Dream Team

A TIP of the hat to Martyn Frankson, Game Week 19’s top Dream Team gaffer.The Everton fan amassed 162 points this past week thanks to a healthy allotment of big names and a couple savvy bargains.
Let’s take a closer look at how he topped the pile…
A brilliant blendCredit: dream team
By now, Dream Team gaffers know that Newcastle’s defensive assets are ultra reliable and two more clean sheets meant Nick Pope (£5.3m), Fabian Schar (£5m) and Kieran Trippier (£6.6m) combined for 50 points.
The latter is now 21 points shy of bringing up his double century having earned a whopping SEVEN Star Man awards – the most of any player so far this season.
Martyn’s stroke of genius was not going all in on Eddie Howe’s defence; instead of backing Sven Botman (£4.7m) or Dan Burn (£4.9m) he opted for Lisandro Martinez (£4.4m).
The Argentine centre-back scored against Arsenal and earned a 7+ rating to counteract the minus points he endured because Man United conceded three to the Gunners.
Martinez then scooped a Star Man award after ensuring his side kept a clean sheet against Nottingham Forest in their Carabao Cup semi-final first leg in midweek.
The Red Devils’ No6 banked 19 points in total to finish level with Trippier as Game Week 19’s best defender.
Holy goalieCredit: getty
Both Kevin De Bruyne (£7.2m) and Riyad Mahrez (£6.1m) are among the top three midfielders overall and the Man City pair combined for a steady ten points this past week.
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Bukayo Saka (£4.3m) scored a wonderful long-distance goal on Sunday to pouch eight points at the expense of Erik ten Hag’s side.
Martyn brilliantly complemented these three popular superstars with Kaoru Mitoma (£2.6m).
The Japan international scored a pleasing curled effort from the edge of the box against Leicester, his fifth goal in his last nine games at club level.
The 25-year-old features in just 0.5% of teams which meant Martyn was among a tiny minority of managers who benefited from the winger’s 13-point haul.
One of many Brighton assets punching above their weight
In contrast, Erling Haaland (£9.1m) is by far the most-popular asset in the game with a massive ownership of 74.2%.
Man City’s prolific No9 scored his fourth Premier League hat-trick of the campaign to take Wolves for 28 points – his total now stands at a ginormous 256.
Elsewhere, Marcus Rashford (£5.7m) continued his scoring flurry with goals against Arsenal and Forest, he’s scored ten goals since returning from the World Cup.
Man United’s boy wonder added 16 points to his total this past week and his ownership is up to 31.7%.
Last but by no means least it’s Eddie Nketiah (£3.5m), another of Martyn’s savvy bargains.
Arsenal’s junior poacher bagged a brace in the entertaining 3-2 win over Man United and scooped the Star Man award in the process to claim 18 points.
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Impressive work from a Dream Team boss who clearly has his finger on the pulse.
Good luck to all gaffers for Game Week 20! More

IS it possible that Dream Team managers are sleeping on Lisandro Martinez (£4.1m)?That seems unlikely given the Argentina international recently won the World Cup – that sort of thing tends not to go unnoticed – but his current ownership of 6.8% feels a tad low all things considered.
We’ll give gaffers the benefit of the doubt and conclude that his popularity is still recovering from his absence post-Qatar when he was given extended leave to attend celebrations in his homeland.
However, the Manchester United centre-back underlined his viability with a mighty 19-point haul this Game Week.
Now a top ten defender in the realm of Dream Team!Credit: getty
The unstoppable Kieran Trippier (£6.3m) was the only defender to match Martinez for points in Game Week 19.
Racking up such a haul is difficult enough for a defender in normal circumstances but the 25-year-old managed to do it despite being part of a defence that conceded three goals at the Emirates on Sunday.
Martinez left north London with his head held high despite his side’s defeat to Arsenal because of his headed goal and a thoroughly deserved 7+ rating to pouch six points when all was said and done.
He then banked a further 13 points thanks to a Star Man display (and clean sheet) against Nottingham Forest on Wednesday night.
Game Week 19 was Martinez’s most profitable of the campaign so far and his overall of 87 points is enough to make him the tenth-best defender in the game.
Erik ten Hag’s side may have been humbled by the Gunners but, generally speaking, they have made big strides in recent months.
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The loss to Mikel Arteta’s troops is their only defeat in their last 12 games.
The Butcher stands tallCredit: getty
And a quick glance at the Red Devils’ upcoming fixtures suggests a good chance of more positive results to come.
They face Reading in the FA Cup this Saturday before fulfilling the second leg of their Carabao Cup semi-final against Forest, in which they hold a 3-0 aggregate lead.
After that they host Crystal Palace in the league before a double header against Leeds, who they have beaten heavily a few times since the Yorkshire club were promoted.
It depends on team selections of course, but Martinez will be eyeing his fair share of clean sheets and 7+ ratings from those five fixtures.
The ex-Ajax defender will surely be a relatively popular recruit once transfers are refreshed in February. More

