Last gameweek was another frustrating one for my spreadsheets, even though predictions performed favourably in comparison with other better known predictive models and algorithms. My spreadsheet proved more accurate than fivethirtyeight.com for both match result predictions (see appendix I) and correct score forecasts (see appendix II). It also performed better than “the world’s most powerful predictive fantasy football algorithm” with regards to the number of goals predicted, albeit only matching bookies best odds in the process (see appendix II). Once again though, they outperformed bookies best odds for clean sheet probabilities, even with the effects of their margins removed by FPL Review (see appendix III). These positive results were in spite of giving other models a big headstart by going out on a limb in fancying CHE so strongly to beat TOT.

The frustration arises from the fact that my spreadsheets’ superiority over bookies odds and other models is still only marginal so far this season, and frankly not yet justifying the time and energy I expend on them. The main causes of instability in my spreadsheet’s predictions continue to be the dizzying rate at which penalty kicks are being awarded, and the overly optimistic, best guess weightings that the promoted sides started the season with. These wrinkles are being incrementally ironed out though, and my spreadsheets are still counting down to the lift off expected after sixteen gameweeks of season data have been collected.

Onwards and upwards then, five teams are deemed more likely than not to score at least 2 goals in GW11.

All five are expected to win their matches this weekend, albeit just by the odd goal based on the most likely number of goals expected to be scored by each team.

I wrote last week about how reductive presenting a single correct score forecast was though, and how much more meaningful it would be to present scoreline predictions in a matrix. For example, the table above shows LIV 2 WOL 1, but the 9.1% probability assigned by my spreadsheet is not the highest, as the probability for 2 – 0 is reckoned to be 0.7% higher (see table below).

This is a much better way to visualise the likeliest scorelines of matches, in my opinion. Note that the probability of the Reds winning 3 – 0 is higher than doing so 1 – 0, and winning 3 – 1 more likely than drawing 1 – 1.

The fly in the ointment here though is that these probabilities are based on Liverpool’s last 8 home games, and Wolves’ last 8 away games, but Nuno Espirito Santo evidently took on board the part in my blog last week when I highlighted his team’s away attack strength weighting was worse-than-average and trending in the wrong direction. Here’s how it looked prior to their GW10 trip to the Emirates Stadium.

So, what did Nuno do for the first time in a away match during his time managing Wolves? He played with a back four! For the second match in a row actually, following a switch prompted by Coady‘s absence in their previous game. The ever-evolving nature of the sport is one of the things that makes life so difficult for predictive models in football. Point being here is another example of why we should always be wary of taking my spreadsheet’s predictions at face value.

All of which needs to be borne in mind when we see Salah at the top my players predicted points for GW11 (see table below), because we don’t yet have enough data to assess whether his prospects will be enhanced or diminished if WOL continue to forego their trademark back five. Also remaining to be seen, is the effect Jota has on the Egyptian’s attacking output and minutes.

The table below shows how many points players are expected to get on average (excluding bonus points, and yellow/red cards). The red ‘P’s indicate where predicted scores have been inflated by the effects of recent penalty kicks, and the numbers in the column to the right of expected points show what these scores would have been if the distorting effects of penalties are removed. In other words, these are the average expected points assuming there are no opportunities to score from the penalty spot.

KDB, Fernandes, Salah and Vardy were the top ranked attacking players in this table last week, and are all in the top half dozen this week (see table above). They were predicted to score 8.5, 8.1, 6.7, and 6.1 points on average, before bonus, and scored 9, 10, 6, and 5 points respectively, making for a very respectable mean absolute error of only 1.05 points for that quartet.

Salah and Vardy have a higher points prediction this weekend, while Fernandes‘ projected score remains the same. Surprisingly, the average expected points for KDB is over 2 points lower vs FUL than it was last week vs BUR, and both Jota and Ziyech are ranked higher than the City playmaker.

Kane returns to my players points table after missing the cut for the first time this season last week, which was vindicated by him blanking for the first time since GW1. Assuming his yellow flag is of the Mourinho mischief-making variety, he looks a good bet to maintain his good record in North London Derbies.

With so many players to choose the best captain from again, I will turn to My Stats Tables in Fantasy Football Scout’s Members Area in hopes of narrowing down our options. Of the 9 teams with representation in my Players Points table above, the only 3 not in the top half of my Team Offence table are unsurprisingly CRY, WBA, and BUR, which should probably put paid to any interest in Zaha, Pereira, and Wood as differential captains.

