Play your card right

I'm not sure there are many things in the fantasy world I enjoy more than tinkering with my team and seeing what I can get by using my wildcard. In previous years I have been forced to use my wildcard early but this year my team is still fairly strong so I could delay if I want to. However, there are pros and cons to holding onto your wildcard:

Pros

• You can use the wildcard at a later date to take advantage of double gameweeks or if your team falls prey to numerous injuries.
• You can play your wildcard towards the end of the season when fantasy teams tend to get stale but real teams can hit runs of good form.
• We are still not totally sure which teams and players are for real and so using your wildcard now might result in you bringing in a load of in-form but ultimately overpriced lemons.
• With the other wildcard in your back pocket, you can select a team now based purely on the next 15 gameweeks and then redo your team again during the transfer window.

Cons

• If you fall too far behind in your mini league it may be too late to make up ground later in the year.
• You have an extra wildcard this year that can only be used between GW23 and GW27 (early January) so unless you want to use two wildcards in a close period of time it might make sense to use it now.
• If you made a few bad choices in your original squad or have suffered a few injuries (or both!) you will chip away at your score with too many 4 point hits. You might be better just biting the bullet and using the wildcard now. In 2009/09 I managed to finish the season in 7,734th place in the competition despite using my wildcard in GW2 after picking a terrible team to start the season.

Who to target?
If you decide to roll the dice with your wildcard I have a few words of advice:

1. Don't get too cute: Didier Drogba leads all players in fantasy points for a reason - he is awesome. Yes, every man and his dog owns him, but again, it's for good reason. It might not thrill you to pickup players owned by alot of other players but you won't find 11 differentiators out there. Play it safe to an extent.
2. Don't chase points: This seems to contradict point one and I agree the distinction is subtle but it is one you must master if using your wildcard this early. This means caution should be exercised before loading up on the likes of Alcaraz, El Mohamady, Kalou or Elmander. I am currently doing some research to try and put a value on 'form' (ie the likelihood of a player with a good score last week having another good game) but form will only help you for 4-8 weeks or so. Class, as they say, is permanent and it is that reliability that you need if you are locking yourself into a lineup for at least 15 weeks or so.
3. Play the fixtures: This is always key for your team but its worth repeating here. If a player has played easy games and your about to pick him up while he plays the other teams then you might get significantly worse value than you think. This is reflected in my aPPMS rating which I discuss in my weekly preview columns.

On the above point, the rankings for the schedules played to date are below (hardest to easiest):

Defensive fixture rating to date

1. West Brom
2. Blackpool
3. Arsenal
4. Sunderland
5. Bolton
6. West Ham
7. Liverpool
8. Stoke
9. Newcastle
10. Wigan
11. Blackburn
12. Fulham
13. Man City
14. Everton
15. Tottenham
16. Man Utd
17. Chelsea
18. Wolves
19. Birmingham
20. Aston Villa

 Attacking fixture rating to date

1. Everton
2. West Ham
3. Wigan
4. Bolton
5. Wolves
6. Man City
7. Blackburn
8. Sunderland
9. Man Utd
10. Newcastle
11. Blackpool
12. West Brom
13. Aston Villa
14. Stoke
15. Fulham
16. Arsenal
17. Liverpool
18. Birmingham
19. Tottenham
20. Chelsea

Note that these rankings are still somewhat distorted by wild results as if Chelsea smash a team 7-0 then suddenly their fixtures seem easier so the big score becomes a self-profiling prophecy. That said, I am still using data from both current and prior season so I am relatively comfortable relying on the numbers for guidance.

These rankings can play a role when picking transfer targets as someone like Mikel Arteta, who has perhaps underwhelmed this season, looks slightly more attractive when you consider the teams he has faced. Indeed the difference between his PPMS and his aPPMS is 0.148 which is 4th among all the players in the league that I track. In fact my new aPoints preditive tool (post to follow soon) suggests that his real total to date should be 39 points which ranks joint 5th among midfielders (Nani, Cahill, Malouda, Van der Vaat and Milner) and 12th overall.

Likewise, while Birmingham have been a bit disappointing to date, it might get a whole lot worse given the ease of their defensive fixtures to date.

I think I am going to hold off on my wildcard this week but feel free to post your proposed teams below and we can discuss the merits of using the WC this week.