Gameweek 27 pitted me against my longtime friend Delvin. Neither of us were having our best season, but he was one of the people who were below me in the head-to-head table. Nonetheless he still had a good team but with four clubs having a double gameweek who knew what he would pull out of the hat this week.
I had intentionally not made any transfers last week, as I wanted two free transfers this week. In the end I made three transfers so I took a points hit. With Brighton's double gameweek in mind, I sold Wolves' injured full back Hugo Bueno and brought in Pervis Estupinan. Up front my plan from awhile ago was to let go of Erling Haaland. With Manchester City having the second leg of their Champions League with Leipzig coming up I did not know whether Pep Guardiola would definitely start him away at Crystal Palace or not. Add to that City blank in gameweek 28, and then play Liverpool in the following gameweek where I would not have started him anyway, so letting him go for a few gameweeks made sense for me. I replaced him with Ivan Toney as Brentford doubled this week and in gameweek 29.
This left me with one final decision to make and that was which player I brought in to midfield for Leeds' Crysensio Summerville. With both teams doubling I decided it had to be a Brighton player rather than a Brentford one, but was it to be Alexis MacAllister, who was in my team earlier in the season or Solly March. March has been in great form since Roberto Di Zerbi took over but if he was not to score in the month that matched his surname I would be livid. With MacAllister being on set pieces I went with him. When I owned him earlier on in the season no one else did, and now may were flocking, so if he stacked points I would have been annoyed if I were not involved. I had thought of also selling Wilfried Gnonto to get Evan Ferguson before I got Estupinan in but went with the Ecuadorean defender instead as you can obviously only have three men from one team. When the deadline passed I saw that Delvin had triple captained Ivan Toney, whilst I captained Kaoru Mitoma instead of originally having it with MacAllister. Delvin's only transfer was to sell Kelechi Iheanacho for Darwin Nunez. The triple captain cut me deep before a ball had even been kicked, I was now extremely pessimistic.
The action started at the Vitality Stadium. After the romp at home to Manchester United, you can forgive people who would have thought that Liverpool were going to stroll to an away win at Bournemouth. Despite having some reservations as after Liverpool beat Manchester City earlier in the season they then lost away at Nottingham Forest, I still went in to this game with three men from Jurgen Klopp's side. Bournemouth were only beaten by a very late goal at Arsenal last week and they hit Liverpool on the break to clinch a vital three points through Phillip Billing. Billing scored at Arsenal last week and at £5.1m with just 1.7% ownership he could prove to be a great FPL differential. The Reds had a golden chance to at least get a point but Mo Salah fired a second half penalty back to Egypt. Salah's miss left him on zero points, when you take a points-hit not gaining any points in the first match and your team losing leaves you in the most melancholic state.
The 3pm's saw Everton keep a clean sheet when I decided to leave James Tarkowski on the bench, typical 'FPL life' moment there, after I had been wondering why I had bothered to get him in. The Toffees edged past Brentford thanks to a great strike by Dwight McNeil, Tarkowski was to get bonus points to further rub the disgrace in my face. Delvin and I both had David Raya in goal and he gained a bonus point for making five saves. All heads were on the game between Leeds and Brighton at Elland Road as many had loaded up on Brighton assets for the double gameweek. It was the perfect start for my FPL team here as Alexis MacAllister opened the scoring with a header after my captain Mitoma had headed the ball to him. Leeds levelled through a deflected Patrick Bamford goal before Solly March put the Seagulls back in front with a scrappy goal, then the goal was given as a own goal, before going back to being March's goal and then it was given as an own goal again...March madness! The own goal was credited to Jack Harrison before he scored a sublime goal at the right end as it ended all square. March owners would have been furious, I mean March's weather has been cold enough as it is and then this.
Tottenham beat Nottingham Forest 3-1 in a much needed win for Antonio Conte's men. Harry Kane did my FPL XI proud as he headed in the first and then tucked away a penalty. Kane showed that single gameweek players can outdo double gameweekers and they should not be overlooked for the captaincy. In the late game I needed Haaland not to score as I sold him and my opponent had him. I also needed a favour from Crystal Palace as Delvin had Manuel Akanji in his defence. I was to get neither as City won 1-0 through a spot kick by Haaland as Michael Olise fouled Ilkay Gundogan, 'thanks for nothing Palace!'.
Sunday saw me really up against it from the get-go as Arsenal cruised to a 3-0 victory at Fulham. I needed the Cottagers to score as William Saliba was in Delvin's team but I was letdown once again! Luckily Bukayo Saka blanked otherwise the damage would have been much more vast. Another surprise blank came from Marcus Rashford as Manchester United and Southampton played out a goalless draw. Casemiro was sent off and the Saints had enough chances to get the three points. Newcastle beat Wolves 2-1 as Miguel Almiron's late deflected winner helped their push for Champions League football.
The gameweek rounded off with the midweek games. Usually double gameweeks are overrated with nothing really going exactly according to plan but this was not the case this time around. Things predictably worked out for numerous managers. Brighton won 1-0 at home to Crystal Palace. Odsonne Edouard and Michael Olise wasted chances as Solly March won the game with a fine finish from a pass from that guy Mitoma. So those who captained March got their goal after all. Mitoma captainers were happy too and anyone who drafted in Brighton defenders got their clean sheet points. The head-to-head was extremely tight but then Delvin's triple captain came to the fore. Ivan Toney headed in Christian Norgaard's flick-on to give Brentford the lead at Southampton. Things were very tight and then Toney was booked. I was thinking now I could possibly squeeze a draw depending on how the bonus points worked out as Toney dropped down because of his caution. But lo and behold in the seventh minute of injury time; Toney assisted the second goal for the Bees as Yoane Wissa converted and with Delvin getting three times the Toney points than me he went on to triumph with Toney going back to the top of the bonus points, 'damn!'.
So despite a solid score of 84 I was beaten and I told Delvin 'friendship done', but to be real he did well with his triple captain, I just wish it had not been against me. Anyway with a Friday night start to the next gameweek there is not much time to dwell.
@DubulDee
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