The Overthinking Roundup: GW32
In which Villa and Brentford went on a wild ride, United again managed to spoil Klopp's farewell tour, and Chelsea dropped to new disappointing lows.
Welcome to the Overthinking Roundup for Gameweek 32.
This is our guide to the week that was. In it, we go game by game to break down the notable stories and performances, before diving into transaction advice for our Paid Subscribers.
As ever, if you enjoy what we do, please share and encourage others to subscribe!
Crystal Palace 2 - 4 Manchester City
Sure enough, as we talked about in the Preview, Pep swung the rotation roulette wheel and landed on a lineup with Oscar Bobb (6.5) playing over both Phil Foden (0) and Jeremy Doku (0). Just like we thought. Some might’ve been tempted to jump on the Bobb-wagon when the team-sheets came out. And he wasn’t awful points-wise, if you did. He outscored both Jack Grealish (2) and Julian Alvarez (1.5) on the day. That said, he had 0 Shots and 1 Chance Created across the 90 minutes, whereas both Grealish and Alvarez were far more involved in the attacking moves. We expect Bobb to move back to the bench, but it is worth monitoring who City turn to for depth over the remainder of the season. The Champions League repeat is still a possibility and Pep will no doubt catch us out with more rogue team-sheets before the season is through.
For Palace, this was fine. I was critical of their performances post-Hodgson so far as being dull. It would be unfair to call them dull today per se. Certainly scoring after 3 minutes does something to the level of intrigue in a game. But even with 2 Goals scored, this wasn’t an exciting day Fantrax-wise. Eberechi Eze (0.5) couldn’t get into the game at all and if we didn’t have the Goals or Assists on the board, only Jefferson Lerma (7) would’ve finished with a starter level score. It’s not all doom-and-gloom though. Michael Olise (4.5) played. Just 15 minutes. But he played. They could really use him back (and I’m sure more than a few Fantrax managers have had him stashed waiting for this return). How he fits into this new formation alongside Eze remains a question. But hopefully talent wins out in that regard. The game’s more fun with Olise in it.
Aston Villa 3 - 3 Brentford
Speaking of fun. What a wild game we had at Villa Park. A surprise return to the side for Ollie Watkins (24) meant our Jhon Duran (0.5) tip in the preview went nowhere. But our Villa backup recommendation, Morgan Rogers (12.5), did do some damage in his 70 minutes on the field. But the story of this game is the wild-ten minute spell in the second-half where Brentford turned the game entirely upside-down. And it came mostly down their left-hand side, where Sergio Reguilon (18) reminded us the upside of his role in this Brentford side. He’s not settled into any kind of consistency yet, but the ceiling is large, even with Brentford conceding 2 Goals whilst he was on the field. Rico Henry will be back next year, so there’s a good chance Brentford don’t make this move permanent. But if they do, it’s going to be interesting where he falls in drafts. The other notable choice for Brentford was that Thomas Frank continues to tease us with his forward selections. We’ve written twice about how we’re looking forward to the Bryan Mbeumo (10.5) and Ivan Toney (0.5) connection to rekindle. Twice we’ve seen different lineups. Yoanne Wissa (15.5) is a good player, so we don’t mean any disrespect to him. But we think Brentford’s prospects look better with the main duo on the field. And with 6 games remaining, they sit 4 points off the relegation zone (with a far superior Goal Difference). With Sheffield United, Luton Town and then Everton up next for them, they really need to put points up to cement their safety. It shouldn’t be a problem. But if you’d asked us, we’d have said they shouldn’t be still stuck down in 16th and stranger things have happened.
For Villa, this result most likely hurts. Squandering a two-goal lead is always painful. Giving up fourth place in doing so hurts even more. And in doing so, they lost the future services of Douglas Luiz (4) to a late Yellow Card that will rule him out of the games against Arsenal and Bournemouth. He’s a massive part of how this side functions and a primary set-piece taker. We’re a bit nervous for them in that regard. With Europe in midweek, then the trip to the Emirates, the odds are tipped against Villa in the next Gameweek. Over to you, Unai. Show us what you’ve got.