THIS is it, the crescendo of Newcastle’s defensive dominance.On Tuesday night, the Magpies beat Southampton 1-0 in the first leg of their Carabao Cup semi-final.
Yet another clean sheet means that Eddie Howe’s first-choice back four now occupy the top four spots in the Dream Team rankings where only defenders are concerned.
The Fab Four
DREAM TEAM’S TOP 10 DEFENDERS

KIERAN TRIPPIER (£6.3m) – 179 points
FABIAN SCHAR (£4.8m) – 129 points
SVEN BOTMAN (£4.6m) – 103 points
DAN BURN (£4.6m) – 103 points
Gabriel (£4.7m) – 101 points
Joao Cancelo (£6m) – 99 points
Thiago Silva (£5.5m) – 99 points
Ben White (£5m) – 96 points
Diogo Dalot (£3.7m) – 91 points
Luke Shaw (£4.1m) – 79 points

Newcastle have kept 16 clean sheets this season, 12 of them coming in the Premier League.
As a result, Nick Pope (£5m) is the clear front runner in the race for the Golden Glove, he’s three clean sheets clear of his closest rival, Aaron Ramsdale (£4.2m), at this stage.
Naturally, the England international is also Dream Team’s outright best goalkeeper.
His overall tally of 126 points is 49 greater than that of David de Gea (£3.8m), the game’s second-best custodian at present.
Top of the classCredit: getty
Trippier remains the main man because of his sheer influence on every aspect of his side’s play.
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He wears the captain’s armband almost every week, is a key contributor to the string of clean sheets, and is hugely influential to the Toon’s build-up play, creating more than his fair share of chances.
As an in-form Swiss army knife, the England international has hoarded 7+ ratings for fun, 20 of them to be precise, more than anyone else.
Crucially, he’s also pocketed a whopping SEVEN Star Man awards, one more than Kevin De Bruyne (£7.3m) and Erling Haaland (£8.8m) have collected respectively.
With an ownership of 50% Trippier is the second-most popular player in the game – only runaway points leader Haaland appears in more teams.
Dream Team’s top defender (by a huge margin)Credit: getty
However, Botman and Burn feature in 6.6% and 5% of teams respectively, meaning the vast majority of gaffers have missed out on their significant returns in recent weeks.
Block picking defenders from one team has long been a legitimate tactic.
In recent seasons, backing three or four Liverpool, Chelsea or Manchester City defensive assets would have paid out huge dividends if timed correctly.
But 2022/23’s version feels different, probably because Newcastle players have not had European fixtures to bolster their schedule, not to mention the unexpected nature of their top four push.
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How long will Newcastle’s supremacy in this field last?
Well, they’ve got Saints again at home on Tuesday before they resume league duties against West Ham then Bournemouth, two teams in the bottom five… More

