Torres Update
However, Spanish "in the know" journalist Guillem Balague had this to say on his site this afternoon:
There is some mixed news for Liverpool fans who will be relieved to know that Fernando Torres beleives he will not need an operation for a hernia injury.So are the UK press just jumping to conclusions? Who knows, but it sounds like Torres will get some time vs Lyon & perhaps the break between then & Monday night will provide enough time for him to start vs Birmingham. We'll wait & see if he has any reaction tomorrow, but there is always a risk picking players who play in a Monday night fixture due to lack of team/injury news before the Saturday deadline.
Torres is suffering from a muscle contracture, typically referred to as a muscle spasm, in the groin. The injury does not normally require surgery but is nevertheless painful and restrictive to a player`s mobility – and while it does mean that Torres will not need to face as long on the sidelines that an operation would have required, he will not be fully fit for Liverpool`s vital Champions League encounter this week will need to be rested over the international break.
Torres has struggled with the injury through Liverpool`s last two fixtures but it was agreed with the club`s medical and technical staff that he could play a role in the key clashes with United and Fulham as long as he did not play both games in their entirety. Consequently, while he has travelled to France for Liverpool’s crucial Champions League match against Lyon, Torres is unlikely to play for ninety minutes.
With a break for international football due in the next fortnight, Liverpool will urge the national coach, Vicente del Bosque, to excuse the Spanish striker from international duty. It is hoped that if Torres is given a full two weeks to recuperate, it is hoped that he may return from the international break close to full fitness.
Moving on, it seems Arsenal's Gael Clichy has suffered a stress fracture to his back & will be missing for at least a month. Bad new for the Gunners but perhaps good news for fantasy managers as it presents another good value defensive option in Kieron Gibbs.
I'll add any more injury news as we get it later today.
Cheers,
AM
22 comments:
The Clichy injury, while being bad news, is still an oppertunity - Gibbs can make a lot of tackles, will attack, and has chances for CS. It's quite frightening to have 2 Arsenal defenders in my team (along with obvious Vermaelen), but it might be worth it.
The question is:
Wilkinson+Nasri
or
Gibbs+SPetrov
?
SF
what's a good site to get injury news from? aside from the physioroom which seems to be wrong most of the time?
I've found this blog to be most helpfull to be honest shadow, i don't really need to look any further.
A very good way to get the news quick though is to just google the player and look for the most up to date entry.
Or use sites such as starting11.com (which has a dedicated yahoo ff forum), football365, fantasyfootballscout, and the football forum. All of these have good up to date regular posts.
But really, everything i've ever found has been posted by AM on here pretty much as soon as i've found it anyway, and fellow posters do our best to keep everyone informed :).
On a side note, i'm seriously tempted by Gibbs, last time i picked him up he returned decent points, i wouldn't worry too much about having him and Verm in your defence, especially at the price. It seem rare for a defender to pick up mammoth points (this year anyway, it's my first season). The only defenders to have done it for me this year are Verm and Alexander.
If this situation follows the usual pattern, I'll drop Torres to be on the safe side, but he'll wind up playing after all and scoring a hattrick (e.g., from last weekend see Billy, Warnock, Jensen, etc.). I don't know how well the managers' mind games work on each other, but they've psyched me out a few times. Seriously though, 19.82 is a lot of cash to roll the dice on, especially considering it's weakening the rest of my line-up.
This is the guy that will win this season of YFF:
Unintended XI - he still has Tuncay, and he is just 5,5 points of the top
SF - I don't like either of those combos...Gibbs + O'Hara? Or even Gibbs + Hunt? With Geovanni suspended & Bullard unfit he should be back on all set pieces.
Mike B - Cheers mate. I try to get all the important injury news in one place so people can use me as a "one stop", but obviously I miss things, so the community we've built up will normally chip in with important information.
Bradley - Tell me about it, I was thinking the exact same thing regarding Torres....if I don't grab him he'll score a hattrick. But he's a huge risk.
Bojan - Unintended XI is blog reader Alex! He's done amazingly to hold Tuncay & still be up there, I personally didn't think it was possible but he's spent his £99m on 10 players extremely wisely each week. Good for him, he has a real chance!