Everton 1 - 0 Burnley
It’s an old-football cliché when a player is struggling with goal-scoring form to say “he just needs one to bounce in off his shin”. Everton’s winner didn’t come off Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s (22.5) shin but it was certainly the type of good fortune that they needed. Calvert-Lewin had a good day overall and will feel unfortunate that he couldn’t add to his generously gifted opener in the second-half. Burnley gifted him another good chance in the second half, which Arijanet Muric (3.25), who we fully accept we got with the commentator’s curse from the Preview (sorry Burnley fans), did well to save. Otherwise, though, this game was pretty low-event stuff. And low-event means low-points scoring from a Fantrax perspective. The Everton defenders benefitted from a rare Clean-Sheet which meant anyone that gambled here (did anyone gamble here?) got a reward. But otherwise, there wasn’t a lot else. 3 Shots on Target, 0.94 xG. It won’t win any ‘attacking performance of the month’ awards, that’s for sure. But three points are three points and Everton looked to be driving towards safety. Except . . . they also just picked up another 2 point penalty charge under PSR. Talk about twists and turns.
Burnley on the other hand are now staring at a 6 point gap (plus Goal Difference) and it feels near enough done. They do get to play Sheffield United and Nottingham Forest. But the rest of their fixtures are tough. And they’re going to need the teams above them to lose out in all likelihood. They’ve shown fight, particularly in the second-half of the season. But ultimately not enough quality when it’s mattered. And they’ve unfortunately continued to self-destruct in key games, with their 7 Red Cards leading the league. It was Dara O’Shea’s (-5.75) turn today and his absence will be tough to cover when they face Brighton next.
Fulham 0 - 1 Newcastle
They can’t all be classics. And this one was certainly out to prove that. These two sides boxed each other fairly even over the 90 minutes, but Bruno Guimaraes (23) used his 100th appearance to remind us all why he, more than anyone else, has been the man behind Newcastle’s ascendence, with a 1 Goal, 4 Key Pass, 2 Successful Take-Ons performance in central midfield, to lead them to a win that puts them in the driving seat for Europa League qualification again. Those of a Geordie persuasion will no doubt have read lots about their financial situation and the prospect of having to sell players in light of the new PSR rules (or the enforcement of the existing rule, however you choose to look at it). We can’t help but feel if Bruno is the man that you’re getting offers for, you might be better off taking the points deductions. He makes everything work for Newcastle and, even if this has been a down year compared to last year, he’s remained the Key Player. Replacing him would be very difficult. Streamer-wise, we didn’t get Elliott Anderson (4.5) as a starter, but he replaced Joe Willock (1.5) after 40 minutes. If that injury is anything serious then Anderson is back in the mix for regular starter status. We did get Lewis Hall (11.75) again and he had a very solid defensive game here. He remains an incredibly exciting long-term prospect for Fantrax so getting this run of games is excellent to see. They get Spurs next and, if he gets the nod there, it’ll be an excellent test of his development as a young full-back, facing Spurs’ winger-heavy attack.
Fulham will consider themselves a little unlucky to have not managed to score in this game but they didn’t create loads. Shot-lover Rodrigo Muniz (5.5) was limited to just 3 attempts. A respectable number for normal players but low by his standards. It was another productive day for Andreas Pereira (11.5) too. He had 2 Key Passes and 2 Shots on Target though wasn’t ever really able to threaten Newcastle, with just 0.29 xG and 0.13 xA. It was his third straight performance with double figure point returns and a reminder why he was so popular in drafts. It’s definitely been more mixed this year for him but when the Fulham attack functions well, a lot runs through him. The Muniz breakout and the integration of Alex Iwobi (9) has helped him significantly. Fulham’s run in includes games against Liverpool and Manchester City but there’s also enough good fixtures there that we could see a strong finish from this group.
