🫣 FPL season from hell, but you're not alone... 😬

Gm football fans. Route One here.

Today’s briefing is a ~5 min read:

• 🌊 Deep Dive… Liverpool want answers and voicenotes…

• 🎰 FPL… the season from hell, does it get much better?

• 🌎 Around the world in 60… Lyon on 2 points and bottom of Ligue 1…

RESULTS

Monday, October 2

(Psst… fixtures are at the bottom)

🗞️ Morning Brief

🎰 Fantasy Premier League

The season from hell: when does it get better?

Well, apparently it doesn’t…

In case you didn’t know, the best 1000 FPL players are performing significantly worse this season compared to the last three seasons.

Is there an explanation for this?

• Firstly, there’s too much faith in legacy assets. United and Chelsea players - which historically perform well - aren’t returning.

• AI choices and more information means that team selection is less varied. Admit it, you’re watching YouTube videos… and so is everyone else. This makes it harder for elite players to differentiate from the crowd.

• Hauls are coming sporadically… players like Watkins don’t have great underlying assets but are returning often. Ultimately, traditional stats haven’t been a good way to judge returns this season.

The cherry on top… the Haaland meta isn’t even doing what we all hoped it would. Odd to be suggesting someone has second season syndrome when they already have 8 goals this season. But it’s the fact his points are not coming in the huge hauls we are used to!

If that tells you anything it’s that: you have to take punts this season - or risk falling behind.

Easier said than done, that’s for sure. Good luck…

🌎 Around the world in sixty seconds

• 🇫🇷 Ligue 1: Once the best team in the league, Lyon, are now bottom of the French league. They have 2 points in 7 games and haven’t led a match at any point this season.

• 🇹🇷 Super Lig: Super Mario, remember him? Well, Balotelli, who has returned to Adana Demirspor, scored a brace in Adana’s 4 - 0 win over Alanyaspor. He then went on to tag his ex-manager in a cryptic Instagram story.

• 🇪🇸 La Liga: Jude Bellingham continues to shine for Real Madrid scoring his 7th goal in 8 games against 3rd place Girona on Saturday. The Galacticos won 3-0, making them top of the La Liga and one point ahead of Barcelona.

• 🇺🇸 MLS: The GOAT, Lionel Messi, thinks Inter Miami should look to sign Real Madrid’s Luka Modric. The Ballon d’Or winner has fallen down the pecking order at his current club, so this could be the perfect way to close out his career.

🌊 Deep Dive

Liverpool want answers… and voicenotes

Pierluigi Collina. Mark Geiger. Martin Atkinson. Nestor Pitana.

See where I’m going with this one? These are the biggest (and most respected) names to referee the game.

But, as we all learnt from the Spurs vs Liverpool game, they just don’t make ‘em like they use to, eh?

Unless you’re living under a rock, you’d know what happened in Sunday’s clash… VAR Darren England failed to overturn an incorrect onfield decision for offside… because he thought that the referee had given it as a goal.. yada yada yada.

You get the jist.

So, understandably, Liverpool want answers. More specifically, they want VAR audio as part of their demand for “full transparency”.

Donut VAR 1: *VAR beeps… “I don’t think it was offside”
Donut VAR 2: “Ok, what are you having for dinner tonight?”

That aside… what does this achieve?

According to legal experts quoted in The Athletic, there’s not much of a legal case that Liverpool can put forward. It’s difficult to quantify what compensation they are owed, and it’s even more difficult to argue that they would have won the game if it weren’t for the poor decision.

Most importantly, this has happened a million times before… if not more.

Liverpool fans deserve to be frustrated + a serious investigation should take place.

Who knows what’s going to happen… but we’re ready for the show.

📺 FIXTURES THIS WEEK

Tuesday, 3 October

Premier League

• Luton vs Burnley - 7.30pm

Champions League on TNT Sports

Early kick-off - 5.45pm

• FC Union Berlin vs Sporting Braga

• Red Bull Salzburg vs Real Sociedad

Late kick-off - 8pm

• FC Copenhagen vs Bayern Munich

• Man United vs Galatasaray

• Lens vs Arsenal

• PSV vs Sevilla

• Napoli vs Real Madrid

• Inter Milan vs Benfica

Wednesday, 4 October

Champions League on TNT Sports

Early kick-off - 5.45pm

• Atletico Madrid vs Feyenoord

• Royal Antwerp vs Shakhtar Donetsk

Late kick-off - 8pm

• Celtic vs Lazio

• Borussia Dortmund vs AC Milan

• Newcastle United vs PSG

• Red Star Belgrade vs Young Boys

• RB Leipzip vs Man City

• FC Porto vs Barcelona

💰 BIG-GAME PLAYER

The puzzle section

Ok, because of the response we got on yesterday’s Who Are Ye, saying it was “too easy” and that your “nan could’ve guessed it”, here’s a harder one…

Who Are Ye?

• I began my career at Leeds’ academy in 1996

• I hold the record for the most England U21 caps (46)

• The only major club honour I haven’t won is the Europa League, but was a runner-up with Liverpool in 2015/16

Monday’s answer:

Who Are Ye?

• I have played with Leo Messi, Peter Crouch and Francesco Totti

• I retired in 2023 after a stint in Japan

The answer is… Bojan

😆 MEME