Van Persie the safest fantasy football striker bet for now

With it remaining unclear as to who the leading strikers are at Manchester City and Chelsea for the time being, Robin van Persie is far and away the safest option to end the campaign as the top-scoring forward in the Premier League fantasy football game.

Given that Van Persie has topped the Premier League scoring charts in each of the last two seasons and having already discovered his shooting boots in the new campaign with a double in the Community Shield, his price of 5/4 to be the top-scoring fantasy football striker is justified.

Meanwhile, the fact that he looks a guaranteed starter at Manchester United is arguably the biggest tick in his column as this is not something that can be said of forwards at the chief title rivals of the Red Devils.

Manchester City have bought Alvaro Negredo (28/1) and Stevan Jovetic (50/1) this summer to add to Sergio Aguero (5/1) and Edin Dzeko (33/1). Realistically, Manuel Pellegrini will only pick two of this quartet at a time and rotation is likely to be greater than at Man Utd.

Chelsea’s lead striker is also unknown, although there is a belief that Romelu Lukaku (25/1) is slightly ahead of Fernando Torres (28/1) and Demba Ba in Jose Mourinho’s pecking order.

However, with speculation linking Wayne Rooney (20/1) to Chelsea refusing to completely disappear and Samuel Eto’o also reportedly on Mourinho’s radar, there is a strong possibility that none of the current trio can be relied upon to be regular starters.

The same is true of Olivier Giroud (25/1) at Arsenal, as Arsene Wenger is also known to be in the hunt for another striker, while Luis Suarez’ six-game ban immediately puts a dampener on his chances as he is effectively giving his fellow forwards a 20-point handicap.

New Tottenham signing Roberto Soldado (16/1) looks the safest of starters at a Champions League-challenging club, but no overseas player has ever been crowned top Premier League scorer in their debut season in the division.

Therefore, it is tough to see him outscoring Van Persie for points.

Punters wanting to take on the favourite in the top point-scoring fantasy football forward market may be best siding with Christian Benteke at 12/1.

The Belgian scored 18 goals last season, has seven goals in five pre-season appearances ahead of the current campaign and will start every Aston Villa game, unless of course he is injured or suspended.

All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.

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