FPL Gameweeks 17-25
The football landscape has changed quite a bit since we last touched base: Klopp announced his departure from Liverpool at the end of the season, Ivory Coast as the host nation emerged victorious at the AFCON following the sacking of their manager Jean-Louis Gasset two games into the tournament, and the pursuit of the Premier League narrowed to a three-horse race between Liverpool, Manchester City and Arsenal. From an FPL perspective, from Gameweek 17 - 25 (not inclusive of the that just transpired this week) the league has continued in the same trajectory as previously, with the top and bottom divide remaining consistent. Across the 9 fixtures there were notable performances (particularly in the last 2 weeks where CK and Agueroooooooo both breached the 100 points mark) with a select few leading the way. Tied for the best records across the weeks were CK, Farabale 5 and ChaBALRS who all had registered 7-0-2 (win-draw-loss). On the flip side, the bottom three performers were Deep In Thought FC, World Class XI, and Benniehanas who all struggled to a 2-0-7 record. The following graphs provide a visual aide in better understanding the data:
The first graph entitled ‘Points Total and Points Difference’ encapsulates this precisely and details who has dominated their fixtures (‘Points Total’ is the total points scored across GW 17 to 25, whilst ‘Points Difference’ captures the differential between points scored during this period versus total points scored by their opponent). From the left to the right you can see in blue the points total of each team in ascending order, with World Class XI at the foot of the table with 398, whilst CK topped the league with 617 points across these 9 games. This should not come as much of a surprise given the two teams are at the bottom and top of the league standings respectively, and if we look further we see that the average position of the bottom 5 lowest scorers is 28th place, whereas the average of the top 5 scorers across this period was 4th place. To put this simply, the league leaders continue to perform as such, whilst the converse can be said for the minnows of the league.
Naturally we could hypothesise that those who scored highest may also have a higher points difference given their likelihood of winning their fixtures would be greater. By and large this correlates with the results attained as you can see that those whose totals were in the top half of the table points (everyone to the right of WeBackAgain) aside from 3 players they all posted a positive points difference. The most anomalous result from that half of the table was for Excellent Finish who scored the 5th highest points yet had a negative points difference of -6. This was in part due to facing the likes of A Shaw Thing (the highest points difference of 115) and Agueroooooooo (currently ranked 8th), whilst he also posted a 4-0-5 record. Interestingly CK had a points difference of +56 which was the 10th highest differential, so it also suggests the high scoring affairs he was involved in and the consistency he demonstrated to emerge with his 7-0-2 record. On the flip side you see a similar story where the points difference correlates with the league position and points total, with the anomaly being IamJoseMurinho who scored the 6th lowest points yet had a 5-0-4 record and posted a points difference of +2. His fixtures were typically low scoring, tight affairs against those in and around him in the league. Whether these skin-of-the-teeth will continue is debatable, as his next 5 fixtures are against those with an average position of 18th (facing the 9th, 34th, 20th, 26th & 5th placed teams).
Graph 2 depicts the position change of each team from GW 17 to 25 such that we can see who has been trending in the right direction.
As you can see we have a clear positive ascension by ChaBALRS who rose 13 positions from 24th place to 11th following his 7-0-2 showing. The next highest movers were Kwamz FC, Vibes FC and Luke Sure who all rose 7 positions to 25th, 15th and 12th respectively, posting 6-0-3 records in the process. Only two players remained unmoved in the league as Gabi Gabby Gabi & Deep in Thought FC stayed in 9th and 34th position after they had a record of 4-0-5. The predominant position change was +/- 3 positions with 11 players falling within that category, whilst #1 FC dropped 12 positions to 28th as the largest faller, followed by RayzFC and Nu Creations falling 9 positions. Naturally much change has happened between the middle of table as teams have shuffled around, however there has also been some movement in the top five: for GW 17 in descending order Chrissyleboss XI led the way with Excellent Finish, CK, A Shaw Thing, and Agueroooooooo following behind. In GW 25 it was the following: (1) CK, (2) Rassclart Addz, (3) Undisputed, (4) Farabale 5, (5) Chrissyleboss XI.
Looking forward to the remaining fixtures until the next international break beginning on the 18th March, Man Citv have the Manchester derby and a trip to Anfield to navigate before then, whilst Arsenal will be looking to capitalise on favourable matchups as they travel to Brammall Lane to face Sheffield United followed by London derbies at the Emirates versus Brentford and Chelsea. Given that I am still in the mix for the title I will not share a potential triple-captain candidate, but if I were you I would look through the fixture list and you might notice something….
I will be back again to present the results during the international break- until then from an FPL perspective stay guarded!
To a simpler life;
