UCL Fantasy Semifinals: Tips, Captain & Team for Matchday 11

Matchday 11 is almost here and there is just 5 games left in the 2022/23 Fantasy Champions League season. That is not much room to gain a lot of fantasy points.

Teams of all UCL Fantasy managers will look very similar in the semifinals.

So, let’s look at UCL Fantasy semifinals tips, and let’s show you how to make the most of matchday 11. We will discuss strategy, best picks, captain, odds, team selection and more.

Tips for the semifinals replays are available here: UCL Fantasy Matchday 12: Tips, Captain, Picks & Team Selection.

1. UCL Fantasy semifinals Tips & Strategy

If you have more than 5 players that have been eliminated in your team, our advice is:

1. One playing goalkeeper is enough for semi-finals. Do not waste your transfer for GK if you don’t have to. There is much better value in, for example defenders with similar price that are often recovering balls (like Thiago Silva for example).
2. Focus on having playing XI, take hits only if you are not able to build a full XI with 5 free transfers. There are just two matches, to be played, so there will not be big amount of fantasy points around, so hits will not worth it.
3. Transfer out your most expensive eliminated players first. You do not want to have expensive dead weights in your fantasy team.

There is very narrow pool of players in semi-finals, so it will be very difficult to move in rankings, because a lot of fantasy teams will be very similar. But if you are chasing, we pick some interesting differentials for you with low ownership.

Tips:

Your biggest advantage over other UCL Fantasy managers can be if you start preparing your teams for the Champions League Final right now. That way you will not have to take unnecessary -4 point hits after the semifinals. But that does not mean you should go all in into two teams…

So, let’s look at how to do it.

1. Who to transfer out in Matchday 11?

But first, let’s quickly discuss who should you transfer out in Matchday 11. Of course, you should get rid of eliminated players. But what to do if you have more than 5 players eliminated?

• Get 11 starters at all costs – use even -4 points hit to get 11 starting players (and in valid formation).
• But try to avoid taking additional -4 hits to get more than 11 starting players.
• Prioritize transferring out the most expensive eliminated players in your fantasy team – that way you can maximize the budget with the starting players
• Keep suspended players on your bench

2. Do not go all-in in two teams in the semifinals.

In the UCL Fantasy R16 and in the Quarterfinals, we always emphasized that you should focus on players from teams that will likely go through. Well, not anymore.

The situation in the 1^st leg of the semifinals is not the same. We have already published the probabilities of progressing to the final, and we saw that bookies favor Manchester City and Inter Milan to go through.

However, we have seen how unpredictable the Champions League could be when it gets so deep in the tournament as it is now. AC Milan going through Napoli is an example of that.

We cannot really predict who will go to the final. So, what should you do in this case?

The answer is diversification…

3. Diversification

Yes, before the start of the semifinal’s 1^st leg, you should use diversification to spread the exposure in your UCL Fantasy squad to all 4 teams, but put little bit more weight on teams which are more likely to advance to the final or on teams who are more likely to score goals in Matchday 11.

Let’s bring back the probabilities of progressing to the final from our previous UCL Fantasy article for the semifinals first leg.

Team	To Qualify
Manch.City	72 %
Inter Milano	54 %
AC Milan	46 %
Real Madrid	28 %

So, here is how you could potentially spread spots in your squad:

• 4/5 players from Manchester City
• 4/5 Real Madrid players (there could be a lot of goals in Real Madrid vs. Manchester City game)
• 3 Inter Milan Players
• 3 AC Milan players

Worst case scenario: 8 of your players get eliminated, 7 players will remain for the final, and you use 5 transfers to get to 12 starters in the Final (where we cannot use subs, so it doesnot matter that you will have just one player on your bench). And we did not even count 3 transfers we get between the semifinals.

Another (more balanced) option:

• 4 players from Manchester City
• 4 Real Madrid players
• 4 Inter Milan Players
• 3 AC Milan players

Worst case scenario: 7 of your players get eliminated, 8 players will remain for the final, and you use 5 transfers to get to 13 starters or to make tactical transfers

This will help you to get perfectly set up for the Fantasy Champions League Final round – it will help you maximize your chances of having at least 11 starters in your UCL Fantasy squad in the final (regarding the probabilities) no matter which team will go through.

