Week 11 - Saturday

Bloody Shay Given. I've written countless time that I hate spending money on keepers because they almost always disappoint me. In previous seasons I would always pick the cheapest keeper I could buy that I didn't think would get hammered 4 or 5 nil but this year I've tried to pick point scoring keepers in the hope I may be able to turn regular Top 500 finishes in to regular Top 100 finishes.- I think I'm going to go back to the tactic of picking cheap keepers.

It was a strange Saturday. I only scored 46 points but somehow moved up 400 places in to the Top 2000, proving it was a very low scoring week. My big decision was to avoid Fabregas or Van Persie & in my opinion it was justified in the end. They returned 20 points combined so were nowhere near worth spending £40m on (thank God!).

I've mentioned Given, but Alexander again helped me out with another penalty. He's probably a season keeper for me as he always has a chance of a penalty but he's also started taking free kicks around the box too & seeing as I hold him at just £5.5m I'd be crazy to drop him. I (along with plenty of other managers) was on the verge of securing 6 clean sheet points for Gibbs & Vermaelen, but a last minute consolation for Wolves made it 0 & 3.

In midfield O'Hara continued to put up fantastic points & again he's a player who'll stay at just £5.7m. I bigged him up when he first joined Portsmouth & told people to buy him so I hope others took my advice. Dunn was also well worth the money but Harry decided that Niko Kranjcar should stay on the bench. The fact he came on for 20 minutes & almost scored twice as Spurs turned the screw on Sunderland proves he should've been on from the start.

Upfront only Adebyaor has played for me so far & he was a wast of space as he barely toughed the ball all game. I was very lucky he was awarded an assist as otherwise he would've received almost zero. I doubt I'll pick him again as he appears to be back to his lazy ways. I really can't stand him.

With Drogba, Rodallega & Etherington to come I have to hope I can get up to around 70 points which I feel will be a par score for the week. Rodallega was my big hunch pick this week so he's the man I'm really relying on to score a brace vs Fulham. I picked him ahead of Defoe which so far looks wise as Defoe scored the same as Adebayor.

One quick note - isn't typical that I drop all my Villa players aftr a double week only for Young, Milner, Agbonlahor, Friedel score 20, 21, 13.5 & 11?

So far on the barndoor I haven't done much other than grabbing Jason Roberts for £6m after his double (with a double week for Blackburn) & Ryan Nelsen. I'm having trouble deciding on exactly who to pick up but Robbo, Myhill, Duff, Dempsey, Geovanni, Hunt, Bullard, Zamora, Johnson, Lampard & Fabregas are some of the players I'm considering.

How has your week gone? Who's in on the barndoor?

Cheers,
AM