The first blank gameweek of the season is upon us, with players from Southampton, Arsenal and both Manchester clubs absent this weekend. Read on as we analyse the clean sheet and goalscoring odds for the remaining 16 clubs in action to help you with those all-important transfer, captaincy and squad selection decisions…

Defensive odds

Team Best clean sheet odds Implied chance of a clean sheet Chelsea 1.87 53% Tottenham 2.1 48% Everton 2.15 47% Crystal Palace 2.25 44% Liverpool 2.45 41% Hull 2.5 40% West Brom 2.8 36% Middlesbrough 3.3 30% Watford 3.3 30% West Ham 3.55 28% Burnley 3.75 27% Bournemouth 4.2 24% Leicester 6.1 16% Sunderland 8.4 12% Stoke 8.7 11% Swansea 11 9% Man Utd No fixture No fixture Arsenal No fixture No fixture Man City No fixture No fixture Southampton No fixture No fixture

Chelsea top the bookies’ defensive rankings for Gameweek 26 with a 53% chance of keeping a clean sheet when they host Swansea in Saturday’s lunchtime kick off. Antonio Conte’s men have kept 7 clean sheets in 12 league games at The Bridge this season, conceding only 7 times at home, so Marcos Alonso, with his additional attacking threat (4 goals this term) makes our starting XI.

Tottenham (48%) rank second ahead of a home meeting with Stoke. The Lilywhites have kept clean sheets in 5 of their last 6 outings at White Hart Lane, while Stoke blanked in their last away game at West Brom. With Danny Rose still on the sidelines, Ben Davies offers us a cheap route into the Spurs defence and starts for our squad.

Completing our starters at the back are two value options in Ramiro Funes Mori (47%) and Wayne Hennessey (44%). Everton have registered shutouts in 2 of their last 3 at Goodison Park, whilst opponents Sunderland have failed to find the net in half (6) of their away games this season. Palace, meanwhile, are favoured by the bookmakers, not because of their own defensive proficiency (1 clean sheet at home this campaign), but because of their goal-shy opponents. Middlesbrough have failed to score in 4 of their last 5 on their travels.

To fill the remainder of our defensive slots, we opt for Hull’s budget shot stopper Eldin Jakupovic (£4.0m – 40%) as our backup keeper, with his teammate Andrew Robertson (£4.5m – 40%) and Sunderland’s Joleon Lescott (£4.0m – 12%) taking the second and third spots on our bench respectively.

Before moving onto our analysis of the bookmakers attacking odds, a quick look at the bottom rungs of the clean sheet ladder tells us that defensive assets from Sunderland (12% – away to Everton), Stoke (11% – away to Tottenham) and Swansea (9% – away to Chelsea) should be avoided this weekend.

Attacking odds

Player Best anytime goalscorer odds Implied chance of scoring Diego Costa 1.63 61% Romelu Lukaku 1.7 59% Harry Kane 1.85 54% Eden Hazard 2.12 47% Daniel Sturridge 2.5 40% Salomon Rondon 2.5 40% Dele Alli 2.6 38% Christian Benteke 2.65 38% Pedro 2.7 37% Sadio Mane 2.7 37% Son Heung-Min 2.7 37% Kevin Mirallas 2.75 36% Roberto Firmino 2.8 36% Philippe Coutinho 3 33% Willian 3.15 32% Ross Barkley 3.2 31% Andy Carroll 3.25 31% Troy Deeney 3.25 31% Christian Eriksen 3.35 30% Jermain Defoe 3.5 29% Adam Lallana 3.75 27% Nacer Chadli 3.75 27% Alvaro Negredo 3.8 26% Jamie Vardy 4 25% Michail Antonio 4 25% Benik Afobe 4 25% Sam Vokes 4 25% Adama Diomande 4 25% Cesc Fabregas 4.1 24% Robert Snodgrass 4.33 23% Matt Phillips 4.4 23% James Milner 4.6 22% Shinji Okazaki 4.9 20% Fernando Llorente 5 20% Manuel Lanzini 5 20% Yohan Cabaye 5 20% Cristhian Stuani 5.1 20% Andros Townsend 5.1 20% Tom Davies 5.3 19% Fabio Borini 5.4 19% Junior Stanislas 5.4 19% Wilfried Zaha 5.4 19% Peter Crouch 5.5 18% Marko Arnautovic 5.6 18% Etienne Capoue 5.6 18% Gylfi Sigurdsson 6 17% Adama Traore 8 13% Scott Arfield 8 13% Tom Carroll 26 4% Sergio Aguero No fixture No fixture Zlatan Ibrahimovic No fixture No fixture Alexis Sanchez No fixture No fixture Gabriel Jesus No fixture No fixture Theo Walcott No fixture No fixture Kevin de Bruyne No fixture No fixture Henrikh Mkhitaryan No fixture No fixture Alex Iwobi No fixture No fixture Yaya Toure No fixture No fixture Raheem Sterling No fixture No fixture Nathan Redmond No fixture No fixture Paul Pogba No fixture No fixture Mesut Ozil No fixture No fixture Leroy Sane No fixture No fixture Dusan Tadic No fixture No fixture Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain No fixture No fixture

After returning to goalscoring ways in the FA Cup, Diego Costa captains our side this weekend, with the bookies affording him a 61% chance of scoring against Swansea on Saturday. The Swans have failed to keep a clean sheet in their last 11 away from home in the league, providing the fiery Spaniard with the perfect opportunity to add to the 15 goals he has already scored this season.

Joining Costa up front in our starting XI this weekend are 2 of his Golden Boot competitors – Romelu Lukaku (59%) and Harry Kane (54%). A home game against bottom side Sunderland bodes well for Everton’s Belgian striker, who has scored 6 in his last 3 at Goodison park, and also notched a hat trick against the Black Cats in the reverse fixture earlier this season. Likewise, Kane has scored 4 in his last pair of outings at White Hart Lane and faces a Stoke team that have conceded an average of 2.5 goals per game on their travels recently (last 4 matches). The England hitman also scored against this weekend’s opponents earlier in the campaign.

In the middle of the park, we double up on Chelsea’s attacking assets, with Eden Hazard (47%) rated by the odds compilers as the most likely midfielder to score this weekend ahead of his match against Paul Clement’s unit, whilst we also double up on London rivals Tottenham, with Dele Alli (38%) making our starting XI too. Both men are already into double figures for the Premier League campaign, with 10 and 11 goals respectively.

Philippe Coutinho (33%) and Kevin Mirallas (36%) complete our midfield for Gameweek 26. Coutinho should have favorable working conditions away against a lacksture Leicester-side. Mirallas, meanwhile, completes yet another attacking double up for our squad, joining his teammate and fellow countryman Lukaku in our side. The Belgian will be hoping the visit of Sunderland will help him build on the 3 goals and 4 assists he has registered for the Toffees this term. Etienne Capoue (18%) takes the first spot on our bench as the budget midfielder of choice for the gameweek.

The bookies also fancy the chances of Pedro and Heung-Min Son, but the duo are overlook as we have already maxed out our allocations of 3 Chelsea and Spurs assets respectively, whilst Liverpool duo Sadio Mane and Roberto Firmino are just a touch too expensive for our squad this weekend.