UCL Grind Down: Tuesday September 27th
With the Champions League continuing this week we once again focus on the Tuesday games and it looks like a fun set of matches to dive into. One thing to remember with Champions League matches is how overwhelming team stacks can be, as one team can potentially score 4-6 goals and blank the other side in what can be a complete devastating rout of the opponent. Throughout this article I’ll include information that should help you decide which players to target from a team, and whether or not a team is worth stacking in a GPP.
This analysis should point you in the right direction, but it is still up to you to decipher the information and make your own selections. Goals aren’t always easy to predict, but following the trends and making the right choices can lead you to success and will win you money over time.
Monaco vs Bayer Leverkusen
Odds to Win
Monaco +207
Bayer Leverkusen +151
Draw +238
Monaco
Corners: Bernardo Silva (Midfielder/Forward, $8,000), Thomas Lemar (Midfielder, $7,400), Boschilia (Midfielder, $6,200), Joao Moutinho (Midfielder, $6,600)
Monaco are playing at home in this matchup and come in as slight favorites, though the odds are decent for both teams. Monaco have had some very good results so far that have pushed them up to second place in the French Ligue 1, with their only loss coming to table toppers Nice in a 4-0 drubbing. They managed to win on the road in their first group match against Tottenham in what is surely a great start in their champions league campaign. This week they take on Bayer Leverkusen in what might be a highly entertaining match.
The biggest unknown with Monaco is the lack of consistency with their corner kick takers as well as the players that cross the ball the majority of the time. There are some injury concerns with this team though with Falcao coming off against Nice over a week ago with a head injury, he is likely not going to play. In his place, Monaco will look for Valere Germain (Forward, $8,200) and Guido Carrillo (Forward, $6,200) to get the goals and offense ticking. Of these two, I like Carrillo more because of his price as well as his recent performances including getting crosses, an assist as well as taking shots.
Bayern Leverkusen
Corners: Julian Brandt (Midfielder/Forward, $5,200)
The German squad struggles defensively, with only 1 clean sheet in the last 6 matches, they tend to rely a bit too much on the offensive side. They are going to come into this matchup missing two key players in Hakan Calhanoglu and Karim Bellarabi. Calhanoglu normally is on corner kick duties and without him on the team, the role slides to Julian Brandt. Brandt also gets to take the open play crosses putting him in immediately contention for cash game purposes. Of course, the most likely scorer for Leverkusen is Chicharito (Forward, $8,700) who is coming off a spectacular game over the weekend with a hat-trick scored. Another solid player option to consider is at defense with Wendell (Defender, $4,400) who can produce plenty of auxiliary stats including tackles, interceptions, crosses and shots.
CSKA Moscow vs Tottenham
Odds To Win
CSKA Moscow +202
Tottenham +151
Draw +243
CSKA Moscow
Corners: Aleksandr Golovin (Midfielder, $5,100), Alan Dzagoev (Midfielder, $5,000)
CSKA playing at home provides a great opportunity to take players from this team as they are a much better team at home than they are on the road and that is especially true when hosting a team in European competition. Look for Moscow to try to control this match and methodically try to find holes in the Tottenham defense. They have had different corner kick takers in each of the matches they have played this season so far which makes it difficult to decipher which of the above two players mentioned should be taken on your rosters. In the most recent matchup this weekend with Krasnodar, it was Golovin who took corners, while Dzagoev was on the bench. However, in previous matchups where both were on the pitch at the same time, Dzagoev is the preferred corner kick taker. Dzagoev also carries upside because he gets more touches and thus more opportunities to make a difference for his squad.
This is a matchup where the home team is an underdog facing a team missing their best striker (Kane) which puts some value in rostering the goalkeeper, Igor Akinfeev (Goalkeeper, $4,400), he has the save upside as well as the clean sheet or even the win. Tottenham played recently in England and have to travel on a short rest to Russia.
At striker, the team relies on the talents of Lacina Traore (Forward, $7,200), however, I may take a gander at either Zoran Tosic (Midfielder/Forward, $5,800) or Roman Eremenko (Midfielder, $6,400) as both of them could offer lower ownership and potential for goals and/or assists if CSKA manage a goal. The biggest barrier to their goal scoring will be the Tottenham defense which has allowed just 3 goals on the season.
