La Liga Week 33 Preview

This is the beginning of a massive two weeks for Spain’s giants. With Real Madrid and Barcelona separated by just four points and next week’s El Clasico sandwiched between two legs of Champions League semi-finals this will be a real test of nerve for both sides. At the other end of the table, with six games to go, it looks increasingly like the final three have been decided with a seven point gap now opened up between the bottom three and 17th placed Villarreal.

Real Madrid host doomed Sporting Gijon on Saturday. Sporting are marooned in 19th but gave themselves hope with an impressive 3-2 win over Levante on Wednesday night. They will still need a miracle to escape the drop now though and Javier Clemente’s side won’t have much of a prayer at the Bernabeu with the form Real have been in. Jose Mourinho’s side registered another emphatic victory in midweek as they crushed their local rivals Atletico 4-1 thanks to a hat-trick from Cristiano Ronaldo. Los Merengues are just three goals away from scoring 107 for the season and breaking the record number of goals for a Liga season set by John Toshack’s Real in 1989-90. Ronaldo also set his own record by becoming the only player in Europe’s top four divisions to score 40 goals in successive seasons. With the midweek Champions’ League semi-final first leg against Bayern Munich coming up Mourinho will be tempted to rotate his side. Ozil, Marcelo and Higuain were all rested against Atletico and could be brought back in against Gijon.

Barcelona just need to keep on winning. They visit a Levante side sat in fifth and still very much in the hunt for a place in next seasons’ Champions League. On Wednesday, Pep Guardiola’s side cruised to a 4-0 victory over Getafe to make it ten wins in a row and are in fine fettle ahead of El Clasico. Levante caused a shock early in the season as they beat Real with a solitary Aruna Kone goal but they are 14/1 to repeat the feat against Barca. The Champions have no new injury worries and they received a boost this week as David Villa announced that he would be back in contention before the end of the season.

Unai Emery gave himself a reprieve as Valencia crushed Rayo Vallecano 4-1 in midweek to give themselves a two point cushion in third place above Malaga. The Turkish manager has come under criticism from Los Ches fans as his side’s form has dipped with Malaga and Levante threatening to steal automatic qualification to the Champions’ League. Valencia visit Espanyol on Sunday and need to keep up their momentum to keep the chasing pack at bay. The Catalunians’ hopes of qualifying for European football next season have taken a hit in recent weeks as they are winless in five. Valencia have also won four of the last five meetings between the two sides.

Malaga will be looking to get back to winning ways against Real Sociedad. Malaaga’s charge into the top four has been laboured and they would be third had it not been for recent upsets against relegation threatened Betis and Villarreal. The odds favour the home side and the likes of Cazorla, Rondon and Isco should feast on a leaky Sociedad defence. Malaga will be without keeper Idris Kameni who was sent off at Villarreal in midweek.

La Liga: The final day - Relegation and Europa Cup battles

The final weekend of La Liga. What is left to play for? Everything has been decided apart from the final relegation place. The top four cannot change position and the Europa Cup competitors are all in place.

In fantasy terms, the best I can hope for is improving on my position of 34th in Fans of Almeria. What I've done today, is use the statistical model to predict the results of the final round of La Liga games, and in turn find out who is going down.

The current La Liga standings:



Key:

• League position cannot change
• Nothing but pride to play for
• Could be relegated
• Europa Cup

So, there are 6 teams battling to avoid that last relegation spot and three teams fighting trying to avoid going through the qualification rounds of the Europa Cup. Exciting stuff!

Here are the final day fixtures with the mathematically predicted scores:

Málaga CF 0 - 2 FC Barcelona
Racing Santander 1 - 1 Athletic Bilbao
Hércules CF 1 - 0 Sporting Gijón
Real Madrid 5 - 0 UD Almería
Osasuna 1 - 0 Villarreal CF
Real Sociedad 1 - 0 Getafe CF
RCD Espanyol 1 - 0 Sevilla FC
Levante UD 1 - 0 Real Zaragoza
RCD Mallorca 1 - 1 Atlético Madrid
Deportivo La Coruña 0 - 1 Valencia CF

Please bare in mind we cannot factor in that extra drop of mayhem that can unbalance normal proceedings on the final day of the season. Working through the list, in order of importance: which of these results feels right?

