2017/18 Soccer Thread

Morocco bidding for the 2026 World Cup so here I am hoping they'll win Canada and saving us from ourselves in our dumb joint bid.

bigred wrote:
Clusks wrote:
bigred wrote:

Signed up for the league. Immediately realized I have no idea what's going on and probably should have read rules before making a squad. Triple Captain? Bench Boost?

Theyre one off things, you can apply them for one game week. Triple captain will, as it says, triple your captain's points. Bench boost gives you points for everyone on your bench. All out attack means you only have to field play 2 defenders one game week (probably the least useful of the three, I find.)

Just to confirm, I can use each one once for the duration of the season? when I first saw them it gave me a paytoplay vibe.

Yeah, you can use each one only once.

All out Attack's been replaced by something new this year, hasn't it?

bigred wrote:
Clusks wrote:
bigred wrote:

Signed up for the league. Immediately realized I have no idea what's going on and probably should have read rules before making a squad. Triple Captain? Bench Boost?

Theyre one off things, you can apply them for one game week. Triple captain will, as it says, triple your captain's points. Bench boost gives you points for everyone on your bench. All out attack means you only have to field play 2 defenders one game week (probably the least useful of the three, I find.)

Just to confirm, I can use each one once for the duration of the season? when I first saw them it gave me a paytoplay vibe.

Once you use them once they're gone! Also keep in mind that on some gameweeks a team might play twice. You also have the wildcard which lets you make as many transfers as you want in one game week.

Fantasy rules are at https://fantasy.premierleague.com/help/ but the site is currently "updating" because it's the 1990s and we can't serve informational pages while other portions of the DB are under stress apparently, so here's a cached version.

As long as I don't get last, I think it's a win. Should we get near end season and I'm in last place I will be sad.

I am sad I didn't take a single Arsenal player. I originally had Lacazette but had to trade down for Firmino to make the budget. I think Lacazette has potential but I'm not going to gamble on him over Lukaku. I hope I can look back on this and laugh when Lacazette wins the league and golden boot for us but we shall see.

And Lacazette immediately scores. I think I might need to already quit fantasy. I don't recall ever feeling a pang of regret as an Arsenal player scores.

bigred wrote:

I hope I can look back on this and laugh when Lacazette wins the league and golden boot for us but we shall see.

Use these powers for good.

I am really looking forward to watching Arsenal-Leicester tonight:

Going to plug Statsbomb's Season Previews if you're into analytics-informed writing. They're damn good and they're not long enough to overstay their welcome. Basically only the top-half in the EPL plus an Eredevisie and Ligue 1 bit but there's good stuff there without getting burred in numbers.

Good job City are the only team with a sh*t defence, according to the pundits. And Robbie Savage, the purpose of whose existence escapes me.

Obviously the defences of Arsenal, Liverpool, Watford and Leicester are only having us on. What japes !

Arsenal's defense is sketchy at best but I think there's potential.

If we continue with 3 at the back, I think a healthy Koscielny, Mustafi, and Kolasinic supported by Bellerin and Ox on the wings looks good on paper to me. However, while we've had success with 3 at the back we've also had some major coordination/brain dead plays at the back. Cost us two goals yesterday although much of that can be attributed to Monreal playing center of the 3 and Czech staying glued to his line.

Also, that Liverpool match was a blast to watch if you like watching Liverpool fall apart. Credit to Salah though. A solid performance despite some lackluster finishing.

Uff. Chelsea off to a rough start.

Indeed. I would be celebrating, except that Cahill and Courtois are in my Fantasy League team.

Still, at least there's no relegation.

Southampton-Swansea was not a good choice. Their midfields just aren't very good, especially with Southampton keeping Lemina on the bench in favour of Steven Davis for some inexplicable reason.

Roke wrote:

Southampton-Swansea was not a good choice. Their midfields just aren't very good, especially with Southampton keeping Lemina on the bench in favour of Steven Davis for some inexplicable reason.

Most likely because he's just signed, Serie A starts next week, so he's probably a bit behind with his fitness.

This opening weekend has been so unpredictable that Newcastle just might keep a clean sheet tomorrow!

Clusks wrote:
Roke wrote:

Southampton-Swansea was not a good choice. Their midfields just aren't very good, especially with Southampton keeping Lemina on the bench in favour of Steven Davis for some inexplicable reason.

Most likely because he's just signed, Serie A starts next week, so he's probably a bit behind with his fitness.

This opening weekend has been so unpredictable that Newcastle just might keep a clean sheet tomorrow!

