This article is part of our Fantasy Premier League Rankings series.
Fantasy Premier League players who have Marcos Alonso on their teams, whether in salary cap or draft, have been increasingly frustrating with the Chelsea left-back, as his returns haven't been nearly as good as they were earlier this season. One of the highest-scoring players in FPL last season after recording seven goals, two assists and 13 clean sheets, Alonso started off this term with a bang, registering one goal, five assists and two clean sheets for 44 fantasy points through his first four starts.
That high total after just four matches gave him a commanding start to the season and helped him become the second-highest scoring defender through 23 gameweeks. There's been some pushback recently on his FPL viability because he has only two assists and seven bonus points in the last 19 gameweeks, and it opened up the discussion a bit about the importance of past points for your FPL teams (with or without Alonso).
The point I was trying to emphasize about Alonso being the second-highest scoring defender is that even if you've been disappointed with his recent results, you've still benefitted from his points all season, with only Liverpool's Andrew Robertson scoring more (129 v. 120). And while everyone wants to point out that Alonso was one of the most expensive defenders this season (either in salary cap cost or high draft pick for the position), again, he's returned more points than all but one player. Or if you want to complain that they all came early in the season, we see thanks to fplstatistics.co.uk that Alonso has reached at least five fantasy points 13 times this season, which also only trails Robertson. It's easy to cherry pick a few gameweeks and show how many defenders have outscored Alonso over a certain time frame, but my podcast co-host Mike Gottlieb correctly points out that all we're doing there is comparing everyone else's best against Alonso's worst. Sure, you can always transfer Alonso out in salary-cap formats, but how often do you want to use a transfer on a defender, especially one who has scored more fantasy points than all but one other defender? There's one other important benefit to having Alonso in your team: you don't have to worry about whether you need to replace him or not, which allows you to focus on more volatile options in midfield and forward. If you want to spend transfers each week trying to get ahead on whenever Matt Doherty or David Luiz or Ricardo Pereira, be my guest, but it'll start handcuffing you a bit when you try to load up on Manchester United players after Jose Mourinho gets canned, for example.
There are few defenders who offer Alonso's upside as well, one that we've been unlucky to see more often this season thanks to his league-leading six shots that have hit the woodwork. If just one of those shots goes in, we could be talking about the highest-scoring defender in the game, and half of them going in would have made him the fourth-highest scoring player overall, ahead of every forward.
Is Alonso is great form lately? No. But selling him because of poor returns only brings in a more volatile player who may have produced more in recent weeks but is hardly guaranteed to keep that going.
And before you say "Lucas Digne has been so much better, I'd rather have him than Alonso!" my response is that you should have both and you should have had both for the past two months.
If you are looking for deeper statistical breakdowns for the upcoming gameweek, we are now offering full 10-match cheat sheets for subscribers that includes bookmaker odds that break down which teams have the best win and clean sheet odds, as well as their implied goal totals, anytime goal scorer odds to show which players they think are most likely to score, detailed free-kick trackers to see which players could have extra opportunities to create chances, as well as fully sortable tables with a number of peripheral stats including chances created, tackles won, interceptions and fouls drawn to help those in fantasy formats that go beyond the Premier League's official game.
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MATCHES (EST)
TUESDAY
2:45 pm: Arsenal vs. Cardiff City
2:45 pm: Fulham vs. Brighton & Hove Albion
2:45 pm: Huddersfield Town vs. Everton
2:45 pm: Wolverhampton vs. West Ham United
3:00 pm: Manchester United vs. Burnley
3:00 pm: Newcastle United vs. Manchester City
WEDNESDAY
2:45 pm: AFC Bournemouth vs. Chelsea
2:45 pm: Southampton vs. Crystal Palace
3:00 pm: Liverpool vs. Leicester City
3:00 pm: Tottenham Hotspur vs. Watford
Yellow indicates questionable to play.