Levante 1-0 Zaragoza

The most important game of the day. In short, if Zaragoza lose, no other results matter in the relegation fight. A home win feels like a fair prediction. Levante have had an excellent 2nd half of the season, but Zaragoza have defeated Real Madrid and Valencia in recent weeks. I expect more goals from both sides but, with a 49% weighting for the home win, I allow Spiegel to convince me that Levante will prevail but there will surely be more than one goal in the match.

Pick: L - Caicedo, Valdo, RZ - Gabi

Real Sociedad 1-0 Getafe

A real hum-dinger. Both sides can go down if Zaragoza win and Depor get a point. A Sociedad home win is one of the top predictions with 51%. I'm happy with that. Again, I might expect more goals from two sides fighting for their lives. Even if Getafe lose, Parejo and Rios should both do well.

Pick: RS - Xabi Prieto, Griezmann; G - Parejo, Rios.

Osasuna 1-0 Villarreal

This feels right. If anything, Osasuna will score more. The Yellow Submarines have nothing to play for and seem to have left for their holidays weeks ago while Osasuna have been in top form, especially at home. Osasuna are pretty much guaranteed safety and can only go down if they concede about 10 goals and Zaragoza, Deportivo and Getafe win.

Pick: O - Ricardo, Camunas, Cejudo, Sola, any defenders

Deportivo 0-1 Valencia

This is one I feel less convinced about. Spiegel makes Los Che heavy favourites but they, like Villarreal, have nothing to play for. Deportivo have found it hard to get excited this season, but they may just get up for this one and upset the prediction. Anything other than a win leaves them vulnerable to the drop.

Pick: D - Adrian; V - Soldado

RCD Mallorca 1 - 1 Atlético Madrid

Both sides are stumbling towards the finish line. Atletico are playing Europa Cup football again. The only issue they have to worry about is avoiding the ignominy of having to go through the qualifying rounds if they come 7th. That tedium will certainly be on players' minds. Both sides don't really need to do a lot to be ok so a point each seems highly likely.

Pick: M - Webo, Nuse, De Guzman; AM - Reyes, Aguero

RCD Espanyol 1 - 0 Sevilla FC

Espanyol have done their best to remove themselves from contention for Europa Cup qualification. Sevilla need a win to avoid having to qualify for the tournament. Kanoute may be a up for a flourish of a sign off. A home win or draw feels fair. Not a tempting game to punt on. Spiegel says 1-0 but I'd expect a few more goals for both sides.

Pick: E - Callejon; S - Negredo, Kanoute

Racing Santander 1 - 1 Athletic Bilbao

Both sides are in a bit of form. Racing have secured mid-table mediocrity but Bilbao need to win to guarantee a straight forward passage into Europa Cup football and may fancy it after a few years out of European competition.

Pick: AB - Muniain

Outside of these games, the sharp eyed amongst you will have noticed the massive weighting the model gives to a Real Madrid victory with 5-0 being the most likely result. Therefore, for your fantasy sides, if you are like me, you will probably be sticking in 49m Ronaldo in and then scratching around to fit in scraps around him.

Here is the final table standings as the maths would have it:



My current lineup for this weekend:

GK

Aoute, Mallorca, 4

Galan, Espanyol, 1
Castillo, A.Bil, 1
Amorebieta, A.Bil, 1

Ozil, R.Mad, 5
Di Maria, R.Mad, 5
Granero, R.Mad, 2
Affellay, Barca, .7
Xabi Prieto, RSO, 14.5

Ronaldo, RMAD, 49
Caicedo, Lev, 12.5

Guadiola's team selection: a headache for fantasy pickers

Pep Guardiola seems to like taking the rise with fantasy football managers. Barcelona, as you might expect, are the highest scoring team in Yahoo Fantasy football: over the season, the accumluated score of their squad makes 2928pts. Their closest rivals are natually Real Madrid with 2754.5 pts. One would imagine that shoehorning as many Barca players into your line-up would be a sensible tactic for any fantasy manager, but alas, the champions elect keep upsetting me. David Villa has 2 goals in 10 games, Xavi hardly ever breaks 10 pts, Messi's value is always 40+, and with the recent fixture congestion, its almost impossible to predict the damn lineup as Pep rotates his boys to ensure freshness.

