ROTATION ANALYSIS IN BUILDING YOUR DEFENCE

After our discussion on Goalie and defender selection strategies, its time to look at the rotation analysis.

GOALKEEPERS

1. 2 way fixture rotators.

Like I specified, there are two ways to look at this. Selecting strictly based on home/away fixtures (this reduces selection headaches) or choosing “easier” fixtues.

Home/Away rotators are easier to find as they are designed by the premier league for policing or tv reasons. Remember we are focusing on rotations with no goalie costing more than £5.0 so you won’t be seeing the popular Manutd/Mancity or Arsenal/totenham rotation.

Burnley/WBA (£4.5-£4.5 and gameweeks 1-19)

Sun, Eve, Mboro, Hull, Wham, Wat, Ars, Spurs, Eve, Mancity, Cpalace, Burnley, Mancity, Watford, Bou, Swa, Manutd, Mboro, Sun.

Crystalpalace/Swansea (£4.5-£5.0 and gameweeks 1-19)

WBA, hull, Bou, Che, Stoke, Mancity, Liv, Wham, Wat, Liv, Burn, Mancity, Cpalace, Shampton, Swa, Manutd, Che, Wham, Bou.

Leicester/Middlesborough (£5.0 - £4.5 and gameweeks 1-10)

Stoke, Ars, Swa, Cpalace, Burn, Spurs, Shampton, Wat, Cpalace, Bou.

From the above, burnley/WBA only face last seasons top 4 in 3 of their 10 opening games. Crystal/Swansea face them only once and Leicester/Middlesbrough only twice so you can have a suitable rotation pair for just £9.5.

“Easier” fixture rotation is harder to find especially as it depends on your definition of “easier”. As usual, no goalie in our focus will cost more than £5.0.

Crystalpalace/Westham (£4.5 - £5.0 and gameweeks 1-10)

WBA, bou, bou, che(a), hull, WBA(a), wat, mboro, cpalace(a), sund, eve(a).

Hull/Middlesbrough (£4.0 - £4.5 and gameweeks 1 – 10)

Sto, Sun(a), WBA(a), cpalace, Eve(a), Liv(a), wham(a), wat, sto, bou.

Burnley/WBA (£4.5-£4.5 and gameweeks 1-19)

Sun, Eve, Mboro, Hull, Wham, Wat, Sun(a), Shampton(a), Eve, Mancity, Cpalace, Burnley, Mancity, Watford, Bou, Swa, Manutd, Mboro, Sun.

From the above, we can see that Crystalpalace/westham never face any of last season top 4 in their first time games neither do Hull/Middlesbrough while Burnley/WBA face only mancity in the 10^th game.

2. One team shop

This is not normally used for premium teams as the cost of both goalies may exceed £10 so we move to teams with high save ability plus competition for places.

Clubs suited for this include Everton (Robles and Stekelenburg both £5.0, Crystal palace (Mandada and Hennessey both £4.5), Leicester (Schmeicel £5.0 and Zeiler £4.5) and Westbrom (Myhill and Foster both £4.5). These team have some of the best opening fixtures and competition among the goalies so should be good value.

3. The main man

For this strategy, we use the first 10 gameweeks and the top teams used are

Manchester united (Bou, Shampton, hull, mancity, wat, lei, sto, liv, che, bur),

Manchester city (Sun, Sto, Wham, Manutd, Bou, Swa, Spurs, Eve, Shampton, WBA),

Chelsea (Wham, Wat, Bur, Swa, Liv, Ars, Hull, Lei, Manutd, Shampton).

Arsenal have been ignored as they have tough opening fixtures.  

The difficult fixtures for Manutd are in GW 4, 6 where they face 2 of last seasons top 4 and from the fixture list, Bou (£4.5 goalie) have WBA and Eve at home so they serve as good foil.

For Mancity, we have GW 4, 7 were they face 2 of last seasons top 5 while Bou face WBA and wat(a) as good foil.

Chelsea brings GW 6, 8, 9 for 3 of the top 5 with Hull (£4.0 goalie) facing Liv(a), Bou(a) and Sto within those 3 weeks enabling a perfect foil.

So a goalie pair for each selection should cost between £9.0 and £10.0and its up to you to pick which strategy suits you best or which pair you favour.

NB: This study is based on 10 weeks because it gives enough space to adjust other areas of our team without spending transfers on a goalie.

DEFENDERS

1. 3 way rotation

Watford/Crystalpalace/Sunderland (GW 1-20)

WBA, mid, bou, eve, sto, cpalace, bou, bou(a), swa(a), hull, bur(a), hull, bur(a), hull, sto, shampton, eve, manutd, wat, cpalace, bur(a), swa.

£4.5 defenders include

Watford (Cathcart, Prodl, Holebas, Nyom), Cpalace (Souare), Sunderland (kaboul, Oshea, Kone).

Middlesbrough/Sunderland/Hull (GW 1-20)

Sto, mid, WBA(a), cpalace, ars, cpalace, WBA, wat, sto, bou, shampton, sun(a), WBA, hull, cpalace, che, wat, bur(a), eve, WBA(a).

£4.5 defenders include

Middlesbrough (Friend, Bernando), Sunderland (kaboul, Oshea, Kone), Hull (Dawson, Robertson).

2. Premium

Manchester United offer Shaw, Valencia, Darmian, Baily at £5.5 as Smalling (£6.0) is out for the beginning of the season. Manchester City offer Sagna at £5.5, Otamendi(£6.0) with Clichy(5.5) and Kolarov (6.0)  set for battle down the left and Kompany still out injured. Arsenal offer Bellerin (6.5) alongside Monreal and Koscieny (6.0) with Merteseker and Gabriel (5.0) set to battle it out in the middle next to kosc. Chelsea offer Terry (5.5) while Azpilicueta, Cahill and Ivanovic are all 6.0.

3. 5 way street

With a lot of options to choose from, there are no particular rotation set for this group but based on fixtures and price, ill advice you to look towards attack minded starters (Merteseker/Gabriel, Daniels(bou), Jagielka/Stones/Funes mori (eve), Morgan/Schlupp (lei), sakho/lovren (liv), ayala (mid), cedric (shampton), Shawcross (sto), van aanholt (sun), wimmer (spurs), dawson (WBA), Reid (wham).  

Any combination of the above will be suitable depending on the choice of goalkeepers and your strategy. Also be mindful that I omitted some players because of their suspensions and injuries which might not be spotted on the FPL site.

Thanks For reading, ill love to hear your thoughts or questions.