daily fantasy sports articles
AFL Fantasy 2023: Round 1 Richmond vs Carlton
We are back!!!
The 2023 AFL Premiership Season returns this Thursday night and that means one thing above all else… fantasy AFL is back! And for us… daily fantasy.
To kick things off this week we get the usual season opener between two of the league’s biggest clubs, Richmond and Carlton at the MCG.
Draftstars have come through with the goods as well, offering a massive $150,000 Guaranteed Main Event along with a wide variety of other lower stakes options with big prize pools. It's a great time to get involved with daily fantasy AFL at Draftstars!
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AFL $150,000+ Tigers vs Blues at Draftstars
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AFL $15,000+ Tigers vs Blues High Roller ($150 Entry) at Draftstars
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AFL $10,000+ Tigers vs Blues Fiver at Draftstars
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AFL $10,000+ Tigers vs Blues Mini ($2 Entry) at Draftstars
In addition to previews for each and every slate this season, Daily Fantasy Rankings will continue with our AFL Resources page. This section provides you all the data you need to build your best line-ups. It includes daily cheat sheets for Draftstars, Player Correlation tables, Player Out tables, Scores Against tables, Tagging information, statistical breakdowns and much more!
CLICK HERE TO ACCESS OUR CHEAT SHEET FOR THIS MATCH
Betting Markets
Richmond ($1.67) vs Carlton ($2.20)
Line: Richmond -5.5
Points Line: 170.5 points
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Weather
Where To Attack?
With this obviously being the first game of the season, we don’t have a body of data to look at in 2023 as yet. That said, we can take plenty from the prior season assuming neither the Tigers or the Blues have any major game plan changes being implemented in in 2023. Overall neither team was very exploitable across any position last season. Richmond conceded slightly above league average fantasy points to midfielders, which is on brand for them, while the Blues really were only good to target in the ruck.
All that said, Carlton did rack up the most possessions in the league in 2022, while the Tigers conceded the sixth most. Therefore, across the board we can expect Carlton to dominate the fantasy game in this matchup.
Game Script – Carlton midfielders and defenders
VALUE PLAYS
Oliver Hollands (DS $6,000) will make his debut this week and look to fill a much needed role for the Blues on the wing. He looked solid in the only official preseason game making a very fast start in the first quarter and ending up with 68 fantasy points from 17 possessions. In a big game like this a minimum priced player playing on the wing will draw plenty of ownership and it is not a spot to fade as we look to spend up on some of the premium priced midfielders.
MID PRICED PLAYS
Tom De Koning (DS $9,660) / Marc Pittonet (DS $8,720) the teams will tell us what we need to know in the ruck division. I definitely don’t want to spend up on the Tigers rucks if they are running a dual ruck setup, but will be more than happy to take a low priced options in PIttonet if the Blues go with both De Koning and Pittonet to start the season.
If youngster Tom De Koning is sole rucking I will be going to him at this mid-priced point. He has flashed potential for years now and throughout the preseason has looked prime for a break out year and this is not a tough ruck matchup against Toby Nankervis who has historically given up points to opposition rucks.
Liam Baker (DS $10,740) looks settled back into a set role off half back. The Tigers don’t have that set kicker across half back anymore with Short’s role change and I expect Baker to pickup plenty of possessions in this role this season. He showed out in the official preseason game with a ridiculous 36 possessions and I love placing him in my Blues stacks as the sole Tiger.
PREMIUM PLAYS
Patrick Cripps (DS $15,030) - The 2022 Brownlow medallist was an absolute monster last season. I love taking him in Round One because we know his body should be cherry ripe to go and he is a big game player who will set himself for this massive opening night matchup at the MCG.
He opened up the season last year against the Tigers with a 30 disposal, 3 goal performance adding up to 112 fantasy points, which set the tone for his season. He is no stranger to these types of games against the Tigers, posting 100+ scores in 6 of his last 8 games against Richmond, while also averaging 106 points per game at the MCG last year.
Adam Cerra (DS $14,120) should be a nice little point of difference as I stack up the Blues players in this matchup. He has upside of 120-130 and should get plenty of opportunity on the inside and outside with Sam Walsh not playing in Round 1. Last year he went big against the Tigers in their first meeting posting 110 fantasy points and if you can spike a similar score on this slate it will certainly be a key to finding a winning line-up.
Suggested Draftstars Lineup
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