That said, all 3 will be facing defences among the 7 worst in the league over the past 6 gameweeks (see table below). The case for Wood rests on him facing arguably the worst defence in the league currently in the form of EVE.

Significantly, the only captaincy options not facing weak defences in GW11 are those drawn from LIV and CHE, albeit the latter’s opponents (LEE) conceded only 0.22 less non-penalty xG than tenth worst WHU. Discouragingly, for those thinking of giving Salah, Jota, or Mane the armband, WOL have the fifth best defence by this metric, as well as joint-sixth best going by Big Chances conceded.

Vardy was a popular captain pick last weekend, and encouragingly, for those willing to back him again, he now faces the second worst defence by this metric. His captaincy claims are strengthened further by topping my Players xG table sorted by Minutes Per Shot On Target, which features only 4 players after removing Wilson and Watkins. Salah is the other notable inclusion in the table below.

Both Fernandes and KDB retain their position in my expected assists table, with the MUN playmaker outscoring his MCI counterpart on every metric in the table below.

As stated last week, the one area where KDB might have the upper hand is with set plays, especially as Telles has taken 9 corners in his 2 appearances to date. Ziyech marks his debut appearance in the table below with a chart topping position.

Through the process above I have whittled down the 19 players who made the cut in my predicted points table down to a shortlist of 5. These are Salah, Bruno, Vardy, Ziyech and KDB.

A key finding of my review of last season’s rolling data was that LEI were a much better team on the road, and that pattern looks to have continued this season. Monday night’s disappointing showing vs FUL notwithstanding, Vardy looks the best armband option to me in GW11.

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A season-high 6 defenders appeared in my players points table last week (Chilwell, Masuaku, Furlong, Bartley, PVA and James), with only the WHU and CRY defenders blanking. The WBA pair and Chilwell are joined this time around by yellow flagged Castagne and Robertson.

Bartley, Furlong and Castagne owe their place in my players points table primarily to underlying goal involvement stats, whereas Chilwell and Robertson can back those up with good clean sheet prospects also (see table below). MCI, MUN and BUR are the only other teams deemed more likely to concede zero goals than (exactly) one. No team is reckoned more likely than not to keep a clean sheet in GW11.

My doubling up on MCI defenders ahead of a much heralded run of 6 good clean sheet chances in a row was all well and good, but was counterfeited by Pep choosing the worst moment to rest Cancelo, and by Mendy scoring his first goal for City whilst playing his best game in years!

Looking ahead, LEE catch the eye with 3 good clean sheet chances in a row (GW13–15), while the Martinez owners who hold onto him despite AVL‘s blank this weekend look likely to gain compensation in back to back fixtures (GW13 & 14). Tellingly, AVL are ranked the fifth best for clean sheets over the next 6 gameweeks despite playing one game fewer.

Cancelo played the full 90 minutes vs Porto midweek, and Mendy played well last weekend, so there has to be a question mark as to him starting vs FUL on Saturday, which is exasperating because he is one of only two players who qualify for inclusion in my Defenders expected Goal Involvement table (see below). PVA is the other, and his owners have grounds for optimism going into GW11.

Compounding the grievance felt by Cancelo owners is the fact that he is also one of only two defenders to feature among the players expected to score above 20 points in the next 4 gameweeks (see table below).

SOU were projected last week to be the third highest scoring team in the 3 gameweeks between GW11 & 13, and I touted a possible move for Walcott, but he failed his audition against MUN, and LEI have edged SOU out now anyway as predicted third best scorers over the next 3 gameweeks. Given the strong case made for captaining the Foxes’ talisman, I plan to transfer Werner and Podence out for Vardy and Jota instead.

That’s all for now, folks. May the GW11 flop be with you.

Coley a.k.a. FPL P0ker PlAyer

Appendix I – mean absolute error of result probabilities

Appendix II – mean absolute error of predicted goals

Appendix III – mean absolute error of clean sheet probabilities

Most of the trends identified in my review of rolling data during the last international break were borne out by results in GW9. TOT‘s rapidly improving home attack and defence strength weightings were cited as “bad news for MCI”. BUR were hailed as the other “standout improver” in that department prior to keeping a clean sheet vs CRY, while the “biggest declines” reported for FUL and SHU foreshadowed their home defeats to EVE and WHU respectively.

