Our Gameweek 16 Hot or Cold article is here to outline the current prospects of key Fantasy EPL players. Our 'Hot' or 'Cold' status will help take away your emotional attachment to certain Draft Premier League players and help you bring in the players that you need to help you dominate your Fantrax Draft League!
These Hot or Cold ratings are based on the data contained within the Weekly Rest-of-Season Rankings : the Draft Society's exclusive weekly refresh of Fantasy EPL prospect rankings!
Gameweek 16 Hot List
These are Fantasy EPL players that have risen in our Weekly ROS Rankings! Keep an eye on these Draft Premier League players, and bring them into your Fantrax squad if you can.
Kaoru Mitoma
Position: Midfielder
Team: Brighton
GW15 Rank: 142
GW16 Rank: 65
What's Changed?: The hype train is here! Totti mentioned that Mitoma would be included in his Waiver Wire article every week until he reaches over 40% rostered, and I'm fully on board. His low ranking in my GW15 ranks was more reflective of the uncertainty surrounding his starts, but after what we've seen over the last couple of weeks I have no hesitation on that front any more. The 2 gameweeks prior to GW14 he was unavailable through injury but managed to earn his first start against Chelsea and he really hasn't looked back. He bagged an assist and 7 ghosts in 72mins, then followed that up with a goal and 10.5 ghosts against Wolves in GW15, nearly playing the full 90mins. Not content with that he came on at half time in the League Cup on Wednesday night against Arsenal, scoring the winning goal in the tie to take Brighton through to the next round. The 25 year-old winger has had to bide his time, going on loan to Belgian side Royal Union SG last season after being signed for a relatively modest fee of £3m from Japanese J1 League side Kawasaki Frontale. He made a number of substitute appearances under Graham Potter (that were extremely ghostie given the limited minutes), however he now appears to have earned new manager De Zerbi's trust.
Mitoma is an explosive player, playing as an inverted winger he's always looking to carry the ball into the box from the left side to create dangerous chances, so far he has completed 2.7 dribbles per 90. He doesn't just look to carry the ball with his feet though, as we saw against Wolves he looks to play on the last man and run in behind to get on the end of long balls, which ultimately ended up with Semedo getting sent off. So while he isn't likely to pick up points for accurate crosses, do expect him to get into the box and supply his team mates with chances, so far he has generated 0.63 xA/90 and picked up 3 key passes per 90, very nice numbers indeed! Also see his 19.1 PP90 and 12.8 gPP90, clearly this is over a small sample size and I wouldn't expect him to keep that up given the sub appearances but it's a great indicator of his potential as a Fantrax asset.
Recommendation: As Mitoma is just 34% rostered at the time of writing, he might be available in your league, if so drop what you're doing and go pick him up now! In more competitive leagues it may be difficult to prize him away from a more knowledgeable manager. If I was to attempt to bring him in, my first port of call would be bigger names who have disappointed, someone like Raheem Sterling (see Cold section), or another player I featured in my Cold section last week in Jack Harrison.
Morgan Gibbs-White
Position: Midfielder
Team: Nottingham Forest
GW15 Rank: 122
GW16 Rank: 85
What's Changed?: While Gibbs-White's 8.6 PPS doesn't appear amazing, if you look closer on his more recent form there is a lot to like, 11.3 PPS and 7.8 gPPS in the last 6 games. This was achieved during a run of tough games including Liverpool, Arsenal and Brighton, but GW15 against Brentford was the cherry on the top, with a magnificent goal from outside the box and a hefty 12.5 ghosties. According to our Set Piece Tracker he commands 78% of Forest's set pieces which ranks him 3rd, only behind set piece God James Ward-Prowse (99%) and James Maddison (84%). This is a significant number, taking 4.3 set pieces per 90 gives him a nice baseline contributing to 26% of his fantasy points, with the potential for him to explode at any time with his ability to dribble and get a shot away. Forest's form has definitely improved, and while I don't think they have completely turned the corner, they now actually have a solid performances in them and it appears that MGW is really benefitting from that acting as the talisman for the team and making things happen.
Recommendation: Forest now enter a great run of fixtures, sitting in 2nd for midfielders in the next 6 matches so I would snap him up if you can. He's another player who has likely been in and out of the waiver wire since the start of the season, at this point most leagues will have cottoned on by now, but if not he's a great pick up. I don't normally recommend bringing players in on a high, but if you could do a deal where you give up someone like Hojbjerg who is massively overperforming his expected points and sits just above MGW in total FPts, that would be great. I would probably go as far as giving up a bigger name like Jadon Sancho, who doesn't appear to be in Ten Hag's preferred XI. If you wanted to sell on a high off the back of the big GW15 performance, you could shoot for someone like the aforementioned Mitoma.
Leon Bailey
Position: Forward
Team: Aston Villa
GW15 Rank: 103
GW16 Rank: 83
What's Changed?: While it seemed likely that Bailey would get the nod for new manager Unai Emery, given that he likes wingers in his system (and he's the only player you could really class as a winger in the Villa squad), there was still uncertainty until we saw the first line up against Man United. But as expected Bailey started and put in a really promising all action display, racking up 9 ghost points to go with a very well taken goal. Question marks will always remain over his fitness given he spent over 2 months out with injury last season and just couldn't manage to get consistent time in the squad after that. However, he's been fit and available all season, starting 11 of the 14 matches Villa have played and is clearly having his minutes managed, typically being substituted around the 70min mark. He's blown a bit hot and cold as Villa struggled under Gerrard, with his 8.5 PPS ranking him 69th for players with 7+ starts, however his recent form has been more promising with 9.7 PPS in the last 6 (ranking him 45th) and I expect that to continue with the new manager bounce under Emery.
