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Mohamed Salah (captain), Liverpool, £12.9m – away at Southampton
The way Salah is producing at the moment, giving him the captain’s armband is a no-brainer.
He has seven double-digit returns in 11 games so far, which is astonishing. A pessimist would say that he can’t carry on at that rate of production – if he does he’s on for a record 369-point season – but an away game at Southampton doesn’t feel like it’s going to be a stumbling block.
Salah has so many routes to production. Last gameweek was classic Mo – non-owners were escaping with just an assist – with Villa chasing the game and the Egyptian pouncing on a counter-attack to score with his only shot on target late on.
Bruno Fernandes, Manchester United, £8.4m – away at Ipswich
With the same reasoning as Salah, I’m rolling with Fernandes who is a man in form and has underproduced based on his underlying statistics.
Gameweek 11’s 17-point haul was coming and the Portuguese maestro often produces FPL points in spurts.
Dwight McNeil, Everton, £5.7m – home to Brentford
McNeil is back to fitness and he has been Everton’s talisman this season.
Three goals, three assists and an involvement in 60% of the goals in games he has played.
Everton have only scored 10 this season but if they can’t find the net against Brentford, who have the joint-second-worst defence with 22 goals conceded, then they are in trouble.
Emile Smith Rowe, Fulham, £5.7m – home to Wolves
The former Arsenal midfielder was a pre-season player to watch for me but is making his debut in the team of the week.
Like McNeil, ESR has become a key player for Fulham and he is returning roughly every other game.
He’s got a knack of arriving in the box at the right time and it wouldn’t be a surprise if he ends the season close to 10 goals – he has three so far in 11 games.
Double Olympic triathlon champion Alistair Brownlee has announced his retirement from the sport at the age of 36.
Brownlee won gold at London 2012 before defending his title in Rio four years later.
A world champion in 2009 and 2011, Brownlee is the only triathlete ever to be crowned junior world champion, U23 world champion, European champion and Olympic champion.
“Triathlon has profoundly shaped my life. I have dedicated nearly half of it to being a professional athlete, fulfilling my childhood dream and achieving far more than I ever dared to imagine,” Brownlee wrote on X.
“I look forward to embracing a slightly slower pace of life, yet not too slow.
“There’s an exciting array of events, challenges and adventures awaiting me — things I’ve always wanted to have a crack at but haven’t had the chance to pursue.”
Brownlee captured a legion of fans by winning gold on home soil in London 2012.
His brother Jonny took bronze and the pair have competed against one another on the biggest stages ever since.
Shortly after London 2012, the pair launched the Brownlee Foundation, a charity aiming to inspire children from all backgrounds to take up the sport.
In 2016, Alistair helped his brother over the finish line at the Triathlon World Series event in Mexico when Jonny started to wobble on the home straight.
Jonny, two years younger than Alistair, was leading the race when his legs started to give way in the Mexican heat.
Alistair, who was in third position at the time, propped his brother up for the final 700m and helped him over the line to finish ahead of him in second place.
Earlier that summer, Alistair became the only triathlete in Olympic history to successfully defend his crown by winning gold at Rio 2016.
It’s hard to find a real standout among the options available. It is even more difficult if you start to compare any potential purchase to Rodri, who is the best in the world.
Zubimendi has defensive qualities that will stand out to City – his tackles (2.6), interceptions (1.1) and clearances (2.2) per 90 minutes are the best among the players highlighted in this piece.
His passing accuracy is pretty solid at 86.9%, but his number of attempted passes is among the lowest. However, you have to take into account the team he’s playing for. Sociedad are a good team, but sit eighth in La Liga – he’d see even more of the ball at City.
It also depends what type of midfielder City target and what role they expect them to play when Rodri returns.
Rodri himself is versatile and has developed his game to add more dribbling and drives forward – it’s not out of the question he’d move into a centre-midfield role upon his return.
