Premier League 2015/16 Lessons In Hindsight, Gameweek 4

Premier League 2015/16 Lessons In Hindsight is a series that forces me to look at the ugly face in the mirror and determine what to let go of past history and what to bring into next season. Gameweek 4 served as the result of my Wildcard picks which was a dangerous move considering the 2 week international break offering more potential hazards.
Results & Analysis: This format has been done before.

Projected Score	Actual Score	FPL KPI	Verdict
Good	Good	Good	Deliver
Good	Bad	Decent/Good	Unlucky
Good	Good	Bad	Lucky
Good	Bad	Bad	Flop
Bad	Good	Good	Gem
Bad	Bad	Good	Unlucky
Bad	Good	Bad	Lucky
Bad	Bad	Bad	Expected

Gameweek 4

Results:

46 Points. 600k rank, rose to 2.6m OR. This time Olsson was left on the bench after keeping Stoke out 1-0 to nab 9 points.

The rule is to keep the Delivers and the Gems, Monitor the Lucky and the Unlucky, and drop the Flops.

Player	Minutes		Influence		Numbers		Verdict
	Exp	Act	Predicted	Actual	Predicted	Actual
Romero	90	90	Chance of CS	Outplayed	Chance of CS	4 SOTC	Flop
Sagna	90	90	Chance of CS, Attk	Def worked	CS, C	0 SOTC (WTF), 2C	Deliver/ Lucky
Azpilicueta	90	67	Chance of Attk	Advanced but quiet	C, Def Stats	1KP, 1C	Flop
Lovren	90	90	Chance of CS	Error Strewn	C, Def Stats	5 SOTC, ELTG	Flop
Sanchez	90	90	Attk	Affected by Red	KP, S	2/7S, 2KP	Expected
Silva	90	74	Attk	Outplayed	KP	3KP	Expected
Pedro	90	82	Attk	Denied by GK	KP, S	5/0S, 5KP	Deliver
Shelvey	90	88	Chance of Attk	Quiet	KP, S	2/3S, 1KP	Outshone
Aguero	90	90	Attk	Outplayed	S	4/0 S	Expected
Diouf	90	80	Chance of Attk	Affected by Red	S	2/2S	Unlucky
Wilson	90	90	Chance of Attk	Scored despite poor	S	1/1S	Expected
McCarthy	90	90	Bench	Def Worked	>3 Saves	4 Saves	Gem
Westwood	90	90	Chance of Attk	Outshone	KP	3KP	Outshone
Olsson	90	90	Chance of CS	Affected by Red	Def Stats	5 SOTC, top CBI	Lucky
S. Taylor	90	0	Bench	Benched	Def Stats	Benched	Flop

Verdict

Delivers: Sagna, Pedro

Unlucky: Diouf

Lucky: Olsson, Sagna

Expected/Outplayed/Outshone: Sanchez, Aguero, Silva, Wilson, Westwood, Shelvey

Flops: Azpilicueta, Lovren, Romero

Not Playing/Injured: S. Taylor

Gem: McCarthy

1 Line reviews of players:

• MCI/WAT: Aguero double-teamed, Silva forced wide, Sagna's CS lucky
• CHE/CRY: McCarthy shines to deny Pedro, Azpi more involved but subbed off early
• NEW/ARS: Sanchez quiet without Ozil
• AVL/SUN: AVL dominated but Westwood couldn't deliver
• STK/WBA: Stoke affected by Red card, Diouf Isolated. Made things easy for Olsson.
• LIV/WHU: Lovren & co. failed, Lucas role failed too
• BOU/LEI: Crossing was poor, but somehow Wilson scored
• SWA/MUN: Shelvey assister to the assister

Afterthoughts

Some lessons learnt:

• CS doesn't mean form. I was blinded by the abundance of CS, and I bought into the Man United and Liverpool CS mini-runs. 
• For Romero, I bought too much into the Villa & Newcastle CS - both sides didn't have scoring form just yet while Swansea were a side that scored 5 goals in 3 games prior to the Man United game.
• The Chelsea punt for CS failed spectacularly. Lesson learnt - buy punts, don't start with them.
• Keeping Stoke & Arsenal at bay usually shows resilience; could I have foreseen Coutinho being sent off? Definitely not. Perhaps West Ham's scoring form was more reliable, just like Swansea's - 6 goals in the first 3 is scoring better form than Swansea's. 
• Possible rule for next season: After 3 games, any team scoring 5 or more has scoring form. 
• Teams that scored less than 5: WBA, SUN, SOU, NEW, STK, TOT, AVL, BOU, ARS, WAT, LIV, MUN. 
• Filtering the big teams out leaves WBA, SUN, SOU, NEW, STK, AVL, BOU, WAT.
• Taking out fixtures where teams played each other, only SOU/NOR, NEW/ARS, MCI/WAT and BOU/LEI were left. 
• Hence, my best options were MCI, ARS, LEI and BOU. The choices were obvious.
• "Stat Punts" should be limited to the 8th attacker and 1 punt MAX.
• 8th Attacker: Westwood. Punts: Diouf, Shelvey. Lesson is to stick with 1 of the two, and go with a safer pick for the other (Mahrez, Redmond)
• Captaincy: Aguero at home vs. Watford was a good choice considering City & his output over the last 2 games. Not a flop captain, but thankfully the damage wasn't too big.

Action Taken

Replacing flops: 

• With Azpi, Romero & Lovren identified as flops, I needed to preach patience in order to avoid further hits. Silva's international injury made the decision pay off; replacing Silva was first priority and for some reason I decided to remove Diouf too...
• With Sagna & Olsson having OK fixtures, I could bench Lovren for GW5 (Man United) and hope for points in theory for Azpi.
• Romero was another I decided to give the benefit of the doubt. The Liverpool game was the decision game on him; besides, I had McCarthy on the bench as a gem anyway.

Chasing form:

• I decided to chase Gomis for a hit. Swansea were in good scoring form, the reviews came out good and I wanted to buy an attacker who was in form (4 goals in 4 games).
• I also bought Sterling, hoping for a like-for-like replacement in the absence of Silva.

The final lineup looked like this:

Romero

Sagna / Azpi / Olsson

Sanchez / Sterling / Pedro / Shelvey (playing for Swansea still)

Aguero / Gomis / Wilson

Bench: McCarthy / Westwood / Lovren / S. Taylor