Double Gameweeks: A team-by-team guide

Introduction

There are 2 teams with 2 fixtures in gameweek 34 (Brighton and Cardiff) and there are 8 teams with 2 games in gameweek 35 (Arsenal, Brighton, Manchester City, Manchester United, Southampton, Tottenham, Watford and Wolves).

Right now, many FPL managers are asking themselves: who are the best players to bring in from these teams?

To help answer this, we’ll take the teams one-by-one and look at 3 things. 1) FPL Goal Involvement: if a double gameweek team does score, who is the most likely player to be involved in that goal – AKA who is the “talisman” of the team? 2) Most starts: who in the team has started the most games and is likely to be “nailed” to play both games in a double. 3) Which defender has had the most goal attempts across the season so far? If backing a double gameweek team for a clean sheet, which member of the backline has the added bonus of potential attacking returns?

Teams 

Arsenal

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Alexandre Lacazette (53%), Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (47%). So if Arsenal score in the double gameweek, there is a 53% chance that Lacazette will be involved in the goal, whether scoring or providing the assist.
• Most Starts: Shkodran Mustafi (26), Bernd Leno (25), Granit Xhaka (25), Aubameyang (25).
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Mustafi (14).

Notes: The fact that we’re 33 gameweeks in now for Arsenal and only one player has more than 25 starts says a lot about how unpredictable Unai Emery is with his teamsheets. The Arsenal Manager constantly chops and changes his line ups and he couldn’t be any further away from a settled starting 11, which makes trying to predict who will get both games in the double fiendishly difficult. Interestingly, however, Lacazette has now started 11 of the last 12 premier league games.

Brighton

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Glenn Murray (46%).
• Most Starts: Lewis Dunk (29), Shane Duffy (28).
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Duffy (30), Dunk (15).

Notes: It is telling that Duffy has double the goal attempts of Dunk, which underlines the Irishman’s superior goal threat. It should also be noted that 13 of Brighton’s 32 goals this season have come from set plays – and of Brighton’s 108 set piece attempts, Duffy and Dunk have been responsible for 40 of these. A potential defensive double-up could be more fruitful that opting for Matt Ryan in goal, especially with chance creator extraordinaire Pascal Gross mooted to return just in time for the first double. Finally, with 2 home games in gameweek 34, it’s worth noting that Murray has started 14 out of Brighton’s 15 home games this season.

Cardiff

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Victor Camarasa (35%).
• Most Starts: Neil Etheridge (32), Ecuele Manga (31), Sean Morrison (28).
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Sean Morrison (25), Ecuele Manga (7).

Notes: Sean Morrison is top for all defenders for penalty box touches this season with a staggering 107. This is mainly because he is the target for Cardiff’s long throw-ins into the box, but with 7 goals for Cardiff in the Championship last year, could he be a double gameweek hero?

Manchester United

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Anthony Martial (46%), Marcus Rashford (40%), Paul Pogba (40%).
• Most Starts: David De Gea (32), Pogba (28), Victor Lindelof (25), Nemanja Matic (25).
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Luke Shaw (20), Ashley Young (11), Chris Smalling (11), Diogo Dalot (11).

Notes: Shaw is currently suspended and will miss the first game of the double against Everton. When filtering the data for gameweeks 18 to 32 to coincide with Ole Gunnar Solskjær’s reign, Pogba’s FPL goal involvement increases to 47% while Romelu Lukaku moves into second place with 46%.

Manchester City

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Sergio Aguero (48%), Raheem Sterling (46%), Leroy Sane (42%).
• Most Starts: Ederson (32), Aymeric Laporte (28), Bernardo Silva (26), Fernandinho (26), Aguero (25), Sterling (25).
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Laporte (23), Walker (17).

Notes: While Man City have a tough double gameweek against Spurs and Man United, it’s worth reminding ourselves of their attacking superiority in the league. As a team, they have created 91 big chances so far this season, while their nearest challenger, Liverpool, have created just 64. City have also had 576 goal attempts this season (78 more than Liverpool) and their expected goals (xG) is 74.99 – over 10 goals higher than Liverpool’s at 64.29.

Southampton

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Danny Ings (50%), James Ward-Prowse (32%), Nathan Redmond (21%).
• Most Starts: Redmond (31), Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg (25).
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Jannik Vestergaard (14), Ryan Bertrand (13).

Notes: When looking at the gameweeks when Ralph Hasenhuttl has been in charge (gameweeks 16 to 33), Ward-Prowse’s FPL goal involvement rises to 38% and Redmond’s rises to 33%. This said, Redmond is somewhat notorious for having exceptionally low goal conversion rates – in the 2017/2018 season he scored just 2.3% of his attempts, whereas this season his goal conversion rate has improved but is still low at 5.6%.

It is a common perception that Hasenhuttl has improved Southampton compared to how they performed earlier in the season under Mark Hughes, but some of their key attacking and defensive stats have actually regressed. Comparing gameweeks 1 to 15 (Hughes) to gameweeks 16 to 33 (Hasenhuttl), average goal attempts fell from 15.1 per game to 10.5 and goal attempts in the box fell from 8.3 to 6.1, while goal attempts conceded actually increased slightly from 13 to 14.4.

Spurs

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Harry Kane (46%), Son Heung-Min (43%).
• Most Starts: Hugo Lloris (28), Toby Alderweireld (28), Kane (27).
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Alderweireld (16), Davinson Sanchez (13).

Notes: Trying to decide which Spurs midfielder to go for out of Son, Christian Eriksen and Dele Alli is a tough call for some FPL managers. Son is the best for minutes per goal attempt in the box (52.4) followed by Alli (60.6) and Eriksen is way behind at 123.9. These stats are flipped when it comes to creativity and minutes per chance created with Eriksen at 37 minutes, Alli at 73 and Son at 67. So it is clearly between Son and Alli for goal threat and Eriksen for assist-potential. This said, Son has scored 12 goals to Alli 5 goals this season. Son has an expected goals delta of +5.65 whereas Alli’s is +0.78 meaning Son has scored 5 more goals than he should have given the quality of the chances he has been presented with, whereas Alli is exactly around where he should be in terms of goals scored. There are two ways to look at Son’s xG Delta – either he will regress and score less in the future or, because he is such a quality player, you can expect him to keep scoring those chances that others perhaps wouldn’t.

Watford

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Gerard Deulofeu (41%), Andre Gray (35% – in 9 starts), Troy Deeney (34%).
• Most Starts: Ben Foster (32), Roberto Pereyra (29), Craig Cathcart (29).
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Jose Holebas (15), Cathcart (12).

Notes: In gameweek 32, Abdoulaye Doucoure had 7 goal attempts and 6 of those were in the box – this made him top for both metrics for all Watford players in the last 6 gameweeks.

Wolves

• Talisman/FPL Goal Involvement: Raul Jimenez (60%), Diogo Jota (56%), Matt Doherty (26%).
• Most Starts: Conor Coady (32), Rui Patricio (31), Jimenez (30), Wilfried Boly (30)
• Most Attacking Defender (by Goal Attempts): Doherty (37), Jonny (20).

Notes: Jimenez is THE talisman of the premier league and is top for FPL Goal Involvement in the division (just ahead of Eden Hazard on 59%). In terms of defensive data and the likelihood of keeping a clean sheet, Wolves are 5th for goals conceded in the league this season (39), 4th for xG conceded (35.60), but they are 11th for clean sheets with just 7. While their core defensive data is right up there with the best teams in the league, they have an annoying habit of conceding one solitary goal a game to wipe out the clean sheet.

—