With an 5 pt lead and a game in hand, (with 3 to play) before Sunday night's fixture against Espanyol, Barca had to all intents and purposes won La Liga. One might expect that going into last nights home derby, Pep might have given a rest to the stars that secured passage to the Champions League final on Tuesday. You'd be given further reason for believing this given that throughout April, the team was heavily rotated with the likes of Jeffren, Pinto, Milito, Keita, Thiago, Affellay, and Fontas featuring frequently in the Liga matches. Even more weight is thrown behind this theory when you consider that Espanyol are on a horrible run of form and never beat Barcelona. So surely, these fringe names would feature in the gimme home game on Sunday?

But no, apart from perhaps the inclusion of Fontas and the absence of Puyol, he goes and names 9 of his strongest line-up; that which we will surely see against Man Utd. You might say to me, Pep could not risk increasing the pressure on himself and his team with another blip after last week's shock loss to Sociedad. you might say, he needs to play his strongest 11 to keep them sharp for the CL final.

Having picked Pinto, Affellay and Jeffren for my side this weekend, I prefer to think he has it in for fantasy football managers. Maybe it has something to do with Jose Mourinho's professed enjoyment of the Fantasy Football game, maybe Pep doesn't have time for such frivolity, but for my money, he's clearly out to undermine my fantasy football selections. Only Affellay got any game time. He got me 1 point.

Real Madrid 1 - 1 Barcelona: clasico stat review

CLICK TO ENLARGE

Barcelona players against Real Madrid players. By all accounts it sounded like Real Madrid were largely on the backfoot fighting to contain the irresistable Catalans. But in Fantasy Football terms, the Madristas were more successful. Overall, Mourinho's men scored 45 pts compared to Barca's 30. Both teams endured some heavy negatives with Raul "the liability" Albiol conceding a hefty -11.5 and the usually prolific Alves registering -7.5. Messi and Ronaldo were the inevitable goal scorers but both were largely supressed by the respective defences. Puyol, Pedro and Maxwell scored 0 for Barca, only Xavi Alonso got a 0 for Real. The average Barcelona player score was 1.07. For Real, it was 3.2.

Predicting results

A Brilliant piece of predicting football results from David Spiegelhalter's blog


http://understandinguncertainty.org/node/763

Week 29: Team of the week

Varas, Sevilla - Golden Man

Javi Varas was Week 29's golden player and his 28 points shows us just how good he and Sevilla's defence had to be to secure their surprise 1-0 win at Valencia. A staggering points haul from the Sevilla no. 2 who was worth just 4 a few weeks ago, and worth just 11.9 at the start of this week.

Osasuna have the most representatives in the top 11: 2 defenders and one midfielder. This reflects the dominance they exerted in their emphatic, and somewhat astonishing 4-0 win at Hercules. Los Rojillos are in a rich vein of form and with 11 points, even without a goal, no wonder defender Nacho Monreal is being targeted by the likes of Liverpool and Arsenal.

A worthy mention must go to Osasuna's Goalkeeper Ricardo who had another inspired game between the sticks and racked up an excellent 22 points with 6 saves. Man Utd, in the hunt for a replacement for Van der Sar, could do a lot worse than "doing a Wenger" and bringing back an ex-golden oldie goalie. 39 yr old Ricardo was barely given a sniff in his brief stint at United between 2002 and 2005.

Sergio Aguero and Jose Reyes once again proved that you don't have to be a winner to get a good points haul. While Atletico went down 2-1, the Kun, Aguero, continued his outrageously good form with a goal and 22 pts (4 goals in his last 3 games). No clamours for the wunderkid to move to a bigger club keep bubbling to the surface.

The Guardian's Sid Lowe suggested that Aguero played virtually by himself against Real in the derby, but Reyes' total of 15, without a goal would tells us the ex-Arsenal forward showed plenty of attacking threat even if he couldn't trouble the scorers. Whilst wearing the Arsenal shirt he once got a 30pts in a week in the EPL version of the game without scoring a goal.

Rondon (left), Malaga

Malaga stiker Jose Rondon also continued his excellent form, bagging a brace to help Manuel Pellegrino's relegation threatened side ease to a 2-0 over European hopefuls Espanyol and secure their second win on the bounce. Rondon now has 12 goals, as many as Aguero and Peppe Rossi.

