hoolahan


Newcastle 0-0 Arsenal
NEW: Barton is easily my man of the match for taking Gervinho off the match. Doesn't have too much to comment about their game - it's so dull.

ARS: With no engines at the middle, they look like a mid-table team. Wenger better get this solved soon, or they might even fall behind of teams like Aston Villa and Everton.

Potential Pick: Ramsey
Drop: GERVINHO

Stoke 0-0 Chelsea
STO: Superb saves by Asmir Begovic. Easily the man of the match. Credits went to referee as well as he denied two penalty appeal from Chelsea. Unfortunate for Matt Etherington however for injuring his shoulder.

Pick: Begovic
Drop: Etherington

CHE: Not quite a good decision by AVB to start Torres instead of Drogba. The Spaniard looked much better than before, but still a distance away from Drogba's ultimate influence and is too expensive to hold unless his form starts to get hot. Held drawn due to some bad fortune sincerely.

West Brom 1-2 Manchester United
WBA: Great debut by Shane Long to score an equaliser as West Brom gave some hard time to Fergie's squad. Almost held United up until a moment of brilliance by Ashley Young.

Potential Pick: Long


MUN: A costly victory with Vidic and Ferdinand gone injured. Young was the decisive man, having scored one and set up another. De Gea almost costed United three points with his slow save against Long's attempt. The young team still look shaky, but fortunately the winners' mentality saved them this time.

Avoid United's defence as for now until De Gea starts to show some sharpness.

Pick: Young, Rooney
Potential Pick: Cleverly
Drop: MUN defence

2011/12 Fantasy Season Preview - Queens Park Rangers

Queens Park Rangers FC

Last Season Summary

League ranking: 1st - League Championship (88 points)

Points per game (home: away): 2.13: 1.70

Goals per game (for: against): 1.54: 0.70

Number of clean sheets: 25 (out of 46 games)

Top league scorer: Adel Taarabt (19 goals)

Top league assister: Adel Taarabt (16 assists)

Transfers

In: Jay Bothroyd, Kieron Dyer, Danny Gabbidon

Out: Mikele Leigertwood

Predicted Season Finish: 14th

I am quite positive about QPR's survival. Decent defence, coupled with the existence of Adel Taarabt, should make them a pretty consistently performing team. I cannot wait to see them in action.

Fantasy Ace: Adel Taarabt (£6.5m)

Being the most expensive fantasy player among those who promoted, Adel Taarabt is this season's Charlie Adam. Crowned as "The Next Zidane" by some, Taarabt does have a lot of skills to show: impressive footwork, wide vision, precision passes, clinical finishing, solid free kicks and the best of all, he can play at both middle and sideways.

With such attacking variability, defenders will have big trouble to guard him. He will definitely shine in the Premier League. I am expecting more than 150 fantasy points from him. Hopefully he won't be gone before the season starts.

Decent Picks: Jay Bothroyd (£6.0m), Dudley Campbell (£5.5m), Danny Gabbidon (£4.0m)

Both are equipped with Premier League experience. Bothroyd scored 18 goals and 8 assists for Cardiff last season. It might be just okay, but with better supplies at QPR (particularly Taarabt), he should benefit.

Unfortunately for Heidar Helguson, the arrival of DJ Campbell is expected to make the former lost his place. Campbell has gone through a productive season with Blackpool, producing 13 goals and 4 assists. That kind of figure at Premier League should be more than enough to gain your confidence on him.

On the other hand, being so experienced in Premier League relegation fight, Wales international Gabbidon is a budget choice for 5th defender. QPR's relatively good defence record compared to the other two promoted sides should be able to help him to score more fantasy points.