Review of Game Week 8

Review of Game Week 8

Best Team 

GW Points: 107
Overall Points: 486
Overall Rank: 57,300

Main Blog Team

GW Points: 70
Overall Points: 384
Overall Rank: 345,407
Transfers used: Trippier out, Sterling in

Game week 8 was another disaster for my blog team, with various slices of misfortune across the team. Starting with Emerson getting sent off for Spurs against Arsenal. Even his clean sheet in the Champions League only meant that he ended up on 0 points for the game week and now faces a three match suspension in the Premier League. We then had Cucurella missing all of the week’s action due to illness. Kane misfired across two fixtures with only 4 points during the game week. Dalot started in a strong Man Utd team during the Europa League fixture and they still couldn’t manage a clean sheet. Regardless the team is in pretty bad shape considering the amount of thought and planning that has gone into it. Thankfully we’ve got 5 fresh transfers for the rest of October and I’ll be looking to utilise at least some of these going into the weekends fixtures. It feels like whatever I do with this team at the moment it goes the opposite way – if I hold players they don’t seem to come good, if I make proactive transfers those players then don’t seem to score. Either way, I’ll keep plugging away but I need a big haul from some of these players as soon as possible to get back on track.

Here are my thoughts on each player:

Ramsdale: 0 points. Arsenal played well but no clean sheet for Ramsdale. Not sure he’s worth keeping given he’s not playing in the Europa League. At the same time, not sure I can afford to waste a transfer on taking him out.

Emerson Royal: 0 points. It goes from bad to worse for Emerson in my team. Almost certainly need to take him out considering his suspension.

Dalot: -4 points. A really poor return for the game week but given his value, I may hold onto him as Man Utd do have better fixtures coming up and he’s playing in the Europa League.

Cucurella: Did not play. Happy to hold for the time being but he needs to be getting game time for me to keep him.

Diaz: 7 points. Better than no points but still not enough for a 5m midfielder. Need to monitor but he’s one of those players who will go and score a couple after you take him out. 

Saka: 3 points. Managed to get a rating but may need to come out considering he’s not getting many minutes in the Europa League. 

Sterling: 5 points. Similar to Diaz, 5 points is better than nothing but I need a big game week from him to get back into contention. 

Mbeumo: 0 points. Needs to be replaced given that Brentford aren’t in Europe.

Salah: 10 points. Happy to hold for the time being, but need a bit more than 10 points across two fixtures.

Haaland: 45 points. Season long pick barring any injuries.

Kane: 4 points. I’m already starting to question Kane, at the moment it’s looking like I should have just kept Jesus as he’s outscoring Kane despite less game time. Surely with the volume of European fixtures in October, Kane outscores Jesus during this month though.

Player watchlist

The players on my watchlist for October are:

Bowen – was exceptional last season and appears to be playing the Conference League. Could have a good month if he gets a lot of game time. 

Saliba – I regret taking Saliba out considering the points he’s scored. The gamble on Emerson didn’t pay off. He’s good value still at just over 3m but I’m not sure about going back to him considering he’s not playing in the Europa League. 

Sessegnon – good value and might get more game time with Emerson out. Seems to come on in most games anyway.

Tsimikas – good value if Robertson isn’t fully fit. Should come on late on in games even when Robertson is back.

Gomez – at 4m with Walker out injured, Gomez could be a good way to get into Man City’s backline.

Lloris/De Gea – I’m not massively convinced by Ramsdale as he’s not playing in the Europa League. Lloris or De Gea might be a better option but both have question marks against them as well.

Foden – typically Foden has been the more premium midfielder who has scored the most people this season. I could have started with him ahead of Diaz but I didn’t in this team. At 6m he’s out of reach with the big three up front. 

De Bruyne – De Bruyne is the highest scoring midfielder, has to be on the watchlist but I can’t see how I can get him into this team.

Cancelo – another player I’d love to have but who is out of reach for this team at the moment. 

Jesus – as mentioned above, Jesus is outscoring Kane so I need to monitor this situation.

Plan for game week 9

My plan for game week 9 will be to take out Emerson and Mbeumo at the very least, I can’t see either of these two adding any real value during October compared to the potential returns of other players. The big problem is that they aren’t hugely valuable so I won’t be bringing in any high ticket players unless I remove Kane or Salah. I won’t be doing that this weekend. The players I’m realistically going to have to look at are Sessegnon, Bowen, Gomez and Tsimikas. I’m going to ponder on this a little longer and will confirm my decision in the morning.

If you’re interested in the fixtures for the clubs involved in Europe, you can check them out here:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CJdq5SxZqrb7EXOpEBbCtbF0hDulMoL05ULja_ng5nY/ – I’ll shortly be updating this spreadsheet to also include fixtures for November.

My other teams

Most of my other teams have had a much better start to the season than my blog team, typical as I’m only interested in doing well with my blog team. My plan for this week is to make plenty of proactive transfers in my other teams and take some really big risks in some of them. I’ll be targeting bringing in a load of Man City players in one team, I’ll probably look at West Ham players in another as they’ve got good fixtures. I’ll also be aiming to get coverage of many of the players on my watchlist above across my 10 teams. The longer the season goes on, the more I’m thinking the only way to go is to cover as many big name players as possible across 10 teams. Mainly because this season has been a complete lottery so far.  

As always, for complete transparency, here are my 10 teams:

2 thoughts on “Review of Game Week 8

  1. by taking out De Bruyne.
    have now 5 man city players instead of 2
    also Paul its allowed me to get rid of 4 players that
    are really dead wood.
    had to be brave to do it must needs.

  2. This is my current team, I have 0 ITB. Im 5th in my mini league, climbing after a slow start. Would you change anything, or leave as is?

    Ramsdale
    Saliba
    Zouma
    Cancelo
    Bowen
    Sterling
    KDB
    Odergard
    Rashford
    Halaand
    Jesus

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