Racing's Kennedy and Sociedad's Griezmann were the dominant forces for either side, scoring a goal apiece as Santander edged a 2-1 win over the Basques. Spurs' Giovanni Dos Santos sealed the win to get his second in eight Liga games for Racing.

After a quiet few weeks Jonathon De Guzman popped up to re-assert himself as Mallorca's leading points scorer with the only goal in Mallorca's 1-0 win over Zaragoza. His 15 points takes his tally to 158 for the season.

The surprise package of the week has to be Villarreal's defender Musacchio. Without scoring a goal, and from a value of just 2.79, Mussachio registered 12 points, as the Yellow Submarine capitalised on Valencia's loss to re-capture 3rd place

Personal Higlights?

Farinos

FARINOS (HERCULES)

Despite Hercules' taking a 4-0 pasting at home to Osasuna, the midfield maestro almost made the team of the week, managing 14.5 points from a value of 5.79.

Team of the week 29

How the best scoring XI would have looked:

Name,team,position,points
J. Varas SEV Goalkeeper 28.00

Nelson OSA Defender 19.50
M. Musacchio VIL Defender 12.00
N. Monreal OSA Defender 11.00

J. Camuñas OSA Midfielder 17.00
J. Reyes AMR Midfielder 15.00
K. Bakircioglü RAC Midfielder 15.00
J. de Guzmán MAL Midfielder 15.00

S. Agüero AMR Forward 22.00
J. Rondón MGA Forward 21.00
A. Griezmann RSO Forward 16.50

Total: 192

My team:

The winning team:

Week 28: Early thoughts

Marcelo: exciting

Early thoughts on this weekend's matchups:

Picking as many as you can from Real represents the biggest temptation this weekend - their match features the biggest disparity between two rivals with Los Blancos at home to struggling Hercules. With injuries still lurking for Ronaldo and Higuain, it makes Fantasy selection a lot more straight forward.

Benzema has been in fine form since the arrival of Adebayor and Mourinho started the two together against Santander. With Kaka perplexingly out of favour, there's every reason to expect the front four of Ozil, Di Maria, Benzema and Ade will start and amass a wanton load between them. If money allows, it would be prudent to squeeze in fullback Marcelo - sensational in the 7-0 drubbing handed to Malaga at home a fortnight ago.

On paper, Villarreal v Sporting Gijon should be a reliable source of points for the home side. However, since Sporting love an upset and Villarreal have been in such stumbling form, it could easily be a damp
squib. Nilmar at 18 and Rossi at 23 feel off-puttingly overpriced. Cazorla at 16 feels plausible, while Cani has dropped to 9 and in goal Diego Lopez has dropped nicely in price to 12.

Levante v Mallorca should be an exciting game for goals. Levante have been in fine fettle, especially at home, and it feels like Caicedo always scores at home. It is tempting to go for the Ecuadorian (14) and AN other. Perhaps the mysterious goal scoring wing-wizard Valdo - in midfield at just 8. Maybe Juanlu - highest scoring midfielder for LEV with 125 enjoys an SOT and an SC.

The rest of the ties feel murky and unpleasent. A standard routine win for the increasingly unlikeable Barca at the expense of Seville (missing Luis Fabiano for 6 weeks now). Almeria could upset the easily upsettable Atletico Madrid. Interesting to see what Piatti can do in this one for Almeria. Valencia look increasingly good and will surely triumph at Zaragoza. Never know where points are coming from with Los Che though. Not tempting enough to invest in this week.

Espanyol will surely get back to winning ways at home to the obdurate Deportivo. Looks like a good time to bring in Kameni in goal. Priced just 11. Also Galan is a perpetually good value defender at 1.

Sociedad will surely triumph over stinky Malaga. The only certainty is that Sociedad will score. Xavi Prieto is a temptation at 13. Agirretxe is the only fit striker and should start in place of injured Tamudo. Bravo in goal at 8.24 looks excellent value. Griezmann takes corners and scores goals. Valued 12.5. Expect Osasuna and Racing to be tight with a clean sheet for Ricardo. Getafe v Bilbao feels dreary.

