Learning from The Great and The Good: Gameweek 12

“And if there’s anybody left in here. That doesn’t want to be out there. I predict a riot”

An FPL riot was expected at Anfield this week either due to the expected hauls or the unexpected team news. In the end it was the Reds defensive options and Shaqiri that caught the eye the most.

Running up to GW12, The Great and The Good had to tackle the Maddison conundrum and the Richarlison riddle.

So who The Great and The Good? They are Jay Egersdorff, Ville Ronka, The Scout-casters (Joe, Andy, Az, David, Granville and Mark), Eliteserien’s expert Niemi and the last man standing Torres Magic.

Overall Performance 

Ville Ronka GW 70 pts Total 817 pts (rank 3015)

TorresMagic GW 69 pts Total 808 pts (rank 5461)

Andy GW 61 pts Total 803 pts (rank 7497)

Mark GW 55 pts Total 782 pts (rank 22421)

David GW 70 pts Total 776 pts (rank 28430)

Niemi GW 67 pts Total 776 pts (rank 29128)

Joe GW 75 pts Total 758 pts (rank 60089)

Granville GW 49 pts Total 738 pts (rank 119963)

Jay Egersdorff GW 55 pts Total 728 pts (rank 163497)

Az GW 62 pts Total 725 pts (rank 180330)

*GW points in the table above are before hits are taken into account.

It was a much closer affair between the best and the worst managers this week with only 26 points separating them. The greatest of The Great and The Good was Joe who took an uncharacteristic hit but went up 43,000 places. At the Hart of his team was the other Joe who scored 10 points but there were contributions all round from Robertson, Alonso, and even Ings !

Jay continued his progress with a teeny weeny green arrow but over the last 4 weeks he has moved up 480,000 places and has two FTs going into the international break. Good news also for Az as he regained his mojo to achieve his first green arrow in 6 weeks.

At the other end of the scale, Mark took a double hit which saw him drop down 10,000 places. Granville came bottom this week as his brave Mane/Salah double up for a hit meant a drop of 37,000.

Transfers and Hits

This is a summary of the rest of transfers for this week :

Andy – Diangana (Maddison)

Az –  Brooks (Maddison)

David – Shaqiri (Maddison)

Granville – Mané, Diagana, Jiménez (Maddison, Richarlison, Mitrovic)

Jay – Shaqiri (Maddison)

Joe – Arnautovic, Gudmundsson (Mitrovic, Maddison)

Mark – Fabianski, Balbuena, Murphy (Dubravaka, Bennett, Guendouzi)

Niemi – Richarlison (Maddison)

Torres Magic – Jiménez (Mitrovic)

Ville Ronka – Anderson (Maddison)

*transfers out are in brackets

Lots of debate this week on who was best to replace Maddison and the result was… inconclusive. Options ranged from the dull (Diangana and Gudmundsson) to the one week punt (Shaqiri), whilst Niemi did the Richarlison hokey cokey bringing him back two weeks after dropping him.

Mark hit the headlines again taking another 8 point hit but his focus appeared to be strengthening his bench. He added two Hammers to his squad who are definitely flavour of the month. They are now the second most represented team with an average of 2 players per squad amongst The Great and The Good, behind only Liverpool at 2.1 and better than City and Wolves at 1.9.

Mark is providing a great contrast in styles to Ville Ronka taking seven hits to the enigmatic FPL legend’s zero. There are only 19,000 places and 35 points between them so this clash of the titans looks to rumble on.

Template

After those transfers the template now looks like this:

Fabianski, Hamer/Ryan

Wan-Bissaka, Robertson, Doherty, Alonso, Mendy

Salah, Hazard, Richarlison, Fraser, Hojbjerg

Aguero, Arnautovic, Jiménez

The Great and The Good showed no patience for Maddison as he was kicked out by all of the managers and therefore the template.

Fabianski is now the most popular keeper and hopefully his fixtures will bring clean sheets as well as save points.

Upfront Mitrovic has also been showed the exit door, with Arnautovic and Jiménez now the preferred support acts to Aguero.

Team Investment and Value

Average Cost of Player looks like this across the teams based on week 1 prices.

Goalkeeper –  4.5

Defender – 5.2

Midfielder – 8.2

Forward – 7.6

ITB – 0.9

Little movement in the balance of the funding but the average ITB pot moves up suggesting bigger changes are on the cards.

Granville continues to lead in at least one metric with a team value of 103.9. Jay’s squad continues to rise and so it is now only Andy who has a squad worth less then 103 million.

Captain and Differentials 

No surprise to discover Salah was the top choice for the armband this week. Only Jay went for Mané which was due to his Salah-less strategy. Whilst Mané blanked the damage was minimal with Salah continuing to be steady rather than explosive. Will more managers follow suit?

Joe Hart and Felipe Anderson were the strongest performing differentials this week for Joe and Ville respectively. Whilst Mark is still the only one to hold Sterling, which will possibly change as The Great and The Good plan their next moves over the international break.

David continues to be king of the captain picks; he has avoided picking a blank armband and averages 20.2 points.

Conclusion 

Jay’s 4 week plan has paid off with a succession of green arrows whilst others are stockpiling West Ham players as they plan ahead. Even Mark’s moves to address his squad depth suggest he is getting ahead of longer term fixture congestion.

How far ahead is it sensible to plan?

Will we see more forward thinking over the international break?

With the GW 15 fixture turn will we see The Great and The Good turn to Spurs, Arsenal and even more Hammers?

Much to ponder over the next couple of weeks..

That’s all from me for now and remember don’t have nightmares.