PlayTheGame

Three players have made their PlayTheGame debuts after turning out for their clubs. They are:
- Scott Sinclair, Forward (Chelsea)
- Mohammed Shawky, Central Midfielder (Middlesbrough)
- Martin Olsson, Centre Back (Blackburn Rovers)

Please note that Vedran Corluka, the Manchester City defender, is now also eligible to appear in Central Midfield after appearing in the position in recent Premier League fixtures (thank you Stephen, Karin, Ian and Ali among others for bringing this to our attention).

Please note that Kevin Kilbane, the Wigan midfield player, is now also eligible at left back after appearing in the position for his club. The Ireland international now becomes eligible as a defender and midfield player and will score in the five categories applicable to whichever position he occupies in your PTG team.

The January transfer window opened at the beginning of the month, but it wasn't until the games on the 12th and 13th of January that these new boys had their first opportunity to turn out for their new clubs.

Participation in the Premier League makes players eligible for PlayTheGame and nine new players have been added this afternoon.

Franck Songo'o – Portsmouth, Central Midfielder
Jonny Evans – Sunderland, Centre Back
Tamir Cohen – Bolton Wanderers, Central Midfielder
Jonathan Grounds – Middlesbrough, Centre Back
Nery Alberto Castillo – Manchester City Forward
Laurent Robert – Derby County, Central Midfielder
Danny Mills – Derby County, Centre Back
Moustapha Salifou – Aston Villa, Central Midfielder
Emanuel Alejandro Villa – Derby County Forward

Ryan Taylor, the Wigan defender is now also eligible as a Left Midfielder after playing in this position in recent Premier League games. Thank you to everyone who bought this to our attention.

Please be aware that Dean Whitehead, the Centre Midfielder of Sunderland is now eligible to play at Right Back in your fantasy teams. Whitehead is only currently owned by 2% of the managers in PTG, but maybe his new eligibility makes the player more appealing.

Whilst we are all used to setting our team and checking the latest league table, PlayTheGame has more functionality available if you scratch beneath the surface. In the first of a new series, we take a look at some of the things you could be missing.

The statistics page (which can be found as an option under the 'Research' tab) has been recently updated with increased search functionality. It is an invaluable resource for any PTG manager to assess how players are performing, and scouting out new players to add to their squad.

Dropdowns have been added to enable managers to sort by more than one category at a time. This includes the ability to search by ‘Out-of-Contract’ players in the ‘Status’ dropdown - particularly useful if you are looking for available players.

PTG managers can now assess players form using the ‘Timeframe’ dropdown. As before you can look at a players performance over the season, but you can now judge players over the last 5/10 games that the players team has played.

The dropdowns can also be used to search by player position, premier league club, PTG scoring categories or number of ‘minutes played'. If you want to look at a specific player, simply enter the players first or last name into the search field and click ‘find’.

Lastly if you want to change the order in which the data is displayed (ascending or descending), just click the category header at the top of the table.

With the January transfer window open, and new players coming into PTG, (once they have played for their respective Premier League team) there’s never been a better time to utilise the statistics page and maximise your squad’s potential through the second half of the season.

There are four players who have recently made their debuts for their Premier League clubs. More importantly for PTG managers, this means they are now eligible to be added to your teams

Kazenga LuaLua, the brother of the Portsmouth striker made his Premier League debut for Newcastle on Saturday. Kazenga is eligible as a Forward

Gretar Rafn Steinsson who signed for Bolton from AZ Alkmaar has made his debut and is eligble as a Centre Back.

Lewin Nyatanga made his Premier League debut for Derby after being recalled from Barnsley. He is eligible as a Centre Back.

Marek Matejovsky, the Reading Central Midfielder is also now eligible to be added to your PTG team.

After coming on as a substitute in the 70th minute the new Liverpool Centre Back, Martin Skrtel made his Premier League debut and has been added to PTG.

Despite it being the FA Cup fourth round this weekend and a scheduled blank weekend for the Premier League, due to Aston Villa and Blackburn's exits in the third round they have re-scheduled their match planned for Wednesday 30th January to this Saturday, 26th January.

Following on from the fourth round there is then a full Premier League fixture list in place across Tuesday 29th and Wednesday 30th for all the other clubs, a midweek rarity for PTG managers.

So don't forget to plan your team accordingly, remembering that each of your 14 active team positions can only be used 38 times across the season as explained in the rules and this blog post from the end of the year.

Relax, Fabio. We know you need to familiarise yourself with the best English players, but there's no need to spend your days groundhopping in the cold because PlayTheGame has done the hard work for you.

We've used mountains of data from our innovative fantasy game to come up with a real-life best England squad and XI based on player performance in the league this season. And unlike certain former England gaffers, we don't favour the big clubs because we judge player effectiveness in relation to their team's performance.

It's not good news for David Beckham - he's not in our game, so he's not in our squad (fantasy about to emulate reality, there?) But PlayTheGame wholeheartedly endorses the growing international buzz around Dave Kitson, and thinks that Steve McClaren was wrong to spurn the glovework of David James and Robert Green. The data also reckons Joleon Lescott deserves another chance. Ready, Fabio? Here's England's finest, and remember, the stats don't lie...

After the matches on Tuesday night, six new players have been added to PlayTheGame. These players are as follows

Rade Prica - Forward (Sunderland)
Phillip Bardsley - Centre Back (Sunderland)
Brede Paulsen Hangeland - Centre Back (Fulham)
Leon Andreasen - Central Midfielder (Fulham)
Mauro Matias Zarate - Forward (Birmingham City)
Marlon King - Forward (Wigan Athletic)

As always, all new players added to PTG are subject to a 48 hour notice period as detailed in clause 11.4 of the rules.

After another evening of Premier League fixtures, four more players made their debuts for their respective clubs. No doubt they are excited about playing in the Premier League, but wait till they find out they are now eligible to be picked by PTG managers! The new boys up for grabs are:

Daniel Sturridge - Forward (Manchester City)
Chris Gunter - Centre Back (Tottenham Hotspur)
Manuel Henriques Tavares Fernandes - Central Midifielder (Everton)
Milan Baros - Forward (Portsmouth)