The latter were one of two away teams identified as having “registered the most significant rises” in my away attack strength weightings, and an away win for the Hammers was one of only two bets (both winners) recommended by my @ColeysPotOdds betting spinoff account. WHU were also one of three relevant teams highlighted as “standout improvers in the away defence strength department”. ARS were another, and both these teams kept a clean sheet. SOU were the other, but conceded a single goal on the way to earning a correctly forecast one one score draw.

Meanwhile, WBA were rightly flagged up as having experienced “one of the sharpest declines” in the away defence strength department, but MUN‘s decline in home attack strength was exposed as “the biggest experienced by any team in any of the four categories”, leading me to describe the encounter between these two teams at Old Trafford as a reverse ‘irresistable force paradox’. I flipped the formulation of the classic paradox to: What happens when a stoppable force meets a movable object? The answer turned out to be that the stoppable force was Bruno‘s first penalty, and the movable object was the goalkeeper who moved too soon!

The 3 disappointments were AVL and LEE (in the home attack category), albeit the latter were only expected to draw against the most improved away defence of ARS anyway, and LEI (in the away attack strength category), who were forecast to lose vs LIV anyway.

This week’s better-than-average weightings trending in the right direction are SOU‘s home defence strength, which possibly spells bad news for Bruno backers, and AVL‘s away defence strength. Conversely, the worse-than-average weightings trending in the wrong direction are CRY‘s home defence strength and WOL‘s away attack strength, which bodes well for Wilson and ARS defenders.

There were five teams deemed more likely than not to score at least 2 goals last week, but this is reduced to four in GW10, who were coincidentally last season’s top four.

All four are expected to win their matches this weekend, and both CHE and MCI are considered to have a two goal edge over their opponents, even though the former face Mourinho’s much improved TOT.

With regards to the one one score draw forecast for LEI vs FUL, I ought to point out that this scoreline prediction falls between the cracks of my model’s algorithms. According to my spreadsheet there is sufficient predicted xG difference between the home and away sides here to credit the Foxes with a goal advantage and, as will be revealed later on, they are one of three teams deemed more likely to concede zero goals than one. Correspondingly, the Cottagers are deemed more likely to score no goals than one. The cause of this apparent paradox is the fact that the combined probabilities of Fulham scoring 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 goals, etc., is greater than them scoring 0.

This all goes to show how reductive nominating a single correct score forecast is. It would actually be more meaningful to present scoreline predictions in a matrix, and here’s how my spreadsheet’s probabilities would look for LEI vs FUL if doing so:

This is a much better way to visualise the likeliest scorelines of matches, in my opinion. Note that LEI 1 FUL 0 has the highest probability here, with the next highest (1 – 1) nearly 3% lower. The good news for potential Vardy captainers is that a 2-0 home win is reckoned to have only 0.8% lower probability than 1 – 1.

Onto the even more tricky business of predicting players points! The table below shows how many points players are expected to get on average (excluding bonus points, and yellow/red cards). The red ‘P’s indicate where predicted scores have been inflated by the effects of recent penalty kicks, and the numbers in the column to the right of expected points show what these scores would have been if the distorting effects of penalties are removed. In other words, these are the average expected points assuming there are no opportunities to score from the penalty spot.

There are more than double the number of players over the threshold of 5 expected points in GW10 than last week, and the number of teams represented has increased from 7 to 12. Only MCI and CHE have more than 2 players listed, with 5 and 4 respectively.

With so many players to choose the best captain from I turn now to My Stats Tables in Fantasy Football Scout’s Members Area in the hope of sorting the wheat from the chaff.

Of the dozen teams with representation in my Players Points table above, only half of them feature in the top half of my Team Offence table (LIV, AVL, CHE, LEI, MUN, and ARS). Having dominated my attacking stats tables for many years, MCI are conspicuous by their absence in the table below, which dents confidence in KDB, Sterling & Co. They rank a lowly 13th for non-penalty xG on target over the past 6 gameweeks.

Disappointingly, only 4 of the 12 teams with representation in my Players Points table face teams in the bottom half of the table for non-penalty xG conceded over the last 6 gameweeks (see table below). Namely, LEI, NEW, BHA, and MCI.

FUL and CRY are ranked 5th and 7th worst defences by this metric, enhancing the captaincy claims of Vardy and Wilson. There is a glimmer of hope for MCI players here by virtue of BUR ranking as 10th worst (11th best?).

In an exercise that demonstrates you can manipulate stats to tell any story you want, the BHA defence is 9th worst when measured by minutes per big chance conceded over the last 6 gameweeks (see table below), which is a better perspective for Salah/Mane captainers.