Spurs have had "Moussa Sissoko at fullback" chatter recently so I'm kind of optimistic about tomorrow.

David Silva's new hairstyle bothers me.

When I first saw it, I thought that City had re-signed Steven Ireland. Only the lack of reported sightings of a pink Range Rover convinced me otherwise.

Somewhat fortunate to take all three points today, but happy to take full advantage of our best chance of a win in the opening seven games.

Could definitely see the results of having so many new players getting used to the club and each other in our abysmal passing (especially in midfield) - hopefully that will improve as folks settle in.

Also: Pickford is, for my money, probably an even more important signing than Lukaku was. Great save late to seal the win, and think his distribution is going to be critical to our counterattack against bigger teams, given our overall lack of pace.

Dimmerswitch wrote:

Also: Pickford is, for my money, probably an even more important signing than Lukaku was. Great save late to seal the win...

That was a save and a half.

Brighton, first game at home in the Premier League. So they are actually going to put some effort in.

Possession - 22%

Job done.

davet010 wrote:

Indeed. I would be celebrating, except that Cahill and Courtois are in my Fantasy League team.

Still, at least there's no relegation.

I had Cahill and Azpilicueta. A beautiful, combined -2 points.

davet010 wrote:

Indeed. I would be celebrating, except that Cahill and Courtois are in my Fantasy League team.

Still, at least there's no relegation.

Oh, balls. Me too. I've got 9 points so far, sitting 18th out of 19 teams!

We're not last!

davet010 wrote:

Brighton, first game at home in the Premier League. So they are actually going to put some effort in.

Possession - 22%

Job done.

Given that their entire stadium apparently cost less than you paid for Walker & Danilo, I don't think that's entirely fair.

That said, the outcome never felt in doubt.

davet010 wrote:

When I first saw it, I thought that City had re-signed Steven Ireland. Only the lack of reported sightings of a pink Range Rover convinced me otherwise.

Had to look up where the Newcastle United legend is playing right now, some how he's still at Stoke!

Match of the Day thoughts.

- Chelsea looked very indisciplined. Thought Cahill was a little unlucky, but that snide little goat Fabregas wasn't, his second booking could have been a straight red. Rudiger looked abysmal, his awareness of what was going on around him seemed non-existent.

- Liverpool are unlucky to have two CB's who can't actually head a football. I can also see Klippity flouncing off when they finish 4th again.

- How did Arsenal get the corner from which they scored their third, when Ozil clearly controlled the ball with his arm as he began his run ?

- On those showings, I think Huddersfield will survive (though Palace were atrocious at the back) and Brighton will struggle. I also think that maybe City could have keep Mooy to play when they need a midfielder to dig in and scrap.

davet010 wrote:

- On those showings, I think Huddersfield will survive (though Palace were atrocious at the back) and Brighton will struggle. I also think that maybe City could have keep Mooy to play when they need a midfielder to dig in and scrap.

That fourth point is a bit of a hot take after all of one game in which one side played the side in the country who are favourites to win the title

I think Brighton's problem is that their team seems so nervous when there is a bit of pressure, 2 seasons ago they threw away the chance to get promoted and last season they seemed determined to give Newcastle every opportunity to win the league. Yesterday there were times where they just seemed determined to get rid of the ball, not realising that they had a bit of time, I don't think they managed to deal with the high pressure in midfield from Man City, but most sides won't this season.

Good start to the season for Dortmund, as Dembele has been suspended for going AWOL after sulking about not being able to go to Barcelona and Aubameyang has said he wants to leave and go to AC Milan, which could maybe have something to do with him dropping out of training 30 minutes in, "remembering he has a cold". The pettiness of some footballers does get a little tedious, doesn't it?

Well, I did say 'on these showings' for a reason

Aubemayang has been touted round Europe for most of the summer, why has he suddenly decided that AC Milan are interested in him ?

Looking again at my Fantasy League team, I can only assume that me picking Batshuayi rather than Morata was based on me being an idiot.

God I hate Jonjo Shelvey. Completely useless out of possession, an idiot in general, and a bigot to boot.

Yeah. I've been rooting for the magpies but he's awful.

Just to clarify the transfer rules:

I can make one transfer for free for gameweek 2 before the deadline?

Any additional transfers will be at the cost of -4 points per transfer?

Any transfers after the deadline will not be reflected until the following gameweek?

If I don't use a transfer, I can bank that for later use? For example, if I don't transfer someone for gameweek 2 I can use 2 transfers for gameweek 3?

Don't think you can bank transfers, from memory.