WELL, we may not have got the win on Sunday, but our guys still scored well for us in AFL Fantasy.

As usual Robbie Gray was one of our front runners with his 108 which is just one point higher than his season average. Robbie is now the second highest averaging forward in the comp and hence he is a must have. Our surprise packet this week was Jack Hombsch who I thought was one of our better players, he had a 110. He is a cheap defender, but he won’t get that sort of score every week as evidenced by his 61.5 average this season.

Kane Cornes said farewell in style from AFL Fantasy with 107 points. Unfortunately this now means that you will have to trade him out of your side. Ollie returned from his 4 weeks off and scored a nice 99. His average is 104, I expect that he will return to a score over 100 again this week now that he has had a run.

Our ever reliable Brad Ebert returned to a bit of form with a 96 but his average is still nicely over 106. Nathan Krakouer being subbed out at three quarter time sent shockwaves throughout the Fantasy community with some worried about his spot in the team now. He only scored 38 and has a break even now of 42 which he should comfortably obtain, but his money making days may be coming to an end if he stays with scoring like this.

Karl Amon came on as the sub for the second time, but didn’t score as well this week. His 25 saw him rise just $9k but he now has a break even of 11. The good thing is that if he can get a full game his price should sky rocket! So if you did bring him in like I did, don’t worry about it just yet. If you are going for an overall ranking you can’t forget about the bye rounds. For those that haven’t played before, the way the bye rounds work is that your best 18 scorers on the field will count. So you need to aim to have at least 18 players on the field each week that are playing.

During the byes it is usual for players to trade out a player that hasn’t had their bye for someone that already has. For example you might have a rookie who has a round 12 bye like Adam Saad, you would play him in round 11 and then upgrade him to a premium (or downgrade to another rookie) that had their bye in round 11 which means you miss out on getting the zero for him and that position effectively plays all three weeks.

So whilst you are looking at which players you have that you need to upgrade or downgrade, keep the byes in mind. Players that are getting a game every week like Oxley, Hogan or McIntosh may lose a few thousand dollars over the next two weeks, but the fact that they are actually playing in the bye rounds can be worth more than their monetary value.

Given our lack of quality scoring rookies at the moment a lot of coaches are holding these playing rookies for now and are hoping that some more rookies will be introduced either during the byes or just before so that we do have some good downgrade options.

Remember we look to downgrade these guy when their break even score is above their current scoring average. And with that don’t just look at their overall average, consider their average across the last three weeks as that is usually a better indication of how the player is performing right at this very moment. Their total average may include a couple of green vest games when they were first introduced to the team.

Best of luck with your AFL Fantasy teams this week and hopefully you are starting to move your way up the rankings. I am always available for some assistance via twitter @pkd73 and you can catch further thoughts from me on a Friday morning at dreamteamtalk.com