Spy Talk: Answering the big questions, Rd 5

• SUPERCOACH 101: Four rounds in, what have we learned so far?
• STAT ANALYSIS: Vital numbers to beat the best, Round 5

Hey Gang!

I’m flying home from a holiday in Queensland and thought it would be the ideal time to look at some key issues in the SuperCoach world.

From a personal standpoint I’ve scored 1477 last week and came into 2000^th overall.

I’m really happy with my side this year having nailed most cash cows and already owning sought after players like Brian To’o and David Fifita.

I’ll look to capitalise on this by either saving trades or producing a couple of calculated POD plays for games where I see a big mismatch.

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Ideally I’d want to target some guys who have a stretch of good matchups over a two or four week period. See Alex Johnston below.

While I do this it will allow my other guys to hopefully continue scoring well and get towards peak price where I can then upgrade to a better option or downgrade for a new cash cow.

Let’s get into it!

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1. Is D Fifita really emerging as a must-have?

In short, I think he is. The concern around Fifita was always his semi lack of base points, but in 2021 so far the Titans are getting him plenty of ball and a lot of it being quality ball which hasn’t just increased points from runs, but also tackle busts (which Fifita is simply elite at) as well as offloads.

This leads to a really good floor and we already know what he can do with regard to linebreaks, assists and tries.

He could have some monster scores this year and barring injuries/HIAs he looks locked in for 65-70 most weeks even when he is a little quiet. Find a way to get him ASAP! The same goes for Brian To’o, he is simply a stud.

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2. Bye Planning – How much thought do I give it at this stage?

Bye-planning is a great tiebreaker if you can’t decide between certain guys. When in doubt, absolutely grab the player who plays Round 13 (the first bye week).

Taking out Origin players I currently have around 11 bye players which I’m happy with. I’ll probably aim for around 15 come that first bye and 16-17 if I can make it happen.

But 15 I think is great because you can then hold the likes of Teddy, Cleary and Papy without having to get them back after and use extra trades in the process.

There will be some more analysis on byes to follow once we get a little closer, but if you only have say four or five bye players currently maybe look to add a few over the coming weeks.

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3. People are dropping Teddy. Is this crazy?

In short I’d only be dropping Teddy for Ryan Papenhuzyen. Otherwise just leave him there and enjoy the ride. Last week Teddy scored 71 and he had two teammates bomb try-assists and he also had a bad night with the hands.

He was very close to another 110+ and we know how busy he will be every week. Points will come.

For those who took the punt and dropped him just pray he doesn’t ton up because if he does his price will hold. Another couple of 60-70s though and you will be laughing!!

4. The way it’s going I want to have backs from the best teams. Especially before a good run of fixtures.

Last week I was lucky enough to own a bunch of Penrith players against Manly. It amounted to mass points for me.

I also grabbed a Souths player specifically for the next two weeks and had Papy against Brisbane.

There are some good options from other teams, but the way these elite teams are piling up points I want to own guys who are in the halves, fullback or are on the end of that backline so I can really cash in when these demolition jobs occur!

Think Cleary, Papy, Teddy, To’o, B.Morris, Luai, Munster, Walker, A.Johnston (with risk) to name a few!

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5. Is Papenhuyzen emerging as a lock in skipper?

In short, most weeks yes! I think when Melbourne have a game they should win easily and given Papy is goal-kicking it’s very hard to go past him. He seems to get better by the week.

Teddy will be an interesting watch over the next month to see how he looks. He will be a gun no doubt, but could Papy potentially surpass him? I think it’ll be close!!

6. Front-row still appears to be a place to save money. I want high upside backs.

As discussed above, I want to target backline players from the gun teams.

If that means I have Christian Welch plugging away and averaging me 60 odd for a while I’m fine with that.

Front-row will be my last place to upgrade unless I’m forced into it with injury or underwhelming performances.

7. Don’t be afraid to sell a cash cow a touch early if you have a plan.

For example I sold Tesi Niu last week to get Alex Johnston. It didn’t work out, but AJ could well ton up this week and make it worth the while.

There is obviously risk here, but the idea is that I’m backing myself and whilst not all decisions will come off, as long as you are chasing high upside scorers against struggling teams you should win in the long run.

It only takes one score of 120+ to make up for a couple of low scores. If you can nail a couple if these in a row you will be flying.

I’ve gone a bit of tangent, but in short don’t be afraid to sell a cash cow a little early (say $50k before peak price) if it means an attacking move.

Note – Tesi played far better against Melbourne then I expected and AJ had a tough day, so they don’t all come off but I’ll be cheering home that Souths left edge tonight and hoping Tesi sticks to scores in the 40s. Don’t let one low score from a guy like this get you down.

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8. Don’t panic. I saw someone last week go from 100,000th to 8000th in one weekend!!

Things can change very quickly in this game! Don’t do anything too crazy and make sure you keep chasing skippers with monster upside. A couple of big weeks can send you flying up the leaderboard.

9. Save trades where possible!

This is a golden rule. By all means if you need to trade and your trades have merit go for gold as the quicker we lock in our best squad the better, but any trades you can save if your squad looks good for the week could be a huge difference maker come the back end of the season.

And it’ll help with the bye period as well. Trust me, if you can it’ll be worth it.

Well I’m about to land so I’ll cut things off there. See everyone on the podcast next week and enjoy the weekend of footy! Any questions hit me up on Twitter ideally and I’ll try to answer as many as I can.

Cheers, Spy.