Tottenham
Corners: Heung-Min Son (Midfielder/Forward, $5,400), Christian Eriksen (Midfielder, $9,300)
Tottenham will be missing Harry Kane again for this one, who along with Sissoko will not be part of this lineup. The story here though is Heung-Min Son who has shown some spectacular ability in the last three matches he’s played for the Spurs in the Premier League with four goals and an assist to his name, he’s been truly a fantasy top asset. In addition to his goal scoring, he’s also taken over the corner kick duties and has 24 crosses in the last 2 games combined. The concern here is the same as it was over the weekend, Eriksen or Lamela could take over the corner kicks and/or crosses at any time and Son’s effectiveness would be over. Overall on the road, Son will be tough to justify in a cash lineup, but his price makes things real simple if you insist on taking him.
Due to pricing, it’s going to be tough to recommend Eriksen with him not taking corners, and while Lamela has been playing well lately, his price tag of $7,600 makes him a no-go for me here as well. One defense, Danny Rose will miss the matchup, which puts Ben Davies (Defender, $3,900) in the spotlight as the second full back alongside Kyle Walker. Davies makes for an interesting play if you think that Tottenham control possession for a significant amount of time on the road. Otherwise, you’re probably likely to find just as good assets for cheaper elsewhere.
Borussia Dortmund vs Real Madrid
Odds to Win
Borussia Dortmund +134
Real Madrid +213
Draw +272
Borussia Dortmund
Corners: Raphael Guerreiro (Defender, $5,200), Ousmane Dembele (Midfielder/Forward, $7,600)
In what might be one of the few times this season, Real Madrid enter this matchup as slight underdogs against the Borussia Dortmund team playing at home in their second match in the Champions League. Dortmund come into this one as one of the hottest teams in Europe with 20 goals in their last 4 matches, and nobody on the team is hotter than Gonzalo Castro (Midfielder, $5,800). Castro has 3 goals and 5 assists in his last four, including 3 assists and a goal in two matches in which he has come off the bench. Nevertheless, this matchup is hard to predict, it can either be a low scoring tight match with one team stealing a narrow win, or it can open up early and be ripe with goals that make this into a fantasy bonanza. My bet will be on the fantasy wasteland. I plan on not taking many players from this team or even this matchup as I don’t trust that it will open up enough to allow for a multitude of goals to be scored.
Real Madrid
Corners: Toni Kroos (Midfielder, $7,200), James Rodriguez (Midfielder/Forward, $8,800)
If I do end up with exposure to this match, then it will be centered around Cristiano Ronaldo (Forward, $11,000). Every time he’s on the slate, it will take a long, hard look to decide to fade him. With my two teams this week, I’ll likely put Ronaldo on one of them and just hope for the best. His price is too high to really make him a staple in any lineup, however, he’s been knocking on the door recently with 14 shots in his last three matches and just a single goal to show for it. Ronaldo is probably on his way to one of his magical matches in which he scores a ton of goals and leaves fantasy owners who chose to fade him regretting that very decision. Will that happen this week against the German outfit, Borussia Dortmund? It’s hard to tell, but the smart bet will lean to “no” given the state of the odds.
If you think this will be a low scoring affair, then the right action to do would be to take either goalkeeper, either Kiko Casilla ($4,700) or Roman Burki ($4,500) would suffice as your option for goalkeeper as both have the potential for multiple saves, but they would be risky, especially Burki as facing Ronaldo is never an easy task.
If you think this will be a match with lots of scoring, any of the Real Madrid forwards/midfielders should do the trick, be it the midfielders that are responsible for corners and crosses (Kroos, Rodriguez) or you can go to Marco Asensio (Midfielder, $6,400), Gareth Bale (Midfielder/Forward, $10,600), or Karim Benzema (Forward, $8,500), but results with them are not certain and more of GPP options.
Sporting Lisbon vs Legia Warszawa
Odds to Win
Sporting Lisbon -387
Legia Warszawa +1346
Sporting Lisbon
Corners: Bruno Cesar (Midfielder, $5,300), Bryan Ruiz (Midfielder/Forward, $5,600), Joel Campbell (Midfielder/Forward, $5,600)
Sporting enter this matchup as the biggest favorites on the board, they boast a 5-0-1 record in the Primeira Liga in Portugal where they are in 2nd place, just one point behind Benfica. Sporting enter this match having narrowly lost the opening match in the group to Real Madrid 2-1 after leading at the 89th minute. Sporting suffer occasionally from defensive lapses late, but this should be a matchup that they can dominate and the key to their dominance is their midfield and their ability to hold possession. In matches similar to this one this season they’ve held north of 60% possession and have had a passing accuracy of 84% on the season in the Primeira Liga.
