Every week this season, two West Ham fans will compete at Fantasy Football to win money for their chosen charities.
Will’s Team
GK: Alisson
DEF: Saliba, Robinson, Mitchell
MID: Palmer, De Bruyne, Saka, Bowen
FW: Watkins, Alvarez, Haaland (c)
We’re still top of the league, say we’re still top of the league! This is the final post I’m writing from Sri Lanka before my return to the UK and one can only imagine how embarrassed James must be to have lost his lead to me while, and I quote, “you’ve just been messing around in the jungle”.
Yeah OK James beat me by nine points last week thanks to Phil Foden’s perfect hat-trick with his 71 trumping my 62. Jonesy will tell you it was foresight and analysis. But we all know the truth.
My 1,271 points overall leaves me well clear of his 1,268 and anyone with two eyes in their head can see my squad is far stronger than his as we enter the business end of the season.
For example, Foden’s tidy return would have come as a welcome bonus to James, but my City trio of Erling Haaland, Kevin De Bruyne and Julian Alvarez will walk all over James’ Haaland, Foden and Kyle Walker between now and May.
One thing I did absolutely delight in was the fantasy gods finally shafting James instead of me as Alejandro Garnacho collected 16 points on his bench.
Anyway, enough gloating, two free transfers for me this week as my defence has been letting me down for weeks.
Alisson comes in for Martin Dubravka and Brighton’s Jan Paul van Hecke replaces James Tarkowski.
Liverpool’s keeper starts with the Reds welcoming Burnley while Van Hecke is benched with Brighton going to Tottenham.
Haaland takes the armband off De Bruyne with the Norwegian having scored every time he has played Everton in the Prem as the Toffees go to the Etihad.
No doubt I win and extend my lead this week. Watch this space.
James’ Team
GK: Raya
DEF: Burn, Porro, Gabriel
MID: Richarlison, Foden (V), De Bruyne, Palmer, Garnacho
FW: Solanke, Haaland (C)
Thanks to Phil Foden, GW23 was a much better week. His hat-trick against Brentford led me to a lovely 71 points, nine more than Will. I’ve closed the gap on him to just three points and I know he’s concerned.
Goals from Richarlison, Cole Palmer and Joao Pedro were also very important to my week, while Erling Haaland finally got back in amongst the attacking returns with an assist.
My only regret was leaving Garnacho on the bench. His two goals against West Ham gave him 16 points, which would’ve been very nice if I’d bothered to start him. But I didn’t.
I do have one confession. Right before the deadline I replaced Darwin Nunez with Dominic Solanke. That decision got me a whole 2 points more than I would’ve done if I hadn’t. Genius move.
Anyway, my thoughts are now on GW24 and trying to continue this newfound momentum.
Will did well to bring in Kevin De Bruyne with the money he was presumably saving to bring Mohamed Salah back into his team once he’s back from international duty. I won’t lie, that has crossed my mind. If I were to do the same, I’d still have enough in the bank to bring Heung-min Son back in when the time’s right. It is very, very tempting! But it would require getting rid of Kyle Walker and spending 4 points on a second transfer.
And that’s what I’m going to do. De Bruyne comes in for Martin Odegaard and Gabriel comes in for Walker. It still leaves me with enough to bring Son back in eventually.
The rest of my squad picks itself again. Haaland will keep the armband as City host Everton, but I am going to start Garnacho over Joao Pedro this week. Brighton are away at Spurs, which potentially reduces Pedro’s attacking potential, while Man United travel to a Villa side that has lost its last two games at Villa Park.
Beyond that, it’s an unchanged XI. An XI I’m expecting to make easy work of Will’s pretenders.