“Maybe Riyad had a problem coming back from the summertime, not the World Cup.”That was Pep Guardiola’s assessment of Riyad Mahrez’s (£5.8m) sluggish start to the campaign and subsequent resurgence.
The Algerian winger desperately struggled for rhythm in his first nine outings this term, failing to register a goal involvement or even a single Dream Team point.
However, he broke the shackles at the start of October with a goal and assist in a Star Man showing against Copenhagen in the Champions League and he hasn’t looked back since.
A man in formCredit: getty
Mahrez has scored ten goals and provided four assists in his last 15 games, a run that also includes four Star Man awards.
Having started Game Week 8 with zero points, the four-time Premier League winner is set to end Game Week 19 with 103 to his name.
Despite giving his peers a massive head start, Mahrez is one of only five midfielders to have celebrated their century at the time of writing, alongside Bukayo Saka (£4.1m), Martin Odegaard (£3.6m), Bruno Fernandes (£5.6m) and Kevin De Bruyne (£7.3m).
In fact, the 31-year-old is third among assets in his position right now, an extraordinary achievement given he essentially overslept at the start of the season.
Making up for lost timeCredit: getty
And it’s probably because of his false start that Dream Team gaffers have been slow to back Mahrez.
Even now, after 60 points across the last four Game Weeks, he only appears in 7% of teams – he’s less popular than Christian Eriksen (£3.4m), Pascal Gross (£3.4m) and Dejan Kulusevski (£3.8m).
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Having publicly acknowledged Mahrez’s poor form at the start of the campaign, Guardiola has heaped praise on the winger in recent weeks and while second-guessing the decorated tactician’s starting line-ups is easier said than done, this one seems like a lock for now.
It’s worth noting that Mahrez has outscored De Bruyne, Dream Team’s leading midfielder, by 24 points since that game against Copenhagen that started his fruitful run.
Got a transfer or two remaining from January’s allotment? You could do a lot worse than recruiting City’s No26. More

IMAGINE getting up early with a burning hangover to play university football and you’re directly up against Kaoru Mitoma (£2.3m).That was almost certainly the brutal reality for at least a couple of students as recently as 2019, when the Japan international was studying at the University of Tsukuba having turned down a professional contract with Kawasaki Frontale.
The 25-year-old did eventually sign with the top-flight club and enjoyed two prosperous seasons before being snapped up Brighton, arguably the Premier League’s smartest recruiters.
He spent last season on loan at Royal Union Saint-Gilloise, scoring eight goals and providing four assists for the Belgian club.
And now, quicker than expected, he’s become a regular starter for the Seagulls and a key player too.
Yet another success story for Brighton’s recruitment teamCredit: getty
Leandro Trossard’s (£4.3m) dispute with Roberto De Zerbi worked in Mitoma’s favour but the quick-footed winger has worked his way up the pecking order through a series of impressive performances.
He’s scored five goals and provided two assists in his last ten games at club level and has captivated fans with his enterprising dribbling and electric acceleration.
Mitoma actually wrote a thesis on dribbling as a university student, an act that taught him to keep his head up whenever possible, but it’s clear he was born with the necessary tools to become an elite athlete, attributes that can’t be learned from a book.
Sixth-placed Brighton have only tasted defeat once since the restart and that an entertaining 4-2 loss to table-toppers Arsenal.
This weekend, they drew 2-2 at Leicester and it was Mitoma who opened the scoring with a pinpoint curling effort from the edge of the box.
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And from a Dream Team perspective it was a particularly profitable excursion because he also swooped the Star Man award to bank 13 points, his joint-best single-game haul so far.
Mitoma has gotten the best of several right-back this season
Mitoma has now produced 60 points across the last eight Game Weeks.
At just £2.3m he’s the latest Brighton midfielder to off superb value for money in the world of Dream Team.
Pascal Gross (£3.4m) flew out of the blocks before passing the mantle to Alexis Mac Allister (£3.5m); recently Solly March (£2.6m) has provided healthy returns but now Mitoma has grabbed the spotlight.
Dream Team bosses in need of a cheap midfield asset capable of ticking over should permanently have one eye on the Amex Stadium, especially while De Zerbi’s tactics continue to ensure plenty of goals to go around.
There isn’t a right-back in the land who isn’t at least partially wary of facing Mitoma on current form. More