4. What to do after UCL Fantasy Matchday 11

After the 1^st leg of semifinals is over, probabilities of progressing to the final will change for all teams.

Based on the 1^st leg results, there likely will be two teams that will have gained an edge in the semifinals 1^st leg, so they will have a higher chance of progressing to the final.

And you will have 3 transfers available. That will help you rebalance your squad and move from diversification to concentration. Let me tell you what that means…

It means, that you will use your three free transfers before the semifinals 2^nd leg (Matchday 12) to get rid of 3 three players that will have lost their 1^st leg match, and the probability that their team progressing to the finals will have decreased significantly.

5. Other Semifinals Tips

• Diversify your defense across all 4 teams
• Bring in players who are good at balls recovered (Tomori, Rodri, Kjaer…)

2. Fixtures to target in UCL Fantasy Matchday 11

Which fixtures you should target? We always use bookies’ odds to help us determine that. Let’s look at which teams have the highest chance of winning their match in the Matchday 11 and scoring a lot of goals in that game:

• Manchester City – 44 % to win, 21 % to score more than 2.5 goals
• Inter Milan – 38 % to win, 12 % to score more than 2.5 goals
• AC Milan– 30% to win, 8 % to score more than 2.5 goals
• Real Madrid – 29 % to win the match, 13 % to score more than 2.5 goals

3. Key notes for UCL Fantasy semi finals 1st leg

• Diversify your defense across all 4 teams
• Bring in players who are good at balls recovered (Tomori, Rodri, Kjaer…)
• Try to have more (8-9) players who play on Tuesday, so you do not have a substitution headache on Wednesday
• Pick goalkeepers from both days if you can
• 5 points is our captaincy threshold (if our captain score 5 or more points we will not change our captaincy)
• 4 points is our substitution threshold (if a player score 4 or more points we will not sub him off)

Read more about our captaincy thresholds: UCL Fantasy Captaincy Thresholds: When to change captain?

5. What bookies says about MD11

What bookies say about Champions League semi finals? We have already show you probabilities of progressing to the final. Now let’s check clean sheet odds and goalscoring odds.

Our probabilities are calculated from bookies odds using our Odds to probability calculator.

Clean sheet odds

There are just two matches so it will be very hard to guess clean sheets.

Real Madrid (31 %) and Manchester City (24 %) are most likely to keep a clean sheet in the 1st leg of semifinals.

You can check all MD11 clean sheet odds here: Champions League Clean Sheet Odds.

Goalscoring odds

With a 46 % probability of scoring a goal, Haaland is the most likely goalscorer in the 1st leg of UCL Fantasy semi finals.

You can check all MD11 goalscoring odds here: Champions League Goalscoring Odds.

6. Best captain for UCL Fantasy Semifinals

We will keep the captaincy section very short. We think, there are two obvious in-form captaincy options for the 1^st leg of the semifinals.

We think that the best captain for UCL Fantasy Semifinals is Haaland who is scoring in almost every game. He is top for goalscoring odds for Matchday 11 as well. If you want to be different, you could bet on home advantage of Real Madrid and you could go for Benzema or Vinicius as your Tuesday captain.

Our backup captain for Wednesday is Rafael Leao (if fit). If unsure about your backup captain, you could choose player good at balls recovered (Tomori, Kjaer) as your captain, which could bring you 3-4 points from your captain even if AC Milan concede.

7. UCL Fantasy Semifinals Team Selection – Scout Picks

Let’s finish our Matchday 11 tips with our UCL Fantasy scout picks for semifinals 1st leg. Haaland is our captain.

8. Fantasy Champions League Tips

Find more tips, strategies, and picks for UCL Fantasy in these articles:

• Beginner? Read our guide: How to play UCL Fantasy?
• Confused about the rules? Read the Official guidelines of the game
• Do you want to get better at UCL Fantasy? Read our article about Essential Tips for UCL Fantasy Success.