Boxing Day Eve Open Thread

merry christmas, y'all.

Hope you’re having a happy, restful day - Christmas celebrations or otherwise. Tomorrow is one of the best days of the FPL calendar and after a crazy start to another COVID-interrupted season it will be nice to see six matches kicking off across four times and the gameweek wrapping up in just two days. Of course, it has to wrap-up in two days because GW 16 starts on Monday! That weeks ends on Wednesday and we get one whole day off before Friday, 1 January starts the New Year and GW17, with the return of 10 matches, 10 kick-offs across four days.

So that’s it - just one FPL-free day between today and January 5th, I hope you and your team are rested. Don’t forget to start the year with a subscription to get everything I write all year, including the Summer 2021 Draft Guide!

If you had a day (or a year) where you needed a lift and can’t swing a subscription drop me a DM on Twitter or a reply here and I’ll be happy to gift a few today!

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Injuries are everywhere.

Ben Chilwell, Reece James, Tariq Lamptey, Ezri Ngoyo and Jannik Vestergaard were all injured before the last week kicked-off and are now joined by Kyle Walker (COVID) leaving defensive ranks thinner at the top. This opens streaming options so keep an eye out for lineup announcements.

James Rodriguez is still going to be out a few more matches, and both Stuart Armstrong and Dwight McNeil are carrying knocks in the midfield. Up front Gabriel Jesus joins teammate Walker with COVID. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is dealing with a slight knock plus the interminable morass of being an Arsenal player. Both Richarlison and Danny Ings are struggling for fitness at the moment with the Brazilian much more likely to be back soon, though he’s just 50% per Ben Dinnery for Boxing Day. The quote from the manager on Ings is particularly hilarious (unfortunately so):

"Will he miss the weekend? We'll have to have a look. We have a lot of games coming up. This is definitely not the best time to be injured. I mean nobody can play a PL game without training during the week so... time is running, and we must have a look tomorrow, and on Friday." -Ralph Hasenhuttl

Michail Antonio is in the same boat as Ings, struggling with full recovery for a team which has other options up top but unquestionably prefers to have their studs leading the lines. Further weakening the position is Ollie McBurnie who is out with a shoulder injury and has been labeled as ‘touch and go’ for the next three games. This would be when I typically scream about adding Lys Mousset, but the French forward has been struggling with an ankle injury since returning from a long layoff and has only 63 minutes across three appearances in the last five matches. In deeper leagues he’s still an add with Everton (H), Burnley (a), Palace (a) and Newcastle (H) the softest stretch the Blades will face. These are must-win, or at least take points, and Chris Wilder must - finally, at long, long last - give Mousset minutes if he’s fit to start.

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This is going to be a wild couple of game weeks so I’m not sure what the publication schedule will be like but I’ll leave this thread open until I start a new one. As always, this is open to everyone so please share the link on Twitter or forward this email to your FPL friends and rivals! You know the drill.