The team relies heavily on crosses with an average of 29 crosses a game in their last three league matches. The full backs (depending on who starts) and the wing players (Either Joel Campbell or Bryan Ruiz) get the majority of these when in play. This matchup also plays out perfectly for Bas Dost (Forward, $7,100) who has recently signed for Lisbon, and within his first three matches has scored 4 times propelling them to their fantastic start. I suspect he will manage to score a goal or two in this one and with Lisbon being heavy favorites at home, I can see a full team stack in this one.
Legia Warszawa
Corners: Thibaut Moulin (Midfielder, $4,700), Steeven Langil (Midfielder/Forward, $6,100)
Legia Warszawa didn’t fare very well last week against Borussia Dortmund. Dortmund ran around them and scored 6 goals, and while the keeper managed 9 saves, his total point haul was just 4. Arkadiusz Malarz (Goalkeeper, $3,600) is priced really low and if you think rostering him gives you a chance at a better team build, I’m going to have to stop you right there and remind you that he’s playing on the road in this one and against a team that is scoring 2.2 goals a match against superior competition. They probably have a good chance at scoring 4+ goals, so there aren’t many options to really go after with the Polish side.
If you do decide to take a random GPP dart throw, I wouldn’t be completely opposed to Steeven Langil as he takes corners, crosses and shots for this team. It’s just a question as to how often they will have the ball. Which I think the answer to that is, not often enough.
Sevilla vs Lyon
Odds to Win
Sevilla -135
Lyon +434
Draw +290
Sevilla
Corners: Pablo Sarabia (Midfielder, $5,700), Samir Nasri (Midfielder, $5,400), Hiroshi Kiyotake (Midfielder, $5,600)
Sevilla are a favorite in this matchup that is looking like it may be a slow affair as Sevilla have made it their mission to try to control the flow and slow the match down. Overall this season they’ve played slower matches, with the exception to their first affair where they were involved in a barn burner with Espanyol and won 6-4, since then, they’ve combined to score 5 goals total and wouldn’t be upset with a 1-0 win against the visiting French squad. The two biggest fantasy targets in this match are then Samir Nasri, the on-loan Manchester City man, and Pablo Sarabia. Both are splitting corners and both are heavily involved in the goal scoring and shot taking for their team. Also worth considering is Franco Vazquez(Forward, $6,800) who has averaged 2.6 shots per game this season for the Spanish side. Overall though, with the exception of one of Nasri or Sarabia, I would probably not roster many from this match as I can see it being a boring 0-0 or 1-1 matchup.
Lyon
Corners: Mathieu Valbuena (Midfielder/Forward, $6,100), Maciej Rybus (Defender, $5,200), Rachid Ghezzal (Midfielder/Forward, $5,900), Nabil Fekir (Midfielder/Forward, $6,700), Maxwel Cornet (Midfielder/Forward, $6,900)
Lyon are a team with some injury concerns, they are missing Alexandre Lacazette, so that weakens their abilities in attack, and limits their effectiveness up front. They do have some competent backups in Maxwel Cornet, who scored in the last match against Dinamo Zagreb in the Champions League. Also worth considering is Corentin Tolisso (Midfielder, $6,000) as depending on the formation, may slot right behind the striker in a 4-4-1-1. Overall though, this team seems to not have much fantasy appeal, you can target Mathieu Valbuena at midfield, but his price is higher than similar options on other teams.
Overall, this match might be a “stay away” for me.
Dinamo Zagreb vs Juventus
Odds to Win
Dinamo Zagreb +1050
Juventus -313
Draw +470
Dinamo Zagreb
Corners: Paulo Machado (Midfielder, $4,300), Junior Fernandez (Forward, $5,700), Ivan Fiolic (Not in player pool)
Another home team that is a severe underdog, except this time, they’re in Croatia and hosting Italian giants, Juventus (The Old Lady). Zagreb has had a tough month in the Croatian league with just a single win against NK Lokomotiva that came in the 83rd minute, they have no real chance to pull off the upset here. What they will do however, is park the bus and hope to pull away with minimal damage. Last season in the UCL they managed to pull off an upset of Arsenal 2-1 at home in the group stage opening match, however, they followed it up with 5 straight losses by a combined 13-1 score line. They opened this season’s tournament with a 3-0 defeat to Lyon on the road. There aren’t really many fantasy options to consider on this squad as they don’t have good odds to score goals or win, thus limiting the upside of anybody on this team. The best option could be the Goalkeeper, Adrian Semper (Goalkeeper, $3,700) who has the potential for plenty of saves especially at home. However, the risk is high with him, but the price is very low. Roster at your own risk.
