I can't say initial thoughts as I've changed this quite a few times already and may well tweak a little later on depending on team news today, but anyway, current line-up.

4-4-2

Given 3m - likely to be this season's value keeper, if he stays fit and Villa perform as expected under McLeish, reasonably solid defence and a safe mid-table season. 1m cheaper than Hart allowing more budget for the rest of the squad. 80-90 points would be about right, anything more a bonus.

Hangeland 4m & Huth 3.8m - pairing these 2 as they've similar attributes, both play for sides that will produce a fair few CSs and they both regularly get on the end of set pieces. Last season's 148 & 154 points hauls would be nice if repeated but anything over 120 would represent value.

Riise 3m - back in the EPL, a FB that likes to get forward that may also get used at LM (if Fulham have another LB to play behind him), sticks in decent crosses & free kicks so should pick up a decent number of KCs and has been known to get his name on the score sheet. I also have a soft spot for him as it was 2 goals from him that won me a YTM MotM way back, just hope he isn't past it now . Looks to be incredible value if he stays fit and should hit the 100pt mark.

Enrique 3.6 - the answer to all of Liverpool's LB problems! Or so we're told anyway The rebuilding appears to be going well, we expect Liverpool to be better in all departments this season and challenging strongly for a top 4 finish (or better), he managed 93 points at Newcastle last season so exceeding 100 this should be a doddle.

Lampard 6m - a little bit of club bias here, first name on the team sheet for me If last season's injury troubles are out of the way then he's going to be one of the top, if not the top scoring midfielder again. Even with missing a good chunk of last season he scored 13 goals and was the 7th highest scoring midfielder on 140 points, no reason to believe that he won't be pushing back up towards 200 points right now. If there's any reason to drop him (injuries, 3-0s, he gets shifted to CB, whatever) then all but 11 strikers can replace him if I'm at full budget.

Nani 5.8m - I've probably been swayed by his 2 goals in the CS, 171 points last season but just 9 goals, is he going to be more of a goal threat this season or, as many seem to think, constantly at risk of rotation with Young, Valencia and Park? If he doesn't fall foul of rotation and adds more goals to his game then we're looking at him pushing on beyond last season's points haul towards the 200 mark as well. Plenty of scope to replace him at any time, only Lampard is more expensive in the midfield list and there are 14 strikers priced above him.

Downing 4m - 141 points last time playing for Villa, he only scored 7 goals so it's the KCs that counted mainly for him, playing for a better club and with Carroll to aim for, surely he'll at least match that and be great value as long as he performs, delivers and keeps his place? Plenty of other options in the price range should he need replacing.

Murphy 2.9 - 2 goals last time isn't a great return for a penalty and set piece taker, surely he has to score a few more this time around? 97 points last time so matching that would represent good value at the price regardless. Should be a safe enough pick anyway to start the season whilst we wait for any other sub-3m players to emerge.

Rooney 7m - joint most expensive player in the game with Tevez meaning all other options are available at any time. Last season firstly Berbatov then Hernandez were the Man U strikers to have, 21 & 14 goals respectively against his 12. If he's not playing up front and scoring frequently then he doesn't represent value, if he's not going to be scoring around 20 goals then he's far to expensive to keep in the team. Very tempting with West Brom first up but realistically if I know Berbatov will start the season I'd be more inclined to play him and switch to Hernandez when fit and that's if I really want 2 Man U players in my front 6. I think that I'm talking myself into changing him later on today If Mancini comes out and says Tevez will start on Monday ......

Carroll 6.5m - hmm, 3 Liverpool players in my X1, haven't had that for a few seasons. The fact is that he was my 2nd choice after Lampard. Natural goal scorer, good in the air and can use his feet well, had a few personal problems, the English Drunken Ferguson There's been a bit of debate as to whether the best option would be him or Suarez, I can envisage Suarez doing a lot of the work with Carroll getting the lion's share of the goals and the glory. Of course Carroll may provide a few knock downs for Suarez or the midfield to run onto, so good KC potential too. Happy to start with him anyway.

£49.6m spent so a little spare to play with.

No Man C or Arsenal players and just the one from Chelsea. Murphy the only one that could be classed as an enabler, well Given is too I guess, but barring injuries, as usual the idea is to leave the back 5 alone as much as possible. They all have the potential for a constant tick over of points, offensively as well as defensively.

I'll see how Nani and Rooney (unless I change him today) start off, these are the two slots I'm most likely to rotate as other players come into form and have what look to be decent runs of fixtures and as any changes here give me more budget to play with then I have more flexibility to switch Murphy and formation.

