Final Word Week 17 | Supercoach EPL trades, captains, PODs


<p>Defining performances everywhere in what was a very, very high-scoring week, where 130-odd points wasn&#8217;t enough to move my podcast colleague Matty Jurman up the rankings! </p>



<p>A sub-100 for the Bolywood Bhoys was never going to be enough &#8211; and the risk of taking the captaincy off Haaland backfired badly with him and Rogers both scoring big up front.</p>



<p>A shout-out to Bruno Fernandes as well &#8211; he has continued to deliver from a deep-lying position &#8211; I have to say I&#8217;ve never seen a team quite like Ruben Amorim&#8217;s Manchester United at the moment &#8211; they won&#8217;t win anything, but they are appointment viewing.</p>



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<p>My strategy over the next little while is targeting how I can have at least one of Fernandes and Foden in immediately &#8211; my preference being Foden &amp; then how I can attack the other, hopefully without needing to downgrade elsewhere.</p>



<p>Two disappointing weeks in a row leaves me ranked 7.7k &#8211; all considered, learning the Supercoach ropes on the run, I&#8217;m not too upset with that. </p>



<p>22 trades in the bank means we&#8217;ll need to be frugal on the Run Home, but I&#8217;m largely happy with the backline and midfield, and the point I&#8217;ve made on the podcast is that we&#8217;ll look to catch guys at the right time upfront on the run home.</p>



<p>My focus this week in terms of trades is getting <strong>Foden</strong> in &#8211; thankfully <strong>Merino</strong> provides us a pretty straightforward spot &#8211; I need to find another 6.5mil to get to him though! </p>



<p>I&#8217;ll talk you through the plan to get there a little later on.</p>



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<p>One word of warning, carrying on from the pod &#8211; we brushed past <strong>Riccardo Calafiori</strong>, who I own and haven&#8217;t really been considering moving on.</p>



<p>500 players have traded him out this week &#8211; if you are considering that with a complete lack of value back there now that Burn and White are now out injured &#8211; I&#8217;d urge you very strongly to hold. </p>



<p>Arsenal aren&#8217;t going to be the defensive force of the beginning of the season until Gabriel and Saliba are back together &#8211; but as I did say on the pod &#8211; they will concede fewer goals than Manchester City this season &#8211; even if they manage to be caught up in the title race&#8230; Again&#8230;</p>



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<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Trade Plans</strong></h3>



<p>Foden is in as we&#8217;ve established &#8211; his Breakeven of 11 at that price would usually have me sitting tight and waiting for the inevitable drop, but the run of fixtures is generous to say the least &#8211; West Ham, Forest, Sunderland (minus 7 players at AFCON) before Chelsea, which is where I think this ridiculous run could finally halt.</p>



<p><strong>Fernandes</strong> at 16.4mil is about 1.5m less and is projected to get to a similar price with any sort of performance against Villa so I did consider the move but at that price I doubt I&#8217;ll be moving out either before the end of the year &#8211; Fernandes has the higher projected price and points by the end of the season but I&#8217;m siding with Foden for the moment.</p>



<p>1- because City&#8217;s run is slightly more straightforward over the next month, &amp; 2- because there is also a fundamental choice between City&#8217;s consistency and United&#8217;s at the heart of the question, if you have missed the boat like me and can only afford one right now.</p>



<p>To summarise this argument, though, both are great, and you need to find a way to have one, if not both.</p>



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<p>Now&#8230; how do you get there? </p>



<p>Daniel Munoz is a great route if you&#8217;ve been holding him &#8211; 13.48 mil, which, if you bring in Victor Lindelof (3.8mil), you&#8217;re most of the way there. </p>



<p>Midfield is full of guys ready to move on&#8230; <strong>Eze &amp; Merino </strong>are both outright sells this week &#8211; if you need the cash to get there, then yes, <strong>Yankubah Minteh</strong> to <strong>Foden/Fernandes</strong> is a trade I would encourage.</p>



<p>Up front &#8211; a downgrade from Thiago to Ekitike, who is set to explode, could help you out, along with a boost.</p>



<p>Matty and I went in-depth on some of the forwards this week on the podcast, and there are plenty of quality options out there.</p>



<p>My solution is rather more straightforward &#8211; dropping <strong>Maxim De Cuyper,</strong> who&#8217;s been in and out of the team like a loanee recently, for the aforementioned <strong>Lindelof</strong>, and with just over 3mil in the bank, we&#8217;re able to stretch ourselves to Foden.</p>



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<p>I did consider a boost as a <strong>Woltemade</strong> owner to bring in <strong>Ekitike</strong> &#8211; and he has looked terrific &#8211; I gave him a massive wrap on this week&#8217;s podcast. </p>



<p>But there are a few others I&#8217;m keen on, and I think we can beat the market to in a week&#8217;s time.</p>



<p>Think the two <strong>Jesus&#8217;s, Igor</strong> at Forest &amp; <strong>Gabriel</strong> at Arsenal, <strong>Marc Guiu,</strong> who could be the beneficiary of Cole Palmer returning, and <strong>Liam Delap</strong>&#8216;s form never quite arriving at Chelsea.</p>



<p>I won&#8217;t be moving for a forward I don&#8217;t absolutely love, with so much change happening up there at this stage. </p>



<p>Woltemade is likely to be a move next week, but I want to be sure.</p>



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<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Captaincy Options</strong></h3>



<p>Everton plays Sunday morning at 7am &#8211; early alarm, and we&#8217;ll have a double chance.</p>



<p>City vs West Ham &#8211; I&#8217;ve paid the money to bring Foden in, so I&#8217;ll give him the VC as a slightly lower-owned player and hope he&#8217;s the stand-out again. </p>



<p>It&#8217;s strange backing against Haaland as hard as I have been over the last couple of weeks while still owning and starting him.</p>



<p>Morgan Rogers is the Monday Morning option with the C next to his name, taking on a Manchester United team that has just conceded 4 against Bournemouth and has a completely unsettled defence heading on one of the toughest journeys in the Premier League to Villa Park.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Trades</strong></h3>



<p>Merino &amp; De Cuyper OUT</p>



<p>Foden &amp; Lindelof IN</p>



<p><strong>Captaincy</strong></p>



<p>VC: Foden (v West Ham)</p>



<p>C: Rogers (v Man Utd)</p>


Final Word Week 17 | Supercoach EPL trades, captains, PODs

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