It looks very much like there will be a Boxing Day bonanza for Fantasy Premier League players, with the top three all at home including Liverpool against a leaky Leicester City side.
Struggling champions Manchester City also have what would, in normal times, be a plum home game for them against Everton.
However, it is also prime rotation season so who, aside from the obvious big names, should you target this week?
Bukayo Saka’s injury at least makes picking between premium assets a touch easier.
The team of the week is selected based on current FPL prices to fit within a £100m budget, as if you were playing a Free Hit.
How did last week’s team do?
Captain Mohamed Salah (again), Alexander Isak and a superb defence saved the week and propelled the team to a strong 84 points.
Just as well they performed as three players didn’t start and the expected Chelsea goal bonanza never materialised.
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Goalkeeper and defence
Lukasz Fabianski, West Ham, goalkeeper, £4.1m – away at Southampton
West Ham haven’t been watertight at the back this season but Fabianski is as cheap as they get and faces the league’s lowest scoring team.
Given the cost of the rest of this week’s team, he makes a lot of sense.
Trent Alexander-Arnold, Liverpool, £7.1m – home to Leicester City
Six clean sheets and four assists is not a lot for this FPL legend with half the season gone – and he only has one double-digit week.
There’s a slight risk he gets a rest at home to Leicester but Alexander-Arnold’s upside is huge in gameweek 18.
He’s only owned by just over one in five teams too so has become an unexpected differential.
Rico Lewis, Manchester City, £4.6m – home to Everton
Copy, paste, updated from last week’s team…
“Everton have failed to score in six of their past seven games so a Manchester City defensive asset is a must.”
Lewis is the cheapest, likely to play and the best creative threat if you can’t afford Josko Gvardiol.
Lewis Hall, Newcastle, £4.6m – home to Aston Villa
Back-to-back clean sheets for Hall who has emerged as one of the best budget defenders.
It’s hard to expect Newcastle to keep out Villa, but Hall is in the top three defenders for expected assists in the past four gameweeks (behind Alexander-Arnold and Antonee Robinson) so has that attacking potential as well.
Midfield
Mohamed Salah (captain), Liverpool, £13.5m – home to Leicester City
No words needed – perma-captain until told otherwise.
Kevin de Bruyne, Manchester City, £9.5m – home to Everton
I think everyone is expecting City, at some point in this awful run of defeats, to snap out of it, find form and absolutely thrash somebody.
Well why not this week?
De Bruyne is a high-risk, high-upside pick in a game that could easily be 5-0 if City play like the old City.
He’s rested and has a return every 75 minutes in his past three games.
Antoine Semenyo, Bournemouth, £5.6m – home to Crystal Palace
He scored against Manchester United from one of his four shots at goal and his underlying statistics continue to be incredible.
The Ghana midfielder has 67 shots in 16 games this season – one away from four per game – and those kind of numbers mean you’re always in with a shout of a return.
The home game with Palace could be one for goals – so pick Semenyo with confidence.
Mohammed Kudus, West Ham, £6.2m – away at Southampton
These next two midfield picks might seem a bit knee-jerk, as both scored in gameweek 17, but you’ll have to take my word for it that I picked this team before they did. Honest!
Either way, Kudus is the way into the Hammers attack if you can’t afford Jarrod Bowen – or you just want to be different.
The Ghanaian is just slightly behind Bowen in all attacking stats this season – 43 shots to 36, expected goals (xG) of 4.02 to 3.56.
Saints, despite a 0-0 at Fulham last time, are still a team to target with forward players.
Ismaila Sarr, Crystal Palace, £5.7m – away at Bournemouth
With Eberechi Eze potentially out again, Sarr has a chance to be a central figure for Palace in a game that could turn into a thriller.
The Senegal winger has four returns in his past two games, and seven returns in just 10 starts this season.
With a very enticing run of games all the way until the start of March, Sarr presents a great budget option in midfield.
Strikers
Erling Haaland (vice captain), Manchester City, £14.8m – home to Everton
The big man has just three goals in his past 12 league games and looks a shadow of his early-season self, when he scored 10 in five matches.
There are no real stats to back up his selection – just a combination of a good fixture (even though Everton have improved in defence) and the reasoning that City have to get better eventually.
If this game was in week three, most FPL players would have been captaining Haaland.
Gabriel Jesus, Arsenal, £6.8m – home to Ipswich
Saka’s injury is a huge blow to Arsenal but their home game against Ipswich is too good to ignore.
Jesus is in red-hot form with a hat-trick in the Carabao Cup and then two at Crystal Palace on Saturday.
He could easily have scored more too and is shoo-in to start up front against relegation-threatened Ipswich.
Subs bench
Remi Matthews, Crystal Palace, keeper, £3.9m – away at Bournemouth
Cameron Archer, Southampton, striker, £5.0m – home to West Ham
Archer might be a good budget bench striker option with Saints facing a decent run of games in the new year.
Jan Bednarek, Southampton, defender, £4m – home to West Ham
Cameron Burgess, Ipswich, defender, £4m – away at Arsenal
All about budget with these two cheap defenders who hopefully won’t need to come off the bench.
Team total cost: £99.4m
Player to watch
Diogo Jota, Liverpool, midfielder, £7.2m
When he is fit, Jota has one of the best points-per-minute ratios in FPL.
The Portuguese midfielder has missed most of the season and the festive period, with plenty of rotation around, means he is always going to be a risky pick.
But Liverpool have a nice run of games up until gameweek 26 and Jota could provide incredible value if he begins to start games.
Team to target
Liverpool – Leicester (h), West Ham (a) Man Utd (h)
Seems obvious but, with seven in 10 FPL players owning Salah, you need to think about other Liverpool assets if you want to make the most of a great run of fixtures until gameweek 26.
It’s worth either investing in defence – which is expensive and might require some budget shuffling – or taking a shot on Jota, Luis Diaz or Dominik Szoboszlai in attack.
