As Santa squirms his 56 waist down my 54 chimney and quaffs mulled wine and mince pies lovingly laid out by my mother, he may well find in that moment of indulgent quiet the perfect time to ponder Fantasy Football manoeuvres - for GameWeek 18 kicks off on Boxing day and you can't be too prepared for a festive season replete with snowdays, sapped hammies and rotated left-backs. So stock up on brussels sprouts, fill your necks with brandy butter and prep yourself to indulge in one almighty Xmas Fantasy Feast - And don't you dare do it without hoovering up all this here below wisdom the three Kings of Bantasy Football have to bestow upon you.
Throwback to when Miley Cyrus was the most objectionable thing going on in the world
Three Wise Men
The Virgil Van Dijk (5.7) -- Southampton
The Virjil Mary has been bringing Gold for the Saints this term, stoking them on to five clean sheets in a row before they finally conceded against Bournemouth last week. If you're scouting a premium defender, and bonus points are your thang, you'll be pleased to know he's second in that regard and shows no signs of stopping.
The Saints have a toughie against Spurs on Wednesday but the Saints will go marching into 2017 with tails bushier than the fluffiest squirrel. Just Petr Cech out these fixtures:
More green there than at a Californian hippie convention.
A potential £50m move to Manchester Shitty could scupper his appeal but it may be a risk worth taking - even if he stays at Soton until the end of Jan, you'll get bang for your buck before he joins the Guardiola pass-it-round-the-back-til-you-gaffe-massively convention.
Divock Origi (6.8) -- Liverpool
This just makes frankincense and you know it. Klopp's moulding his Divock Swayze-style into a bona fide lone striker and it's paying big fat turkey dividends. four goals on the trot and 7 bonus points since Jurgen saw the light of this pace merchant's talent.
If you can get the lad spearheading an attack that's boshed in 19 goals in their past 8 games - and for the peanut price of 6.8 - you'd be crackers not to say "yes". Just because it's obvious doesn't mean it won't work:
Theo Walcott (7.8) -- Arsenal
Myrhh, allegedly
"Not being funny, mate - You've just gone and brought me rocks, haven't you?"
- John to whichever 'Wise' King thought he could get away with bringing the Lord and Saviour pebbles for a birthday present. What a plank.
I'm not sure quite how Walcott fits in as Myhrr in this strained Xmas analogy - although I imagine the above image is a decent representation of what the inside of his patellar tendons look like. Injuries are always on the horizon with this chap - but he can be a Fantasy dynamo if you time your purchase right.
Back-to-back home games - against manager-less Crystal Palace and soon-to-be-manager-less West Bum - should yeild at least four goals between them - and you'd be stunned if Theo weren't at least heavily involved. His playing time has been decent lately too, and he's only being subbed every other game. Get him in; feel wise AF later.
Keep the Faith
Harry Kane (11.2) -- Tottenham
A whole lot of Fantasy managers, including yours truly, are rightly miffed after the HurriKane double blanked while hosting Hull and Burnley - not least as we (rightly, I might add) captained the sucker.
The 100,000 greenhorns who've transferred him out, though, are premature reactionary jessies with memories shorter than a midget elf. Kane is Spurs' talisman; he was the top scorer in the Prem last year, and he hasn't played badly since coming back from injury - he simply wasn't presented with any gilt chances in the past two matches.
If he stays fit he will score goals aplenty. Don't throw your toys out the pram and make a mahoosive mistkae* just because you got the unexpected - be pleased that Spurs' mids are getting in on the action because Kane can rack up assists as well as goals if the likes of Alli and Eriksen don their shooting stockings.
*typo not corrected for comedic effect.
Jingle Balls
Sadio Mane (9.4) -- Liverpool
The ballsiest move you could make this time of year is to bring someone in for short-term gains only. It's a giant risk - and that's another way of saying it's pants-on-head retarded - but if you back yourself to make so many points out of Sadio between now and the African Cup of Nations and/or have a stringent early January Wildcard plan to which you will invariably stick, then be my guest.
Otherwise this move is more balls than balls, and you'll be jumping for joy instead of jumping for joy (see below to get joke).
Pics of the Year
Merry Xmas / Happy Holidays / Cracking Christmukkah / Krazy Kwanzaa everyone! And may 2017 rain Fantasy points down upon you.
