Top 5 Career Hall of Fame – Gameweek 35 Review

To help with those last minute transfer dilemmas this week’s article on the Top Five career Hall of Fame (HoF) managers includes a detailed look  Peter Kouwenberg’s deployment in Gameweek 35 of his wildcard.

Peter ended Gameweek 35 with a score of 71 and moves up to a season high of 423 in the overall FPL standings. Aiming for hat-trick of three digit finishes, Peter is now only 33 points outside the top 100.

This article focuses on the moves and strategies employed by the five elite managers who grace the upper echelons of the career Hall of Fame. Members can see the latest top five via our Live Hall of Fame update.

To help out I have also utilised Fusen’s FPL Statistico tool to gain an extra insight into their thinking.
Before we look at their teams in more detail, here’s why they are the best FPL managers:

POINTS & RANK

*from GW6 onwards

Only David qualified for the cup and he went out in Gameweek 19. Only Ville still has his Wildcard, all apart from David have played their Triple Captain chip, and three have also played their AOA chip.

A generally disappointing week for everyone apart from Peter, the only manager to score more than 50 points.

Ville Ronka slips to 20,308 and in his ninth season as an FPL manager is in real danger of finishing outside the top 10,000 for the first time ever. Southampton’s Manolo Gabbiadini followed Boro’s Alvaro Negredo in recording disappointing captain scores for the HoF career number one. Surely on his Wildcard now and with Bench Boost still play, the Finnish Enigma will need to summon all of his FPL managerial powers if he is to retain top stop in the HoF.

The graph above shows the ranks of the Top Five managers over the 35 Gameweeks so far. The vertical scale is from rank 1 to 1M. The distance between the ranks corresponds to the number of points separating them. For instance there are 205pts between rank 1 and rank 10,000, and 279pts between 10,000 and 1M. The graph gives an idea of how difficult it is to move up the ranks as you near the summit.

CAPTAIN

Peter and Steve Poulsom were the only managers to captain Tottenham’s Harry Kane. Although his five points from the North London Derby wasn’t exactly an explosive return it certainly bettered the extremely disappointing returns from Messrs Benteke, Gabbiadini, and Coutinho.

After a week to forget on the captain front, will our Top Five back the out of form Alexis Sanchez to deliver over two fixtures?

Over the season Sanchez has been picked as captain 28% of the time, averaging 14.2pts when chosen. Manchester City’s Sergio Aguero follows in popularity having been handed the armband 22% of the time, averaging 15.9pts as captain or triple captain, with Everton’s Romelu Lukaku chosen 12% of the time averaging a mighty 20.7pts.

In the graphic below I’ve displayed this information for the five most popular captain picks.

Overall the Top Five have known when to put the armband on Lukaku, he has handsomely repaid the faith placed in him when chosen as captain. You could argue that the trolls in this graphic are Tottenham’s Harry Kane and United’s Ibrahimovic. They have not been explosive choices on the few occasions that they have been trusted with the armband, averaging 11.2 and 13.2 points respectively.

CAPTAIN POINTS

Peter remains the best performing manager out of the Top Five in his ability to select the right captain. His 541 points is the top score in this metric by some margin. It is no surprise that he is also the highest ranked FPL manager of the five.

To help you make your crucial captain decision be sure to read YMA’s Form and Fixture analysis together with the Captain Sensible articles.

TRANSFERS – Gameweek 35

A wretched week in the transfer department with only David Meechan’s new recruits out performing their replacements. Not even Ville was patient enough to hold onto Alvaro Negredo who, like Palace’s Christian Benteke the week before, scored against his former employers.

PETER’S WILDCARD

Not only was Peter (aka MyPrettyPony) kind enough to share his Wildcard moves ahead of the deadline, he also outlined his possible Gameweek 36 moves in last week’s comments section.

This week could see Aguero and Gabbiadini making way for Jesus and Chelsea’s Diego Costa, which would give him a front 8 of; Kane, Costa, Jesus, Sanchez, Hazard, Eriksen, Sane and King. Wow!

A budget defence supports such a fearsome and expensive front eight, however that didn’t mean a lack of points in Gameweek 35. Southampton duo Yoshida and Stephens along with Bournemouth’s Adam Smith added a collective 22 points to his Gameweek score.

It’s set to be an exciting finish to the campaign for Forest fan Peter, with a first top 100 finish still possible.

TRANSFER SUCCESS

Oddly, despite scoring 71 points, Peter recorded a negative total on his transfer dealings. This is due to former charges including Negredo, Dele Alli and Boro’s Calum Chambers all having good gameweeks. Peter seems better off when taking a hit!

Over the course of the season Steve has mustered more immediate transfer points minus hits than any of his fellow bosses at the HoF’s top table.

Immediate transfer success is not in itself proof of overall success but simply one part of a complex picture. Steve for instance is 20 points ahead of Peter in this metric, however he is 147 points behind overall.

One obvious result of making more transfers is an increase in Team Value. Not surprising that Peter has the most valuable squad, allowing him to purchase such an expensive front eight.

FORMATION

The standard 3-4-3 was again popular this week with three managers choosing this formation.

Over the season Ville and Marlen Rattiner have been strong advocates of 3-4-3, Marlen opting for the formation 29 times. Yet it is David, favouring 3-5-2, who has scored the highest average points with 61.4. It has also been the most successful formation for Peter, the seven times he has chosen or defaulted to 3-5-2 he has average 69 points.

3-4-3 has been favoured 58% of the time by the career HoF Top Five, with 3-5-2 second with 23%. 4-4-2 is the third most popular on 10%.

PLAYERS GAMEWEEK 35

TEMPLATE GAMEWEEK 35

Goalkeepers – Pickford, Caballero

Defenders – Valencia, Alonso, Yoshida, (Gibson), (Stephens)

Midfielders – Sanchez, Eriksen, Alli, Zaha, Sane

Forwards – Lukaku, Kane, (Costa / Benteke / Gabbiadini)

With eleven players now in over 50% of the teams there is a certain consistency to the template.

However will Middlesbrough and Crystal Palace players retain their places ahead of the two double gameweeks? Or are managers now stuck with these assets?

In the sub 6.0 category Bournemouth’s Josh King continues to offer good value for Peter, purchased for £5.4 back in Gameweek 28.

With three crucial Gameweeks to go will Ville, Marlen and Steve join Peter and David in the top 10,000?