Luton Town 2 - 1 Bournemouth
And on a theme of strong finishes, along come Luton. Truthfully, this game was pretty dire for most of the 90 minutes. Neither side really created much and you’d have been forgiven for thinking neither side had much to play for. We expected far more from Bournemouth, in particular, given the makeshift nature of Luton’s healthy lineups at this point in the season. In the second half, Bournemouth put up just 0.18 xG. And that’s the half that they scored in. Marcus Tavernier (11.5) is typically one of the most reliable guys in the game, though has had a more muted run recently, so him being involved in Bournemouth’s Goal isn’t surprising. He’s now likely to miss some time, with a hamstring injury, though. We recommended stashing Justin Kluivert (9.5) ahead of this game and he was probably the most lively player for Bournemouth whilst on the pitch. The ‘Assist’ was certainly fortunate, with an xA value of 0.02. But he also had 3 Shots on Goal, which tied for the most on the team. None hit the target, which minimised the benefit, but the Ghost Point returns could certainly have been healthier with just a few slightly different bounces of the ball. With Tavernier likely to miss time, he’s a potential beneficiary and one to monitor.
Whilst it was excusable that Bournemouth played like a team with nothing much to play for (they’re sat in 12th with 7 Games to go, Premier League status comfortably secured), Luton were not in a position to be grateful for a point. So their 0.22 xG from 4 Shots in the first-half was not good enough. It’s to their credit that they could turn it around, after going behind so early in the second half. The surprising catalyst on the day was Jordan Clark (26.5) who had 3 Shots on Target, 1 Goal and 3 Key Passes. The 30-year old has put up a double figure score just one other time this season. That too came against Bournemouth, with an Assist when the two faced each other in mid-March. He’s not someone you want to roster (though he is currently rostered in 2% of Leagues according to Fantrax stats). There are clearly some sickos out there playing in 20 team leagues. Some of you may still be rostering Carlton Morris (20), though, so there was a chance that Luton’s comeback helped someone. We still aren’t really recommending anyone outside of Ross Barkley (8.5) and Alfie Doughty (5) on a weekly basis, but Morris has been thrust back into the lineup by injuries and in really deep leagues, availability has some value. Leave him firmly on the wire for the trip to Manchester City, though.
Wolves 1 - 2 West Ham
We asked in the Preview whether we were going to get Wolves’ innovative “play all your full-backs” tactic again. We did. We also questioned whether it was a good tactic. And . . . well it sort of worked here? West Ham are a tough side to generate much against, but they ended with 1.47 xG. That’s hardly ground-breaking, but for a team with no striker and four full-backs, it’s quite good. Pablo Sarabia (17) has no doubt turned around seasons for a number of managers, sneaking in as a short-term streamer but never giving up the spot due to a succession of injuries. It’s the sort of luck you need sometimes if you’re hoping to win a title. And, as has been the story with Sarabia all year, it was a set piece role that really lifted him as he took Wolves’ penalty and finished nicely. That penalty was won by Rayan Ait-Nouri (12.5), continuing in an attacking midfield role once again. Managers who started him were close to an absolute jackpot, with Gary O’Neil withdrawing him at 55 minutes, with the score at 1-0 Wolves. Just 5 more minutes and we’d have been looking at a Clean Sheet too. But those are the breaks, I guess! Wolves did almost get a late point here from a Max Kilman (0.25) header. VAR adjudged there to have been an offside player involved in the play, which wiped off the equaliser. Wolves would’ve probably deserved it, on balance, for what they’ve managed to do with square pegs in round holes. Matheus Cunha (3.5) did return in this one and the hope will be that he’s healthy enough to play an even bigger role in the next game against Nottingham Forest.
James Ward-Prowse (17.5) is a great example of ‘he is who he is and we know what that is’. He’s a fairly limited open-play midfielder but a man who adds a tonne of value through his set-piece contribution. That’s always been enough to prop him up in Fantrax, even in contexts like last season’s Southampton side (who were truly awful at times). The fit at West Ham seemed obvious and he started well, so his barren 2024 has always felt strange. Even stranger, though, is the way he broke out of it in this one. Goals direct from a corner have an xG rating of 0.01. But, with a hint of a helping hand from the weather, that’s exactly what he did. If you’ve not seen it, it’s worth taking a look. Not sure it tells us anything about whether he’s ‘back’. Without the Goal, his day looks pretty pedestrian again. But that’s true of basically everyone at West Ham other than Ward-Prowse and the ever-reliable Lucas Paqueta (15). Even if there’s a degree of fortune in it, West Ham roll on. Fulham next.