Comments welcome.

Given is a very interesting shout at that price. Yet somehow he's the only one of those players not featuring in any of my 13 teams. I think that's my mistake not yours though.

I have to question Carroll. He's still unproven in the Liverpool squad so possibly overpriced. But I've picked him to so I get the appeal of him.

Good team

<begging> don't suppose you could drop by my thread for a rate. I'd managed a hundred views on it before I'd even posted a team there so it would be nice to have some audible company! <\begging>

Sky Sports, Mancini confirmed Tevez wont play against Swansea due to lack of match fitness .

I was considering Drogba until AVB said Torres is fit and ready to play might end up going with Rodellega as Wigan have a decent looking first few games

Riise and Murphy both taking FK's for Fulham? (And Duff takes corners from one side at least - well he took the one that Johnson headed in against Split.)

As long as they hit Hangeland on the head and go in then I get the KC and the goal
Duff will spend most of the season injured yet again.

Wow... A team substantially different to most others here, yet you make some compelling cases...

SO many choices and conflicting ratonales. To quote Alan Partridge, "It's not arousing, it's just confusing!"

Don't make me go back and reshape my entire starting eleven from the ground up...

Having *good* reasons for doing something doesn't necessarily result in good decisions

Good team Vid, similar to a fair few of mine. I don't have any Rooney coverage though, as I think he will be dropping deeper with Hernandez up top in the main. Will still score well, but I don't think he will be VFM.

As a Liverpool fan, I have a lot of Suarez, but hardly any Carrolls (maybe 1 or 2 over all comps). Suarez will be at the heart of everything we do this season, and I just fancy him to score big. It could be Carroll who scores big though, or most likely both

Only other concern would be Nani rotation.

41 points from the first set of matches, mid-table in the Open XI ML (11th/21) 12 off the top and 14 clear of the bottom, about average then

Thoughts from what I've seen, I'm happy with the back 5, no reason to think that they won't achieve the points I expect over the season, yet.

A different ref could easily have given Chelsea 2 pens, as long as players are running into the box with the ball they will come, free points for Frank, eventually.

I'll give the Downing/ Carroll partnership time to show if they're going to produce or not.

As said above I'm not sure about Nani & Rooney, even though Rooney scored the whole team laboured a fair bit, might be shifting Nani out in the near future, Young looks to be the one to have in Man U's midfield, but there may be better value away from Man U.

After watching Aguero's debut no doubt many others will also be thinking that he could very quickly become a "must have", waiting could prove very costly.

Thoughts right now are Murphy Formica (2.6m midfielder playing as a striker) to give me the extra needed to move to 4-3-3 with Nani Aguero and stick with Rooney for a few more games.

4 days to think about it

Nice team Vid, I see you are 0.2m short to get Aguero in for Nani but you can always ditch your TFF favourite....

TFF favourite? If you mean Mr Lampard then he's a fixture across the board

Up to 136 and 5th in the Open ML, 19 pts off the lead, all to play for here.

Waiting on definitive news regarding Riise, I'm fairly sure that I want to take Nani out with Silva, Young and Nasri being the main candidates to bring in (in price order). I want to give Carroll more time but a slightly cheaper option would enable me to bring in Young and Nasri for Nani and Murphy but I may sit on the transfers for a little while longer, I'll see what sort of mood I'm in after the internationals.

I'm thinking that I need some Arsenal and Man City presence in my front 6, Nani and Murphy can go and do I continue to wait for Carroll to "fit in" as Mystery said above? Comments regarding his fitness and attitude from Capello may go a way to explaining why he isn't featuring for Liverpool even though Dalglish has defended him publicly, a lot of money sat on the bench for both me and Liverpool whilst others are doing the business. If I remove Carroll then I'll probably take Downing out to as I picked him to hit Carroll on the head with crosses.

I'm quite happy to sit with the back 5 as they are whether Riise is injured or not for a few weeks longer.

From Arsenal - Walcott, Arteta or Benayoun? All have their merits and injury risks. Will Arteta take some set pieces off RVP? That would probably just be enough for me to swing it in his favour but there's the nagging feeling that Walcott could hit the goal trail big time. Benayoun, is he going to be a regular starter? If so then he will produce very good points for his price range.