Recommendation: If there was a time to trade Bailey in, it was probably last week, but if the manager who rosters him is wary of the injury problems you may get some value in a deal. I would look to move out someone like Willock for Bailey or even Sancho/Hojbjerg as mentioned above.
For the full list of Gameweek 16 risers, check out our Weekly ROS Rankings page!
Gameweek 16 Cold List
These are Fantasy EPL players that have fallen in our Weekly ROS Rankings. This may be due to poor form, being dropped from the preferred XI, suffering an injury, or receiving a suspension. It's time to consider trading or dropping these Draft Premier League players from your rosters!
Raheem Sterling
Position: Forward
Team: Chelsea
GW15 Rank: 40
GW16 Rank: 70
What's Changed?: For a player likely taken in the first round of the draft, Sterling's numbers make horrible reading; from 11 starts he 's scored 3 goals (3.0 xG) and provided 1 assist (2.1 xA), on his way to a paltry 7.0 PPS and 4.5 gPPS. Yet, the most worrying thing is he appears to have gone downhill since Graham Potter arrived. Not only has he been benched for 2 of the 7 games since Potter's arrival, but he has been shunted all over the pitch, at times being deployed as a wing back similar to how Potter used Trossard at Brighton. This has played out in the numbers, in his 6 starts for Tuchel, Sterling averaged 9.8 PPS (4.6 gPPS) and under Potter this has reduced to just 3.6 PPS (4.4 gPPS). He hasn't even managed to increase his ghost point output in that wing back role to offset the lack of attacking returns. He has had a steep drop off in terms of expected goals and assists too, under Tuchel he was generating 0.37 xG and 0.23 xA per start, while under Potter that has decreased to 0.16 xG and 0.1 xA. He hasn't been unlucky, he's just not in the right position to get the attacking returns that he needs to make him a viable fantasy asset.
Recommendation: At this point his value is so low you've got to just wait and hope the World Cup shakes him back into form and/or Potter comes to the realisation that Sterling is best placed nearer to the goal. Chelsea have a really nice set of fixtures after the World Cup so you could do a lot worse than wait and see if he can come good for that run and look to trade out. However, as mentioned above if you somehow managed to get the Mitoma manager to bite, I'd happily trade Sterling out for him right now.
Jack Grealish
Position: Midfielder
Team: Manchester City
GW15 Rank: 30
GW16 Rank: 37
What's Changed?: I had so much optimism for Grealish this season, I had envisaged him on the left and Foden on the right delivering chance after chance for Haaland. But that optimism quickly eroded as early as the 2nd game of the season, where he was benched before suffering an injury that put him out for 3 GWs. Since then he's suffered from Pep Roulette, starting 5 out of the 8 games he's been available in the Premier League, yet he's started 5 of the 6 Champions League games. This really isn't what you want to see as a Fantasy manager, you don't want another Riyad Mahrez on your hands! OK, it's not that bad, but going forward can we really expect more than around 60% starts for Grealish in the Premier League? I would take that if knew he would be lighting it up, but short of a goal and 21 FPts against Wolves in GW8, it's been rough. From 6 starts he's got 1 goal (0.7 xG) and 1 'fantasy' assist (0.8 xA), averaging just 8.8 PPS (5.8 gPPS), really not what you want from your 2nd round pick. There is some optimism as he ranks 4th in the Premier League for Shot Creating Actions with 5.59 SCA/90, so he's super involved when he's on the pitch, unfortunately it's just not generating high quality chances at the moment. This number is also slightly inflated as we've become accustomed to Grealish being substituted early, averaging 78 mins per start. In fact Grealish's one assist of the season was for doing what we know best of him, being fouled, which allowed KDB to score a monster free kick. It's a murky picture but it still seems like Pep's system is stifling him in terms of his fantasy points celling that we saw at Villa.
Recommendation: A month is a long time in football, especially when Grealish has a chance to show what he's got on the big stage at the World Cup. For managers who roster him I would advise to hold, unless one of your fellow managers wants to pay over the asking price, maybe to complete a city handcuff/stack. At this point I would probably take Palace boys Eze or Olise for Grealish if you could make that happen.
Marc Cucurella
Position: Defender
Team: Chelsea
GW15 Rank: 87
GW16 Rank: 96
What's Changed?: Cucurella had stubbornly stayed around 60 in my ranks for a long time, there was always something that made me hesitate to drop him further, whether it was a good in real life display (despite a poor fantasy score), an assist, clean sheet or the injury to Chilwell making him potentially more appealing as a wing back. However, he's now dropping like a stone, the numbers are just horrendous - in 11 starts he's averaged 4.2 PPS (4.4 gPPS) which includes 2 assists and 2 clean sheets. To make an extremely unflattering comparison, these are Kyle Walker type ghost numbers, without anywhere close to the optimism you have of a clean sheet as you do with Man City.
Recommendation: There's no chance I would stream him away at Newcastle this weekend, so I would happily drop him straight to the waiver wire and not look back. Look to target a GW16 streamer or a potential stash for the World Cup period.
For the full list of Gameweek 16 fallers, check out our Weekly ROS Rankings page!
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