Fantasy Football: Q3 Report

Wow! BPL has just completed its Gameweek 30, which means we have about 8 more matches before the season concludes! Sure seemed like yesterday that the BPL 2011/12 season just kicked off!

On the reality front, whilst there are quite a number of teams jostling for the 3rd and 4th positions, both Manchester clubs are going virtually neck-to-neck in the title race! After grinding out a 1-0 victory over Fulham, Man Utd is 3 points clear, (still) with inferior goal difference of (-3) but with only 8 matches to go. The key message here is that Man Utd’s final stretch looks significantly easier on paper, with upcoming matches include Blackburn, QPR, Wigan, Villa and Everton before the Manchester derby. Compared to Man City’s schedule of playing Sunderland, Arsenal, West Brom, Norwich and Wolves, things are looking good for Man Utd. Without further distractions from domestic cup competitions as well as the Mickey Mouse Europa League does help too!

Meanwhile, back in Fantasy Football land, I am happy to announce as at the completion of GW 30, I have finally managed to claw my way back to the top amongst my friends! In my Q2 report, I shared that only 10 points separated the top 3, with Friend A on top, followed by Friend P and me in third spot. Over the next couple of weeks, Friend A started to drop points rather drastically, possibly due to the lack of support from his bench. So that left me, week after week, trying to catch Friend P.

As I approached GW30, I gambled on buying Grant Holt (NWC) to score goals against woeful Wolves, and it partially paid off with Holt scoring twice….and sadly collecting a RED card too. Sigh. Thankfully, my other players did enough to secure me 50 points, which was sufficient to overtake Friend P for now. Yay me!

In terms of stats, this is a summary of my Q3 report:

Globally, I have improved my positioning from 3,855 (0.8%) to 2,889 (0.5%). My team value has increased just slightly from $168M to $171M. I doubt it would increase any more within the final stretch of 8 games. Current points collected is 1,324.3, with the chasing pack of Friend P (1,312.6) and Friend A (1,258.7)

Looking forward to an exciting finish to this season’s BPL, both on in reality and on the fantasy front.