Man City - Tevez, Aguero, Dzeko, Silva, Nasri to name but 5. Tevez is a goal machine, fancied to make his first start of the season and will give his all and once he's back in the team will surely be a fixture, until the January transfer window at least It appears that Dzeko's place is the one under threat, a strange decision if it comes to pass given how well he combined with Silva and Nasri against Spurs. No question that these two will provide plenty of chances for whoever plays up front and each other. And there's the record signing Aguero who looked to have settled in immediately and along with Silva appear to be the safest selections in terms of being definite starters for the time being.

I'll stick with Lampard until we see how well (or poorly) Chelsea perform with Mata and Meireles in the line up, with maybe Sturridge being given a run and maybe Torres finally starting to score goals, I might need that 6m to switch to a 4-3-3 or 3-4-3.

Several hours yet before I have to make a decision.

3 transfers made

Given
Hangeland
Riise
Huth
Enrique
Lampard
Nani Walcott
Downing
Murphy Cahill
Rooney
Carroll Tevez

transfers remaining: 27
budget remaining: 0.5

With Tevez starting today as said above, I fully expect him to keep his place in the team and score for fun.

Believing Walcott to be the major goal threat from Arsenal's midfield I've gone with him.

Not sure where the Cahill selection came from, I've put him in elsewhere as he's playing up front but with no recent form he's probably not a sensible selection here.

17 points scored last week, the lowest of all the open XIs and have dropped to 15th, 44 points off the lead.

The Tevez move clearly didn't work, do I immediately concede defeat and that I've wasted 2 transfers to change him again?

Same with Cahill, still no idea what possessed me to bring him into this team, it looks like he'll still be playing the lone striker role which isn't ideal, with Man C, Liverpool and Chelsea up next the chances of him finding the net when marked by CBs instead of midfielders must be remote.

Is Lampard's starting spot really under threat? Leave him in and see 6m sat on the bench or take him out and see a couple of goals fly in?

Downing? I was going to shift him out at the same time as Carroll but left him in for another week, time to look elsewhere?

Walcott not starting doesn't help matters either, the potential is there for a massive points haul but not whilst he's sat watching the team getting demoralized yet again.

Still happy to let the back 5 run on for another few weeks although switching to a 3-4-3 may have merit.

Tevez, Lampard and Downing out would add 17m to the 0.5m in the bank.

Spurs appear to have a decent run of games coming up, VDV & Adebayor for 10.7m? 2 slots from the same club or spread it around?

Jump on the Aguero bandwagon before everyone else disappears completely out of sight? Or maybe Torres who surely has to get it all together very soon and help me gain ground?

I haven't used any enablers at all and there are a few low priced front 6 players steadily racking up points so far, Di Santo at Wigan @3.7m has outscored not just all other players in that price bracket but also most of the premium priced players too. Larsson at Sunderland @3.3m another to consider, both teams have decent fixtures for the next couple of months, but not to use them as enablers, just straight picks and leave a few million hanging around until later in the season. (I'll have a look at my Tiny side again a bit later)

It all boils down to the same questions most of us have right now, do we save transfers and hope/ pray that Rooney & Aguero don't continue as they've been so far and that the players we have instead start firing in the same way? Use transfers to bring them in to hold the gap and maybe a couple more to try to find someone to close it? Try to find the next bandwagons before they start rolling?

3 more transfers made

Given
Hangeland
Riise
Huth
Enrique
Walcott
Downing Silva - can't afford not to have some sort of Man C representation
Cahill
Lampard Torres - probably a bad move but it might work out
Rooney
Tevez Adebayor - shifting the bench warmer back out for an in form striker

transfers remaining: 24
budget remaining: 0.5

Given
Hangeland
Riise
Enrique
Huth Mata
Walcott
Silva
Cahill Modric (a few weeks ago)
Torres Drogba (following Torres suspension) Aguero
Rooney
Adebayor

transfers remaining: 20
budget remaining: 0.0

Missed a couple of transfers about a month ago, 2 more made yesterday, this team is not going well!

Another month passes, no transfers made, actually had a decent 55 point week (3rd best of the Open teams), still sitting mid-table, now 89 points behind Razorback.

Modric has done me no good whatsoever, brought him in for wk 8 and has returned a stunning 11 points in that time, a bad selection.

The last time Rooney scored more than 2 points was back in wk 8, his 2 very good weeks (3 & 5 - 40 pts) is a very long time ago now. Of course always the risk that as soon as he's taken out he starts on a scoring spree, but that 7m may well be used better regardless.

Just need to look at the next half dozen or so fixtures to see whose form is going to drop to a 2 pointer's