THERE’S an unwritten rule here at Dream Team HQ that states we never ignore a hat-trick.Given that the player in question usually banks 28 points as a result of scoring three goals in a game, we feel it’s always worth remarking on in one way or another.
But boy, is Erling Haaland (£8.8m) putting our rule to the test.
Just another day in the life of Alfie Haaland’s sonCredit: getty
Manchester City’s No9 scored all his sides goals in a 3-0 win over Wolves on Sunday to register his FOURTH hat-trick of the season.
The prolific striker is collecting match balls at such a rapid rate that it’s difficult to find a fresh angle each time.
Behold the Haaland paradox: when a hat-trick is both simultaneously unremarkable and astonishing.
Making a big thing of the Norway international’s performance at home to Julen Lopetegui’s side is like highlighting the fact the sun rises in the morning.
Equally, the fact he’s made scoring hat-tricks normal is incredibly abnormal.
To put the frequency with which Haaland is bagging triples into context, consider that Sergio Aguero currently holds the record for most Premier League hat-tricks with 12, achieved over nine and a half seasons.
Given that Haaland has four in half a campaign, we can perform a fun though experiment in which he remains a Etihad resident for as long as the legendary Argentine while maintaining his current rate, and therefore finishes his City career with 76 Prem hat-tricks.
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That’s obviously not going to happen but those numbers underline the freakish nature of his debut season on these shores to date.
Where is he keeping all the match balls?Credit: getty
Ruud van Nistelrooy previously held the record for the least amount of games needed to register four Premier League hat-tricks – the Dutchman achieved the feat in 65 outings, 46 more than Haaland.
The list of players with fewer hat-tricks to their name in England’s top flight includes revered goalscorers such as: Cristiano Ronaldo, Didier Drogba, Nicolas Anelka, Robbie Keane, Son Heung-min and Jamie Vardy.
On four hat-tricks, he’s currently level with Mohamed Salah (£8.6m) , Dwight Yorke, Teddy Sheringham, Fernando Torres and other notable names with years of Premier League experience.
If Haaland didn’t already have the Golden Boot sewn up then he surely does now – he’s on course for 50 league goals for crying out loud.
Harry Kane (£7.6m) is his closest competitor and the England captain is ten goals adrift.
Records are tumbling
There’s a similar gulf at the top of the Dream Team rankings.
The 22-year-old is 92 points ahead of the next-best forward, Marcus Rashford (£5.4m), and 84 points ahead of his nearest rival overall, Kieran Trippier (£6.3m).
To put that lead over the Manchester United man into context, Aleksandar Mitrovic (£5.1m), who is enjoying a brilliant campaign by anyone’s standards, has 91 points in total.
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Haaland’s current tally of 256 points means Ronaldo’s all-time record of 477 in a single season is genuinely under threat – a reminder that the five-time Ballon d’Or winner is the only quadruple centurion in our beloved game’s history.
Let’s circle back to this topic the next time he scores a hat-trick… call it a fortnight. More

IF Arsenal do win the Premier League title this season – and such talk is warranted given they’re on track to achieve 100 points – then Eddie Nketiah (£3.2m) will deserve his fair share of the plaudits.When Gabriel Jesus (£5.3m) was sidelined with an relatively significant injury, there were plenty of fans and pundits who doubted whether the Gunners could maintain their momentum.
The Brazilian No9 scored five goals and assisted another five in is first 14 league games for his new club, gluing the front three together beautifully.
In addition, many observers had already questioned whether Arsenal had the necessary depth to sustain their impressive results – Man City’s second-choice XI is considerably stronger.
However, Nketiah has led the line superbly since the restart, scoring six goals in as many games.
Do you owe Nketiah an apology?Credit: getty
Sunday’s main event played host to the 23-year-old’s crowning moment as he scored a brace against Man United to help Mikel Arteta’s side to their 16th victory of the league campaign.
In an age of false nines, Nketiah is a striker in the mould of a classic poacher.
While limited in regards to some technical aspects of the game compared to Jesus, Nketiah has razor-sharp instincts when inside the opposition’s box.
His predatory nature was fully on display against the Red Devils as he scored a close-range header to capitalise on hesitancy from Aaron Wan-Bissaka (£3.3m) before his improvised finish in the 90th minute bagged all three points.
A prolific scorer at youth level for England, his prowess in the penalty area has rarely been doubted but there were question marks over his ability to link up with Bukayo Saka (£4.1m), Martin Odegaard (£3.6m) and Gabriel Martinelli (£3.6m) in the same effortless manner as Jesus.
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So far, Nketiah’s contribution to Arsenal’s build-up has been greater than expected, much to Arteta’s relief, and more than a few doubters owe the young forward an apology.
The Gunners haven’t missed Jesus as of yet
And his success is plainly there for Dream Team managers to see as well.
An 18-point haul at the expense of David De Gea (£3.8m) and company means Nketiah has banked 49 points in the space of six games since the restart.
Hat-trick machine Erling Haaland (£8.8m) was the only forward to register more points at the weekend.
At the time of writing, Nketiah features in just 2.1% of teams – the slim of minority of gaffers who recruited him in the wake of Jesus’ injury have been handsomely rewarded.
On top of everything else, he’s extremely affordable at £3.2m. More