That may mean City want a defensively sound option, such as Zubimendi or Wharton.
If Rodri stays in the six role – defensive midfielder – then City may opt for a ball-playing midfielder and that means Reijnders and Calhanoglu (he has the highest passes into the final third among the contenders) come to the fore with their impressive passing accuracy.
There’s also the unknown. Torino, who Ricci plays for, are currently 11th in Serie A. He’d be alongside better players and have more of the ball at City. Is there untapped potential for City to unlock?
It might sound obvious when we say that India have scored more runs than Australia in the past two series, but that really was one of the key differences.
In the 2018-19 series, India’s average first-innings score of 327 dwarfed Australia’s 253. That gap was reduced to 15 runs (288 to 273) in 2020-21.
India’s top six in 2018-19 averaged 37.5, compared to Australia’s 27, but the hosts squeezed that last time.
India’s middle order (five to eight) outscored Australia comfortably in both series (34 to 24.9 in 2018-19 and 33.4 to 26 two years later).
However, there are concerns about India’s batting after their series against New Zealand.
They only made two scores of 250 or more in that series, and were bowled out for 46, 156 and 121 across the three matches.
Rishabh Pant, who has been crucial in their previous wins over Australia, is in form and averaged 43.50 in that series, but captain Rohit Sharma averaged just 15.16 and Virat Kohli 15.5.
Yashasvi Jaiswal (31.66), Shubman Gill (36) and Sarfaraz Khan (28.5) also struggled, as only Pant made more than one half-century in the series.
Kohli and Rohit only average 22.72 and 29.4 in Tests in 2024 and it is hard to see India winning if those numbers don’t rise.
Rohit will miss the first Test for the birth of his second child so India will have to find a new partner for Jaiswal at the top of the order. Bowler Jasprit Bumrah will lead India in Rohit’s absence.
Giannis Antetokounmpo put in a dominant performance as he scored 41 points to help the Milwaukee Bucks to a 122-106 victory over the Chicago Bulls.
Antetokounmpo, who has scored 40 points or more on three occasions this season, added eight rebounds and nine assists, while team-mates Brook Lopez and Damian Lillard contributed 21 and 20 points respectively.
Zach LaVine top scored with 27 points for the Bulls, who reduced their deficit to 104-102 with just under eight minutes left before the Bucks pulled away.
The victory continued a resurgence for the Bucks as they claimed a fourth triumph in five games after winning just two of their first 10 and they are now ninth in the Eastern Conference.
The Cleveland Cavaliers bounced back from their first defeat of the season with a convincing 128-100 win over the New York Pelicans.
Ty Jerome scored a team-high 29 points for the Cavaliers, who had their 15-game winning streak ended by the Boston Celtics in their previous game.
Jerome landed six of his seven three pointers for the Eastern Conference leaders in a second quarter in which he scored 20 points.
“It was great. Those moments don’t happen a lot in the NBA,” said Cleveland coach Kenny Atkinson.
“It was a superstar performance. It was great for the crowd, great for the group and great for Ty.”
The Golden State Warriors, who are top of the Western Conference, beat the Atlanta Hawks 120-97 to record a fifth straight home win.
Andrew Wiggins scored a game-high 27 points for the Warriors, while team-mate Stephen Curry added 23.
Super League champions Wigan Warriors will start the 2025 season with a home game against Leigh on Thursday, 13 February.
Beaten grand finalists Hull KR welcome Castleford the following evening and promoted Wakefield travel to Leeds Rhinos on the Saturday.
BBC Sport will show St Helens’ home game against Salford later on Saturday afternoon, while Catalans Dragons welcome Hull FC on the Friday night and Warrington Wolves travel to Huddersfield in the weekend’s final match on Sunday, 16 February.
It was announced earlier this week that Magic Weekend, where all 12 teams play at the same venue across one weekend, will be held at Newcastle United’s St James’ Park on 3-4 May.
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