SOU rank among the top half dozen defences by either measure which lessens the appeal of Bruno for the armband, irrespective of his 100% record of attacking returns in away games since joining MUN. And Werner will have to find his shooting boots if he is to prosper against Mourinho’s men who have conceded less than 1 big chance per match during their last 6 games.

I turn next to my Players tables to see if they can revive or solidify interest in any of the captain contenders under the microscope. I used to sort my Players xG table by Minutes Per xG, but because of the distorting effects of penalties, I sorted them by non-penalty xG instead last week. The problem with that metric though is it discriminates against players who have played fewer minutes, so I’ve gone for the Minutes Per Shot On Target metric instead this week (see table below), which showcases Salah‘s appeal as an armband candidate. The claims of Vardy, Watkins and Wilson are further strengthened also.

Kane remains in my players expected goals table and, as we saw earlier, TOT top my Team Offence table. So how do we square this with Kane missing from my players points table for the first time this season? Firstly, as the table below shows, the CHE defence has been head and shoulders better than any other team over the last 6 gameweeks.

Secondly, TOT did have a very favourable fixture run prior to last week’s win vs MCI, so this will have played a part in their impressive underlying attack stats.

There were only 2 players in my expected assists table last week (Grealish and Rodriguez), but KDB and Fernandes arrive right on cue to join them in the same gameweek they are ranked 1st and 2nd in my players predicted points table. Bruno has often been dubbed United’s KDB but, if the stats from the last 6 gameweeks are anything to go by, it won’t be long before we start referring to KDB as City’s Bruno?

It is clear from the table above that MUN‘s playmaker is creating chances for his colleagues at a faster rate than MCI‘s. Where KDB might have the advantage though is with set plays, as he is one of only 4 players who qualify for inclusion in my Set Piece Takers table (see below).

Through the process above I have whittled down the 23 players who made the cut in my predicted points table down to a shortlist of 6. These are KDB, Bruno, Salah, Vardy, Wilson and Watkins. For my team, that will mean choosing between the assumed first choice penalty takers for MCI, LIV and AVL.

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Tarkowski (6 pts) was the only defender to appear in my players points table last week, but there are six in GW10. While the points potential of Chilwell, Masuaku, PVA and James are widely understood, the same cannot be said for WBA‘s Furlong and Bartley, both of whom are selected by only 0.2% of managers.

Of the 4 teams represented by those 6 defenders, only CHE are deemed more likely to concede zero goals than one (see table below), along with LEI and ARS. There were 2 such teams last week (WOL and BUR), and they only conceded a single goal between them. Unlike last week, there is a team (MCI) reckoned more likely than not to keep a clean sheet in GW10.

If ever there was a time to invest in MCI‘s defence, then now is it. A cursory glance at the Clean Sheet Probability projections for the next 6 gameweeks (see table below) reveals a clean sweep of excellent prospects for the Sky Blues in each of them. The fact these 6 good clean sheet chances in a row would take me right up to a planned GW16 Wildcard explains why I have doubled up on MCI defenders going into GW10.

I have repeatedly banged the drum for Cancelo before and during the season. Not only was he singled out preseason in my backline bonus magnet blog as the best Sky Blues defender to own, his expected goal involvement has been good enough to see him take his place in my Defenders table (see below) right on cue. If Ederson can be persuaded to focus on guarding his net rather than the whole penalty box then a long overdue points haul could be imminent.

As advertised last week, ARS have 2 good clean sheet prospects in their next 3 games. The same was true for BUR last week who duly obliged, and ditto LEI the gameweek before.

My planned GW11 transfer doesn’t appear in my table of predicted top points scorers over the next 4 gameweeks (see below) but, provided he can avoid one of his regular injuries, he might do so this time next week. I will be watching his performance against MUN this weekend with nervous interest.

Nobody is more surprised than me that I’m seriously contemplating transferring in the infamous FPL troll that is Theo Walcott, but SOU are projected to be the third highest scoring team in the following 3 gameweeks (see table below), and his underlying stats from an admittedly small sample size of starts for the Saints indicate he might be the player to benefit most. Annoyingly though, GW13 will coincide with the first midweek Premier League fixtures of the season, meaning Theo will be required to remain fit for 3 games in a week.

That’s all for now, folks. May the GW10 flop be with you.

Coley a.k.a. FPL P0ker PlAyer