Cheers,
AM
i've heard some news about armand traore replacing clichy instead of gibbs though. someone check around the arsenal website?
This just makes me x10 more worried for our season. Rafa just hasn't created a team with depth to handle injuries from Torres/Gerrard. Absolutely missed out not getting in Barry, huge to sell Alonso although he didn't have much choice, Lucas has stepped up but isn't a playmaker, Aquillani won't save our season and we about to field basically a youth squad vs Lyon. Troubling times, probably going to punch another hole in the wall
This absolutely totally, completely and utterly sucks. If I was a Liverpool fan I would be reaching for the cyanide kool-aid right about now. Torres is the 3rd leading scorer in YFF behind Drogba and Van Persie. Naturally I have had him from week 1 at a deep discount. I don't have the $ to replace him with RVP, no other strikers make me jump for joy right now, the play for me would probably go 5-2 keeping Drogba and Rooney up front and replacing Torres with Fabregas. I think many of us will be in the same boat.
Much will depend on the prognosis and the site of the hernia. Generally, a hernia operation while seemingly minor is still major surgery. I am an athlete, had a hernia operation a few years ago, and I wasn't good to go for 6 weeks. And a couple of weeks more to get up to full speed after being idle for that long.
The saving grace here, and the dilemma for managers who have Torres at a discount, is the international break, no games from 11/9 to 11/21. This might give him time to heal. The question will be whether we hold him this week and take a potential 0 and not give up the discount or make the switch now. Even after getting burned last week with Blini I still will probably be inclined to keep him. I suspect if he is getting surgery, it will be announced and done as soon as possible and then its a no brainer and he's gone. Maybe he will be well enough to stick in for Drogba when the ANC rolls around.
Whatever happens here, this should make it ABSOLUTELY clear to the brain trust at Liverpool of the need to buy another world class striker in the January transfer window. Otherwise Liverpool's chances of staying in Europe next year may be gone.
Now the good news, for me anyway, is Clichy's injury. I was desperate to find someone to replace the injured Seabass and Gibbs seems to be the answer. He filled in well the last time. But I read anon above, and @him, who the hell is Armand Traore?
I thought, at least with my team, I was done with drama until the ANC and figuring out what to do about Drogs. But here we go, we will all be going crazy again for the next few days.
Are we having fun yet?
chris m
AM - Thank you for the advice. I already got O'Hara, so Hunt was my choice, though I have a certain fear about him. Without Bullard and Geovanni he can take more responsebility, but Hull can also fall apart instead. I picked him up, but I think he has the same chance for points as SPetrov has, so SPet's performance on midweek should supply the answer for me.
The upside of picking Hunt was the free money, in which I used to upgrade Crouch to Tevez. I'm really not sure that it is the right choice, it really depends on Tevez's place in ManC, and Crouch can get phantom points or even goals against Sunderland... Tevez didn't get more than 8.5p except from one time, which is worrying, but all in all Burnley are much weaker than Sunderland. Have I made the right choice?
Right now:
Given
Vermaelen Bridge Gibbs
Fabregas O'Hara Palacios Hunt
Drogba RvP Tevez
SF
My team:
Given
Vermaelen Zabaleta G. Alexander
Fabregas Lampard Aquilani Palacios M. Brown
Drogba Eduardo
Does anyone still have Bily at 4.7 ? How many games will he miss? If it's one, I'll keep him. Just one YFF game right?
Justin
Hes definately out for 1 game, however with Piennar set to be fit I'd bet Billy goes back to the bench and making +60min appearences
Billy should be suspended three games for straight red, no?
Bily is out for 3 matches:
http://www.thefa.com/TheFA/Disciplinary/SuspensionLists.aspx
same as AM's report above, with some translation clarification:
http://www.guillembalague.com/blog_desp.php?titulo=Torres+Injury+Latest+-+Updated&id=368
Torres - so looks like it's not quite something that requires surgery, but more like a niggling groin injury. sound familiar? maybe he caught it from Stevie. seems like a little better news, but still could be a trap that's sprung on us fantasy managers at any moment...