Juventus
Corners: Dani Alves (Defender, $5,900), Miralem Pjanic (Midfielder, $7,000), Paulo Dybala (Midfielder/Forward, $9,200), Juan Cuadrado (Midfielder/Forward, $7,200)
Juventus are entering this matchup with renewed confidence having won their last two matches after losing the Derby match with Inter Milan just 9 days ago. Expect Juventus to put to rest any doubt in this match early as they look to attack from the break. They’ll rely on their full backs, wide midfielders and their forwards to put the pressure on Zagreb to score plenty of goals in order to position themselves as top dogs in this group. I don’t mind paying up for Dani Alves at FB as he could net double digit crosses and a couple of shots. He already has a goal this season, but is missing an assist. That might be reversed this match. He had 5 Key Passes last time in this tournament in a 0-0 draw with Sevilla, so the team will be looking to score some goals to make up for that.
Also worth the roster spot is Gonzalo Higuain (Forward, $9,800) He’s likely to be lower owned than others such as Chicharito or Ronaldo, but he has as much upside having scored 4 goals already for his new team this season. Higuain does have a low floor if the team doesn’t get a lot of shots off, but I expect that Juventus will take more than 20 shots in this match and he should have a good portion of those.
FC Copenhagen vs Club Bruges
Odds to Win
FC Copenhagen -128
Club Bruges +410
Draw +282
FC Copenhagen
Corners: Ludwig Augustinsson (Defender, $4,600)
The home team are favorites here and for good reason, they managed to steal a point away at FC Porto and the Danish champions are currently leading in the local league having gone undefeated in the first 7 matches there. This matchup features them against the Dutch side, Club Brugge, who should have a tough time. Overall though, this match is tough to predict as Copenhagen haven’t played in Europe since 2014/15 and there aren’t a lot of stats on the players. Best we can go with in this case is that this is a team that is favored playing against a seemingly weaker team. In their first match Copenhagen gave me reason to think they can carry on their performances this week, and with that, I would consider targeting the full backs, Ludwig Augustinsson (Defender, $4,600) and Peter Ankersen (Defender, $4,600)
Overall, I don’t think this matchup will include lots of goals and if it does, the forwards Santander ($7,300) and Cornelius ($7,100) might be slightly over priced compared to other options you might get.
Club Bruges
Corners: Ruud Vormer (Midfielder, $5,000), Laurens De Bock (Defender, $4,200)
Bruges lost 3-0 to Leicester last time out in a match that seemed to favor Brugge in terms of possession and total touches. They got off 11 shots against the English Champion. In a way, that was the matchup that Leicester strives in, where they rely on the counter attack, as that is what won them their championship in the premier league last year, and Bruges fell right into it. This time, they’ll try to do better, but they’ll be on the road against a team they are not favored against. De Bock is an option as his price may be affordable, however, I would probably take a chance on Ruud Vormer, not only does he take corners, he also gets touches all over the place and is the engine that runs the midfield for Bruges. Taking a GPP flyer on Jose Heriberto Izquierdo (Forward, $4,800) might prove like a good plan as he is very cheap for a player that might score a goal if things break nicely for him.
Leicester City vs FC Porto
Odds to Win
Leicester City +147
FC Porto +218
Draw +233
Leicester
Corners: Marc Albrighton (Midfielder, $7,300), Riyad Mahrez (Midfielder/Forward, $9,100), Christian Fuchs (Defender, $5,500)
Leicester come into this matchup after an embarassing defeat to Menchester United in which they suffered 4 first half goals early. They managed to pull one back, but the team will be looking for a resurgence in this one as they want to cement their position as a contender in Europe. The matchup here is a tough one though as Porto have always given English teams trouble, but I think that Leicester have the weapons and the discipline to pull it through.
Islam Slimani (Forward, $7,500) is the ideal candidate for this team to score goals. He’s going to be active against Porto and will probably slot in right next to Jamie Vardy. Slimani also has a history against Porto having scored 5 goals in three matches against Porto in 2016! He’s a prime candidate to score some goals for his new team and continue his show of dominance against his former Liga NOS opponents. In other options, you could target Marc Albrighton as he’s still the primary corner kick taker and his price is affordable given the circumstances.
FC Porto
Corners: Otavio (Midfielder, $6,200), Alex Telles (Defender, $5,000), Miguel Layun (Defender, $6,400)
With Porto going on the road to play against the English champions, they’ll have their work cut out for them. It might end up being too expensive to target any of the full backs in this matchup, but there are some options in the midfield and forward including Otavio (1 goal and 1 assist in last 3 matches), Andre Andre (Midfielder, $6,600), Andre Silva (Forward, $7,800), though, most of them fall under the GPP options and I wouldn’t try to consider them for cash games.