Fantasy review

Anelka: 70 points this season

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It was a good weekend for many of the Premier League's big guns with Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool all keeping clean sheets in convincing victories, and the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Nicolas Anelka and Steven Gerrard finding the target.

As ever there were also a number of surprise packages and it is the job of the Fantasy Review to highlight the biggest winners and losers from the latest round of Premier League fixtures.

Before we get to the players I must confess that I fall into the latter category this weekend after my three suggestions in last Thursday's Fantasy Preview all failed to impress.

Luka Modric has still to break his Tottenham duck after turning in a disappointing display in the 2-1 defeat to Fulham, while Theo Walcott rarely threatened to pick up extra points in Arsenal's shock 2-0 loss at home to Aston Villa.

The worst was still to come on Sunday as Pablo Zabaleta could not even collect a solitary appearance point, with Manchester City conceding two goals in their 2-2 draw against newly promoted Hull City.

The right Man City player to have tipped from this match in hindsight would have been Stephen Ireland. The midfielder grabbed two goals and the man-of-the-match award, although he did receive a yellow card to reduce his total to 11.

The top two stars of the weekend were the aforementioned Anelka and Ronaldo, who both amassed 12 points for their efforts.

Anelka took his total for the season to 70 points, and his monthly score to 34, with a brace in Chelsea's 3-0 victory over West Brom. The Frenchman was also named Man of the Match and will be licking his licks at the prospect of facing Newcastle at Stamford Bridge on Saturday.

Spectacular

Ronaldo did not pick up the man-of-the-match accolade despite netting two spectacular goals in Manchester United's 5-0 demolition of Stoke. He nevertheless matched Anelka thanks to his assist for Michael Carrick's strike.

Hot on the heels of Anelka, Ronaldo and Ireland were a host of players on eight points. Fulham's Simon Davies scored and got an assist against Tottenham, while Martin Laursen added an assist to his clean sheet in Villa's win over Arsenal.

West Ham goalkeeper Robert Green kept Portsmouth at bay with a string of superb saves to earn man-of-the-match recognition, while Jose Bosingwa continued his fine form with a goal and clean sheet against West Brom. The Chelsea full-back has accumulated 64 points already this season, a staggering amount for a defender.

Honourable mentions on their weekend's work must also go to Salomon Kalou, who picked up seven points for two assists, and Gabriel Agbonlahor, who scored seven for a goal and man-of-the-match award.

Blackburn may be on a seven-game winless run but there was some cheer for Christopher Samba fans at Ewood Park as the Congo international scored his side's goal and took the man-of-the-match prize to gain seven points.

Defenders from Liverpool, Aston Villa, Manchester United, West Ham, Portsmouth and Chelsea all boosted their totals with clean sheets but it was a different, more depressing story for those managers who put their trust in members of the Stoke or West Brom backlines.

While West Brom shipped three goals, Stoke's defeat to Manchester United cost each defender who completed the game (Andy Griffin was substituted before the last two goals went in) three points.

Emmerson Boyce was somewhat harshly sent off in Wigan's 2-2 draw against Newcastle and unfortunately the Fantasy Football scoring system is not quite advanced enough to compensate for dubious refereeing decision so he also dropped two points.

However, he had already completed a defensive game (at least 45 minutes) and was dismissed before Newcastle scored either of their goals so the damage was not quite as bad as it could have been.