Pool - they're gonna turn their shit around, they just have to. i'm not pretending they will win the title or anything, but i think this is just a real heavy blip on the radar and they will regain their composure soon. Gerrard and Torres being out can hurt them, but I think Benayoun,Kuyt,Lucas,etc. will pull up their socks and step up, they've done it before. We'll see how things pan out with Lyon, but keep in mind they're home to B'ham at the weekend and Aquilani should finally jump into the fold, without Gerrard's presence, which could be a good thing,kind of ease him into the team.
Hunt - for 7.73 I think he's a good bargain home to Stoke. He's certainly been quiet for the past 5-6 weeks, but we know he's easily capable of putting up +8 points to prove his worth. Geo out, Bullard possibly out or at least for some of the match.. definitely worth a look now that his price is lower.
The Yak - i'm eagerly waiting for his full return to fitness/form. if i could somehow know that he would be sure to start and play 90 min. I would pick him up in a heartbeat for 8.06 Everton is looking really unstable, Yak is the perfect spark to turn things around. If somehow Arteta could get his ass back out on the pitch, Yak's value spikes up for me. Though he's been known to be inconsistent in years past, he's always been a strong threat for goals and feeding us with fantasy points.
Dunn - good price, home to Pompey
G.Alex - I've had him 3 or so of the 10 matchweeks so far, and last week, which was nice, but not too excited about Burnley away to Citeh.
Johnny Heitinga - keep wanting to drop him, and end up keeping him, hoping he'll have a big week. but having him pretty much at market rate, leans me towards getting rid.
Thanks Bojan/AM, am amazed to be up there and gutted I had three non scores last week as I should have gone top and then I would have popped the champagne before my inevitable fall from grace and into the bottom half before Christmas, I support Darlington so it's naturally how things go.
I can't spend my usual 24 hours staring at my line up running through scenario's in my head and not actually touching a key as am off to Dublin tomorrow for four days so I may actually get a life away from YFF.
My main worries this week are a) Torres - He's broken b) loading on Man City, as so far they have not been that impressive, no real stand out players and also dreaded rotation c) picking AshYung as he still hasn't done anything despite my theory he will and finally d) am I being serious and loading on the Blackburn v Pompey game!!!
Alex (Unintended XI)
On the Man City subject, who does Sparky see as his front two? OK lets say Ade is first choice, Bellamy just got playing time due to injuries and can slip out onto the wing, whats left? two players that cost a lot of money fighting it out (am discounting Robinho, he will be fit shortly before the transfer window/see Bellamy re: wing)
So Tevez, the almost attacking midfield style forward and Santa Cruz, a target man type that at £18m and a six month chase you would expect will start now? will Hughes stick with this front three thing at home with Tevez the link behind Santa/Ade?
OK i'll cut to the chase, is Santa Cruz now an excellent choice at £6.01m or will he be a bench player?
And finally, is Ade fixed yet?
Alex
Oh and seen a few comments re: Arteta, forget him for 2009, will be new year before he's a regular starter, he had another op yesterday to clear infection on an already delayed recovery.
OK!
I know this might sound dumb and immature(YFF wise) ....
But why aint anyone picking Beattie?? : )
He IS against the ever porous Hull-D !!
And I'm really heavy on Stoke,Citeh,Gunners,Blackburn,and,Pompey!!
ALL my players are from the above teams only! And FYI I have NO player above 12$$ : )
The rest of my team is upto you to figure out!
I know you wanna!! :P
Cheers!
Teknokrat!
: )
PS - I'll let everyone know how it pans out... : )
And my team is final.. i dont give a damn to the CL as none of my players are in it :D
So see ya guys on Saturday right after the Deadline... For the BD of course : )!!
sitting on 343 and have 7.64 to spend on a midfielder or go 433 and spend the 7.64 on a defender. any suggestions?
Team is currently
MyHill
Verm Alexander Gibbs
Lamps Hunt O'Hara (A N Other)
Drogs RVP Dindane
Kirkland
Verm Givet Alexander Gibbs
Fab Hunt O'Hara
Drogba Defoe Yayga
Would like to put in some Liverpool players (Benayoun/Babel/Kuyt),any room to improve?
Rgds.
Ajani
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