Here at Twelve, we’ve been wondering if we can use our algorithm in order to do well at fantasy football. To test the theory, we’ve been playing Draft Kings‘ weekly Premier League game, in which you have to select players from their chosen matches.

Our performance has been on an upward trend, but we’re still short of taking home the cash prizes. Perhaps as more player data is accrued for 2018/19, we’ll get even better? We can but hope. Here are the matches for this week’s game, which players would you select?

We’ve run the data on these teams and created a leader board which you can find here. Due to the constraints of the game, we can’t simply take the top eight players from the list for our team. You need to be realistic too; Jorginho may make more passes than a Tony Pulis team, but while he scores well with us he doesn’t contribute much that will earn fantasy football points. The leader board is our starting point, but some creative licence is required too.

Who’s in the team?

The top three players on the chart are all Chelsea players, so Eden Hazard and Marcos Alonso make the side. Next on the list is Mohamed Salah so he’s in too, though this may backfire as Chelsea host Liverpool on Saturday evening (and our preview of the match is worth a read). But while they may not all get the clean sheet points, there’s still points to be won for shots and crosses. All three should do well.

Harry Maguire is our top ranking defender from the eligible teams this week. Old Slabhead is up against Newcastle, so has a decent chance of keeping a clean sheet. Next in line on the chart is Shane Duffy, but we’ve overlooked him in favour of Aymeric Laporte, who is behind him.

Their teams face each other on Saturday, funnily enough. As that means it’s Manchester City vs Brighton, it’s clear which defender is more likely to concede several goals. The Seagulls are poor at defending set pieces too, so perhaps Laporte can weigh in with a goal.

That just leaves two slots in midfield to fill. We’ve opted for Roberto Pereyra (our player of the week from week one, and 10th in the rankings this week) and James Maddison (who is 21st). Both have started the season well, and aren’t too expensive to acquire.

Here’s our full team. How do you think we’ll get on? If you pick a team, post it in the comments below. Good luck!