There’s an art to trading in draft fantasy football. A good trade can be the difference between a title win and a mediocre bottom half finish in your Fantrax league and there’s never a bad time to boost your roster.
What is the art of trading? Buy the big names low and trade those over performers high! Here’s a few under performing names to take advantage of at a bargain price.
Gylfi Sigurdsson | Midfielder | Last Three Scores: 4, 0, 13
Last year’s top scoring Fantrax midfielder has fallen a long way short of the heights of last season and disgruntled owners will have most likely had to draft Gylfi Sigurdsson in tail end of the 1st round or the start of the 2nd.
Sigurdsson has been the victim of Marco Silva’s failed attempts in finding the formula to fix Everton’s evident problems and has found himself on the Goodison Park bench a few times recently. However, injuries have seen him brought back into the fold and a decent showing in the win at Southampton last week should see him firmly back in favour.
It doesn’t get much better than this week’s fixture against Norwich City at home so if you’re going to get Siggy on the cheap, now is the week to do it as he’s more than likely to fill his boots in Gameweek 13.
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain | Midfielder | Last Three Scores: 0, 3, 2
In targeting Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, you’re looking at an in-form player waiting for his chance rather than a player in poor form trying to re-discover their best. Probably the best way round.
The Liverpool man’s Fantrax scores barely reflect how he is playing, largely due to the fact that he hasn’t been given his chance to shine in the Premier League. Oxlade-Chamberlain’s performances in the cup competitions has been nothing short of outstanding and his form has carried over into the recent international break with England.
It’s surely only a matter of time until the Ox gets his chance and with Liverpool’s upcoming fixture list on the favourable side, a start for the in-form midfielder should bring about decent scores.
Having said this, the form of Fabinho, Gini Wijnaldum and Jordan Henderson has also been good, meaning there is still a large element of risk in going in for Oxlade-Chamberlain. This should be something mentioned in negotiations with any other manager you may have to speak with in order to secure his signature. Well worth the gamble in that fourth/fifth midfielder slot if you already have the core in place.
Callum Hudson-Odoi | Forward | Last Three Scores: 2, 1, 0
It’s been a strange three weeks for Callum Hudson-Odoi owners. “Strange” can also be translated to “disastrous”.
CHO’s return to action after a long lay off was explosive and he registered three decent scores thanks to three assists in two and a half games. It was, therefore, a surprise to see Christian Pulisic return to the lineup against Burnley at Hudson-Odoi’s expense. A Pulisic hat-trick later and CHO still hasn’t left the bench.
The Chelsea forward’s trade value couldn’t have been higher three weeks ago. Today, it couldn’t be lower, a nightmare for CHO owners. There’s no doubt he is supremely talented and when he plays he will be explosive but he’s no good to anyone while sat on the bench.
If you’ve got a couple of forwards that start week in, week out already, it’s well worth the effort of getting Hudson-Odoi in to start him in the (seemingly rare) occasions that he does play. You shouldn’t have to give up much to get him in.
Harry Kane | Forward | Last Three Scores: 14.5, 0, 4
Harry Kane is a guaranteed first round pick, every year; first five picks overall in fact. However, he is always one that I’d prefer to avoid picking so early on due to how dependant he is on goals/assists in order to score well in Fantrax.
Normally that isn’t a problem, especially when Kane has one of those purple patches he so frequently enjoys. This isn’t one of those patches. The England talisman has scored once since the end of September, meaning his fantasy scores have also been poor. In fact, in three games against Sheffield United, Watford and Brighton, Kane has scored a combined 9.5 points. Woeful.
It’s obvious that Kane will hit at least 20 goals this season which is exactly why he is well worth owning, but it wouldn’t be a surprise to hear that owners who used their first round pick on him may be getting frustrated by him at this early stage. It also doesn’t help that Spurs just aren’t very good at the moment.
His price will still be pretty high at this point but the key is to get him in ahead of his next scoring run. I’ve seen a deal which includes Roberto Firmino going the other way. It’s the Brazilian who I’d prefer to own at the moment but in terms of the score over the rest of the season, that could go either way. It’s well worth an enquiry for Harry Kane right now at the very least.
Wilfried Zaha | Forward | Last Three Scores: 6.5, 11.5, 8.5
I think it’s probably fair that after failing to score in his first 12 matches, Wilfried Zaha’s season is yet to get going. However, all that may be about to change.
As you can see by his last three scores, Zaha has been putting up respectable numbers without scoring goals and those three scores came against Arsenal, Leicester City and Chelsea respectively.
Crystal Palace have endured a horrendous run of fixtures, culminating this week against the unbeaten league leaders Liverpool at Selhurst Park. After Gameweek 13, Zaha and co should see an upturn in fortunes.
Now is the time to capitalise on disillusioned Zaha owners who have watched their (probably) star forward fail to score in three and a half months of Premier League football as they don’t face a single fixture where they shouldn’t expect to get some sort of positive result for the rest of the calendar year.
In the same way as Zaha, you should look to target the owner of the under performing Andros Townsend as Palace will soon take on Burnley and Bournemouth before embarking on a run of facing very beatable opposition in Watford, Brighton, Newcastle, West Ham, Southampton and Norwich City. Now is the time to strike.
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