Brighton 0 - 3 Arsenal
On the theme of rolling on, it seems that this years’ Arsenal are determined not to fade down the stretch like last year’s team did. This was a hugely comfortable beat-down. Arsenal have moved into (marginal) favourite status for the title with a number of forecasters after the weekend’s results. The manner they’ve done it is impressive and shows up in their Goal Difference. There’s something machine-like in the way they’re able to swap in and out the various forwards and have it all still work. Moving away from the ‘Kai Havertz (28.5) is an 8’ experiment took a while but they’re seeing way more production from Havertz since moving him back into the attack. Today he had a Goal and an Assist from 2 Shots and 4 Chances Created and an xG+xA of 1.20. That’s good stuff. Having him ticking over just means we trust everyone of the regulars in the Arsenal attack at this point. Not that any of them will have been on Waivers at basically any point. They’re going into the final stretch in a good place, with only minor knocks on the injury front. The only real question mark is how Mikel Arteta manages the rotation of the squad if they continue to progress in the Champions League (some of you may remember that their wobble in late 2023 coincided with European fixtures cluttering up their calendar). But they’re in good form and have momentum behind them. Who would bet against this title going down to the final day at this point?
For Brighton we’ll just give it a big shrug. They hit into a buzzsaw here. They were behind for two-thirds of the game and generated only 0.53 xG (2 Shots on Target, 10 Total). It’s not good but it’s not like they’re the first team to find Arsenal a tough nut to crack. They get to travel to Burnley next but the rest of their fixtures are pretty tough. If they’re able to finish in European competition spots, we’ll be impressed.
Manchester United 2 - 2 Liverpool
This game was peak football content. By the xG, Liverpool created more (3.67) in this game than Arsenal did in theirs (3.39). United created 0.70. And yet there was a second-half stretch where it seemed possible Liverpool were going to leave with no points at all. Jarrell Quansah (-0.75) was unfortunate to see his early-second-half mistake punished by Bruno Fernandes (16.5) and Kobbie Mainoo (19) turned a tough chance on the turn into a second Goal shortly after. The combined xG value of their two goals? 0.09. This was what you’d call a true ‘footballing’ in many ways. Jurgen Klopp was quick after the game to point out that ‘he has to score that’ type analysis is basically pointless and we mostly agree with him. Liverpool created enough to win this game and they didn’t. For Fantrax, them putting 21 of their 28 Shots off-target is painful. But all of the attackers had good Fantrax returns. Luis Diaz (23) opened the scoring and took a total of 6 Shots. Darwin Nunez (12.5) created the first and had 5 Shots for 0.34 xG. Mo Salah (20.5) scored the penalty and had a total of 6 Shots too, for a total of 1.26 xG. A further 0.81 xG fell to Dominic Szoboszlai (11) who got a lot of early chances that he couldn’t convert. On a different day, it’s hard to imagine this not bouncing differently.
United won’t care, though. It wasn’t pretty. It wasn’t great for Fantrax. But they’ve got points from Liverpool twice now this year. I’m going to find them a fascinating team to examine this Summer ahead of draft season. There’s really not a lot to say in this one, though. The whole story is the 2 Goals. They go into a run now of playing Bournemouth, Sheffield United and Burnley. You’d like to imagine that we can see good points returns from some of these United guys through that stretch. Some consistency please, chaps. Is that too much to ask?
