The biggest national team tournament on the continent returns to action after a five-year break as Euro 2020 is about to kick off on Friday, June 11th, 2021 with Italy playing host to Turkey on an opening day. The European Championship will secure us an action-packed month where we will get UEFA Champions League to watch the continent’s top prospects and players battling each other on a daily basis as 24 teams go for glory.
If you want to increase the level of your personal engagement in the games where you might not be emotionally involved, the Euro 2020 Fantasy Football game has to be the way. We’ve witnessed a massive growth in popularity of Fantasy Premier League (FPL) over the last several years (and particularly in the 2020/21 season). There are no doubt that such popularity will translate to the major European national team tournament.
Since a lot of fantasy football aficionados will play the game this summer, we have decided to ask our friends at bettingtips4you to list some of the most valuable options among the goalkeepers and defenders. If you want to find that extra differential edge over the competitors or friends in your mini-leagues, the following list will certainly be of huge help.
Goalkeepers
The goalkeeper spot is probably the least significant place in your fantasy football team. The inexperienced players will go with the most popular/familiar names like Manuel Neuer, Thibaut Courtois, or Hugo Lloris, but they would be making a big mistake. You must be wondering about the reasoning behind this statement.
Well, these three keepers are priced up at €6.0m. The best they can get you in one game is 6-8 (max) points. Unlike in the Premier League Fantasy, there are no bonus points in the Euro 2020 fantasy game, meaning you can only rely on clean-sheet and saves points (one point for three saves). We should also mention that the likes of France, Portugal, and Germany have been drawn to the same group, meaning it is hard to expect plenty of clean sheets for Lloris or Neuer anyway.
Turkey, Hungary, and Finland offer great budget options
Instead, there is much more upside to going with budget keepers and saving your money for the other (more important) areas of the pitch. You thus have Turkish first keeper UgurcanCakir at €4.5m. Peter Gulacsi is also €4.5m, while you can get Finnish LukasHradecky for just €4.0m. These keepers will certainly get you 1 to 2 (some maybe even 3) save points per game regardless of whether they keep a clean sheet or not. A clean sheet would be just an additional bonus. By picking two such keepers over the top-priced options, you can save €3.5m.
Defenders
Much like the case is with goalkeepers (although not quite to the same extent), there is not that much upside in spending loads of money into your defense. The reason is simple. There are so many fantastic options in midfield and attack (just think of Cristiano Ronaldo, Harry Kane, Roberto Lewandowski, Kylian Mbappe, Kevin de Bruyne, etc.) and you will not be able to afford them if you go big on your back line.
That being said, the Euro 2020 Fantasy Football game does bring a number of high-priced defensive options we would warmly recommend you to avoid. For example, Ruben Dias has been one of the most popular picks among players from all over the globe since the game was released. We are strictly against bringing the Manchester City center-back into your team. You need to pay €6.0m to sign Dias and what will he get you? He has two super-tough matches against Germany and France in the group phase and he is hardly likely to get you anything at the opposite end of the pitch. He may nick a rare header from the corner kick, but you don’t want to rely on that by any means.
Florenzi, Alba, and Zinchenko the ones to go for
If you do want to go big on defenders, Alessandro Florenzi and Jordi Alba (both at €6.0m) are much better options. They have much easier groups and they represent a far greater attacking threat in terms of both assists (in particular) and goals. Another top suggestion would be Ukraine’s Oleksandr Zinchenko who has increased his form drastically in the second half of the season while wearing the Manchester City jersey en route to the Premier League title and the UEFA Champions League final. Zinchenko is deployed as a midfielder for his national team and that mere fact instantly increases his appeal among fantasy football managers given he is priced at €5.5m. You may skip him for the opening game against the Netherlands, but the Man City left-back is certainly a top-notch option for the matches with North Macedonia and Austria.
Fantastic budget assets
Last but not least, we have to mention several important budget assets that may make all the difference for your fantasy teams. Jason Denayer is nailed in Belgium’s three-man back line, Simon Kjaer is the first option at center-back for Denmark, Pau Torres will likely start for Spain, while Martin Hinteregger will be a massive threat in the air in Austria’s shirt. Believe it or not, they are all priced as low as €4.5m. Could you ask for a bigger bargain?
