With Michail Antonio almost a no brainer as on OOP player in the Sky Fantasy Football game, a forward classified as midfielder, it begs the question are there any other West Ham assets sky game worthy of consideration?
Its slimmer pickings than in FPL as the pricing is not so good value as a whole with Sky possibly taking the end of season form rather than the final finishing position into consideration. Antonio is a good SkyFF asset, getting a few shots tier bonus as well as the goals. As a team West Ham sit 14th (prior to Brighton-Southampton) for bonus points overall at 65, these bonus points can be important to keep a players points ticking over. Antonio has 7 bonus points in 7 starts, bearing in mind these were tough fixtures that’s ok and you would have expected a higher rate against some lower half teams as fixtures ease, the issue is his injury and lack of clear timescale on when back or not being fully fit has thrown a spanner in many Sky players planning.
The fixtures up to 13th Febuary include only 3 top 6 teams from last yearr so it’s a good opportunity of points, given how West Ham’s form can switch and be unpredictable in the past I’ve taken a value approach and more weighted towards those players
Fabianski – 6.6M
Personally I bought him in for the Aston Villa game getting rid of Guaita finally, when I looked Fabianski was the top keeper for overall points and had less than 2% ownership at the time, now on 72 points, he has racked up 5 tier 1 save bonus points, and 3 Tier 2 amassing 19 bonus points (35 last season), against some tough opposition that makes some sense on saves, the clean sheets though have boosted his score with 4 recorded so far plus 2 penalty saves/misses, with a good run of fixtures he is my top pick for value and points and allows me to carry him through to overhaul at the very least.
Defence
Maybe not so obvious but with some easier fixtures clean sheets will boost scores if we do keep them as hoped over next run of games. The 3 safest for starts are Creswell, Ogbonna and Coufal, the other 2 Balbuena and Masuaku have only slightly more risks attached. In terms of bonus the best performers have been Balbuena 6pts, Cresswell and Coufal 5 each, then Masuaku 2 and Obbonna 0. On overall points and most attacking returns potential Creswell would be the best but prices vary wildy from 7.5-6.1, and Cresswell is 7.4M
So my Defensive pick is Coufal at 6.1M. He has started 3 less games having joined the club late in the transfer window and in terms of what sort of player is he’s a good defender and gets forward with occasional shots but regularly crosses, he lacks the attacking nature of Masuaku but is more efficient in his overall game, to invest in him you’re really backing the team for clean sheets as much as the player but he does offer a cheap way in to the Hammers.
Midfielders and Forwards
I will cover forwards quickly as I don’t consider Haller a Sky option, if/ when Antonio is considered fit he would start over Haller so no point going into Haller too much here.
If you think Antonio is 8M nearly every midfielder looks poor value in comparison, they’re all fairly similar in points output so no one really leaps out in the same way, every player listed aside one is priced at between 7.3M (Soucek) to 8m , Soucek is not enough value compared to his FPL price, and depends on if those chances go in , in terms of starts him, Rice and Bowen are the most secure while Fornals has a little more risk of not starting so my pick if I have to pick one is Bowen. Bowen is industrious and will have shots and puts in crosses, so far not at the volume to hit many Tier bonuses , he’s scored 4 goals and has 1 assist to date and at 7.9 could be tempting, but does not carry the full threat Antonio would so its hard to fully recommend him as a priority selection.