Sat, Mar 12 ALM versus AMR
Sat, Mar 12 RZG versus VAL
Sat, Mar 12 MAD versus HER
Sun, Mar 13 SEV versus BAR
Sun, Mar 13 VIL versus SPO
Sun, Mar 13 LEV versus MAL
Sun, Mar 13 ESP versus DEP
Sun, Mar 13 RSO versus MGA
Sun, Mar 13 OSA versus RAC
Mon, Mar 14 GET versus BIL

Week 19: preview

Almería (19th) v Real Mad (2nd) (Sat)

Back in November, Barcelona put 8 past Almeria in a ruthless visit to La Liga' s minnows, and surely it will only be a matter of how many for Real. Mourinho has no new injury worries and it seems he will go with the same front 4 that beat Villarreal with Kaka likely to come off the bench again. It seems worth hanging on to the Brazilian (market 11.78, bought at 10.38) whose value is only going to go up, and the same should apply to Karim Benzema (m 12.81, b 11.69) with Mourinho, sort of backing the Frenchman this week.

Barcelona (1st) v Malaga (16th) (Sun)

And surely another routine win and a record for Barca against the recently moneyed Malaga. The Boquerones have added Julio Baptista, Ignacio Camacho, Sergio Asenjo, Enzo Maresca and Martin Demichelis, but this surely will not be enough to resist Messi et al. Unsurprisingly, in fantasy terms there are no great bargains to be had. Of the front three - Messi (45.83), David Villa (28.14), Rodriguez (21.14) - only the latter looks great value. Villa averages 13 but even when he scored last week, he only got 12.5. In midfield, it is tempting to take a punt on new signing Ibrahim Affellay (4.07), who was on the bench for the past two games and is surely due a first team opportunity soon.



Villarreal (3rd) v Osasuna (15th) (sat)

Surely a home win for the Submarine, who by many accounts gave Real a run for their money, despite losing 4-2 last week. With Ruben starting and scoring in that game in the place of the long term injured Nilmar, this unknown quantity looks set to continue up front with Rossi and looks a bargain at 6.55. In midfield, the attacking options of Cani (10.71), Carzola (15.26, averaging 8.03) or Valero (11.77) appeal. Also, Diego Lopez has to come into the fantasy goal, his price having sank to 11.26 thanks to his conceding 4 at Real. But the yellows can take nothing for granted; Osasuna's Ricardo was the top scoring goalkeeper last week at home to Getafe. Although, this may also say a lot about Osasuna's defensive short comings.

Ruben "Warpath" Villarreal, not to be confused with Ruben, Villarreal

Valencia 4th v Deportivo 13th (Sun)

Valencia have to be clear favourites, cruising into the game on a great run of form, while Deportivo will still be recovering from the 4-0 battering at home to Barca last week. Valencia's Juan Mata scored the only goal last week in their one nil win at Levante and, with the striker penning a new deal this week, looks a safe pick. Although, priced at 18.38, there may be some better bargains around (e.g. Ruben).

Sevilla 10th v Espanyol 5th (Sat)

This is the most closely matched tie of the round with both sides in fantastic form heading into this game. Sevilla have won 4 on the trot and in Kanoute and Fabiano have an in form, dangerous strike force. But, Espanyol have one of the best keepers in the league at the moment in Carles Kameni.

Athl Madrid 6th v Mallorca 8th (Mon)

This should be one of the games of the week but both teams are likely to cancel each other out. Forlan is tempting at 17 but the Uruguayan hasn't scored in La Liga for 6 weeks. Likewise, Aguero (20), is unlikey to have a great time against a decent Mallorca defence.

And the rest...

Saturday

Getafe 7th v Real Sociedad 12th 
Zaragoza 20th v LEV 17th 
Sporting 18th v Hercules 11th 
Athl Bilbao 9th v Racing 14th

Week 18: Kaka returns

Kaka came off the bench to score his first goal and points of this season, in only his second game since returning from the knee injury which has kept him out thus far. The Brazilian scored the 4th as Real Madrid extended the gap between themselves and third placed Villarreal to 11 points with a 4-2 victory at the Bernabeau.