Sheffield United 2 - 2 Chelsea
If you say inconsistency three times in a mirror, the spirit of Todd Boehly will appear behind you. Chelsea are probably in their most dysfunctional period since Ken Bates was custodian and yet, if they’d had the ability to hold on to leads against Burnley and Sheffield United, would be sat in 7th place, just one point behind Manchester United with a game-in-hand. And yet . . . they’re not. Make no mistake, this might have been Chelsea’s worst performance of the season. They created 0.24 xG against Sheffield United. Sheffield United are on-track to concede 101 Goals in the Premier League this year. I could write a lot about this game, because it was wildly instructive in the problems Chelsea have - but the short version is that they’ve got a whole lot of players that you can’t play together and a whole lot of injuries that mean they often have no choice but to play those players together. Yes, it’s true that if Djordje Petrovic (4.25) hadn’t fumbled at his near post or if any of Cesare Casadei (0), Benoit Badiashile (-2) or Mykhailo Mudryk (0.5) had competed properly in defence, they probably would’ve gotten away with the three points. But it would have been a pretty undeserved three points. This looked a lot like the 2023 iteration of this Chelsea side, where a lack of production at full-back hamstrung everything. Though most sites show this game as Chelsea playing their usual formation, it didn’t look that way at all in game. It was a back 5 shape, matching up Sheffield United and meant that, for the most part, chances were being thrown at Marc Cucurella (-2) in the box or the ball sticking with Noni Madueke (12) on the right. Criminally it also meant Cole Palmer (11.5) was pushed out of his usual position on the RW and into a central role that he’s never looked all that comfortable in this season. Chelsea are going to be another really interesting one to write about this Summer, given you can make a pretty strong argument that five of their ‘first team’ have barely played this year. But it’s worrying to have expensive depth pieces that are completely unable to compete with Sheffield United when needed. They’ve got a long break before facing Everton on MNF.
Sheffield United, on the other hand, got great output from one of their depth pieces here. This was Oliver Arblaster’s (13) fourth Premier League start. He ended the day with 5 Chances Created and a bunch of defensive contributions. He didn’t look at all out of place against Chelsea’s expensive midfield. There’s a lot to be optimistic about in his performance and Sheffield United may have a key piece in their campaign to get back to the Premier League already sorted in Arblaster. The other performance that has to be individually called out is Oli McBurnie (20). Yes, the Goal was vital. But McBurnie made life hard for Chelsea’s defenders all day. They’ll be delighted to see the back of him. There are so few players like McBurnie left in the Premier League in 2024. And yes, there probably is a reason for that. But it’s always fascinating to see how defenders react to the onslaught that McBurnie presents them with. Sheffield United have Brentford next then Burnley. If they can carry momentum with them, they can close the gap to the teams above them in those two games and have something positive to carry over into next year.
Tottenham 3 - 1 Nottingham Forest
There’s a trap that it’s easy to fall in to where football is made to seem like a complicated game. And yet sometimes, it’s about putting the right combination of good players on the field and being able to run really fast behind defenders. Spurs have embraced this more than anyone. And it’s why they’re getting production from the likes of Timo Werner (10) and Brennan Johnson (10) on a weekly basis, even as many (including us in the case of Johnson) would’ve questioned why they want those players based on their previous output. This wasn’t exactly their peak performance. They played Forest pretty much equal in the first-half before running away with it late. No one really jumps out on the stat sheet or Fantrax points tally as being particularly exceptional but they had 6 double-figure scores. That’s good stuff, for those wondering. They don’t rotate a whole lot and the Yves Bissouma (3) and Pape Matar Sarr (1.5) midfield was replaced at half-time having not really imposed themselves in the first period. But this was mostly fine. They get Newcastle next after a bit of rest. We’d imagine the lineup looks fairly similar and it should be an intriguing matchup, particularly with Newcastle likely lining up second-choice options at full-back. Expect more on this in the Preview.
Forest came out swinging and weren’t particularly slowed by the early Own Goal they conceded. Chris Wood (13) was the hero again, as he has often been, linking up well with Anthony Elanga (18). The restoration of Elanga in the last two games has been positive and we can’t imagine he’s coming back out again any time soon. With games against Everton, Sheffield United and Burnley in their last 6 fixtures, it’s entirely possible that you want some exposure to Forest forwards (yes, really), so it’s worth determining if any of them are still sitting on the wire anywhere in your league. Don’t let the fact that they faded against this Spurs side in the second-half influence you too much. Spurs are good. And Elanga still got plenty of points. We’ve said it a few times, but if Forest do go down, their forward line is going to have plenty of Premier League suitors.
Another week, another set of transactions for our subscribers. As usual, we’re not going to shout out long-term injuries or suspensions in here. We recommend regularly using a resource like PremierInjuries to keep on track of potential stash-ahead guys as we get closer to their expected availability dates.
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