Fantasy review

Beattie: 12 points

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There were plenty of thrills, spills and surprises during the latest round of Premier League matches as Chelsea and Liverpool both suffered defeats and Manchester United moved to the top of the table.

The weekend started with Wayne Rooney, Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard all ruled out through injury, no doubt sparking some frantic late changes for Fantasy Football managers across the land.

Rooney, Gerrard and Torres are unquestionably three of the finest players in the division and anyone who took their eye off the ball and perhaps left one of them as captain will have been cursing their luck when the realisation dawned.

Not being able to rely on some of the usual suspects for points arguably made the weekend's action more compelling, with others coming to the fore and producing the sort of performances that will have made their managers proud.

Top scorer

James Beattie was the top scorer with 12 points after netting twice in Stoke's 2-1 victory over West Ham at the Britannia Stadium and walking away with the Man of the match award.

Surprisingly, nobody else reached double figures but there were a glut of players who earned eight points on another high-scoring weekend.

Charles N'Zogbia was recognised as the Man of the Match after scoring for Wigan in Sunday's 1-1 draw with Manchester City, while Diniyar Bilyaletdinov performed similar heroics to rescue a point for Everton against Wolves.

Abou Diaby struck Arsenal's second in the 3-1 victory over Birmingham and was hailed as the star of the show, while James Collins also picked up a Man of the Match prize after netting the winner for Aston Villa against Chelsea.

Ledley King popped up with an unlikely goal to help Tottenham see off Portsmouth, David Dunn maintained his magnificent form with an inspirational display against Burnley and Blackburn team-mate Franco Di Santo also contributed a goal and an assist, although he dropped a point after receiving a yellow card.

The amount of goals being scored during the early part of the season has been staggering and certainly makes for entertaining viewing, but a shared frustration among Fantasy Football aficionados has been the lack of clean sheets.

Defensive frustration

There was further evidence this weekend that every team in the league seems to have forgotten how to defend, or is simply too interested in attacking, with Sunderland the only side to keep their opponents at bay.

Phil Bardsley stood out in the Black Cats' back-line during the 1-0 success against Liverpool and also emerged with eight points after being picked out as the Man of the Match.

Reds fans will argue they might not have conceded either had it not been for the freak goal scored by Darren Bent off a beach ball at the Stadium of Light.

It is hard to explain why one young Liverpool supporter might have thrown the beach ball onto the pitch but perhaps he had picked Bent in his Fantasy Football team and become so immersed in the game that he decided to help out in whatever way he could. But we can only speculate.

There were no heavy defeats this weekend but Birmingham and Burnley both conceded three goals and several of their defensive players picked up bookings. Joe Hart and Liam Ridgewell were both cautioned for Blues, while Clarets trio Clarke Carlisle, Tyrone Mears and Brian Jensen were also yellow carded.

Wolves striker Stefan Maierhofer and Michael Brown of Portsmouth were both sent off. Tottenham's Jermain Defoe also saw red on his return to Fratton Park but, having scored earlier in the match, he still finished with three points.

Mixed bag

Finally, let us review the predictions of self-appointed Fantasy Football expert James Pearson in last week's Fantasy preview, which turned out to be a mixed bag.

Arsenal midfielder Cesc Fabregas did well to collect four points for an assist, but Peter Crouch did not start for Tottenham and picked up just a solitary appearance point for coming on off the substitutes' bench.

The third player to be recommended in our preview, Diomansy Kamara, is in action for Fulham against Hull City on Monday night and we will be back with more hints and tips ahead of next weekend's games.