Cristiano Ronaldo scored a hat-trick and assisted Kaka to score 37pts and take his tally for the season to 376.5, and his value to 46.84. Like Ronaldo, Messi hogged the points in his side's victory, scoring 25 as Barca tonked Deportivo 4-0 at the Rizor. (Total 330, value 45.83, avg 22 from 14 games.)

Ronaldo and Messi aside, the other striking performance of note was Seville's Freddy Kanoute who booted a mighty 27 as the southerners continued their recovery with their 4th straight victory. The Mali man scored twice in a 3-2 victory at Real Sociedad and Seville now lie 10th.

I had focussed my attention this week exclusively on Real Madrid (v Villareal), Mallorca (v Almeria), and Santander (v Gijon). 5 of my 11 came from Real Madrid. Ozil (paid 5.45, now 11.51) and Di Maria (6.11, 11.15) joined Kaka in midfield, and managed a miserly 4 and 0.5 respectively. I handed Benzema a striker's berth and he coughed up a reasonable 7.5 for his 11.56 value. The Frenchman has scored 10+ only twice (1 goal) in 17 appearances. With Higuain out for another 4 months, it seems likely he'll get another crack at the cherry against Almeria away next week. In defence I replaced card prone Carvalho with bargain R.Albiol, who at 2.81 managed -1 point.

Real Mallorca were an excellent resource this week as strikers E. Nsue (14.5) and M Perreira (8.5) and defender Ivan Ramis (11) all netted for me as the islanders battered lowly Almeria 4-1 in Palma to go 8th.

In goal, Racing Santander's Tono scored me a decent 14.5, despite the home side only managing a 1-1 draw against bottom of the table Sporting Gijon. The lad has done well considering I have him at 8.8 (now worth 12.9). Racing defenders Torrejon and the expensive Henrique were less impressive, registering 0.5 each.

Overall, the pick of the keepers was Osasuna's Ricardo (now worth 14.38), the former Manchester United keeper top scoring with 21 as 15th placed Osasuna held 7th placed Getafe at home in a scoreless draw. Espanyol's Carles Kameni remains second most expensive keeper (15.9 behind Valdes 20.38), scoring 18 as the 5th placed catalans thumped Zaragoza 4-0.

In defence, the top players were:

Didac, Espanyol, 15.00
Jose Angel, Sporting, 13.5
Rafa, Getafe, 13.00
Miguel, Valencia, 11.5

None of these guys scored a goal, and Jose Angel didn't even keep a clean sheet.

Jose Reyes

In midfield, former Arsenal forward Jose Reyes top scored with 20 and got his first goal of the season even while his team, 6th placed Atletico Madrid, were hammered 4-1 by the unpredictable Hercules (now 11th). Malaga's Duda deserves a mention with the 4th highest midfield score of 12.5 as he has emerged as something of a mystery. The former Porto man is the highest price midfielder by far at 20.17 (4 more than the nearest contender, Reyes), but has yet to score a goal this season and averages a relaxed 7.7 from 7 games.

Jose Reyes, A.Mad, 20.00
J. De Guzman, Mallorca, 16.00
Javier Martinez, At. Bilbao 16.00
Duda, Malaga, 12.5

Ex Premier league Quincy Owusu Abeye also plays for Malaga and scored 2.5. The former Arsenal, Birmingham and Portsmouth striker has not scored more than 5 since week 6.



Best possible side this week (not including Messi or Ronaldo)?

Kanoute, Sev, 27.00
Luis Garcia, Espanyol, 20.00
Luis Fabiano, Seville, 16.5

Jose Reyes, A.Mad, 20.00
J. De Guzman, Mallorca, 16.00
Javier Martinez, At. Bilbao 16.00
Duda, Malaga, 12.5

Didac, Espanyol, 15.00
Jose Angel, Sporting, 13.5
Rafa, Getafe, 13.00

Ricardo, Osasuna, 21

Total = 174.5


Winning side:

LUNG - 133pts

Ronaldo, Real Mad, 37
Kanoute, Seville, 27
Trezeguet, Hercules, 13.5

Vicente, Valencia, 2.5
Ozil, Real Mad, 4
Alonso, Real Mad, 2.5
Khedeira, Real Mad 0

Ramis, Mallorca, 11
Pique, Barca, 10.5
Carvalho, Real Mad, 1

Ricardo, Osasuna, 21