Fantasy managers who are looking at owning just one premium Liverpool midfielder in 2019/20 may face something of a dilemma.
The relaunch of Fantasy Premier League has seen the gap in price between Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane narrow considerably.
The Egyptian has dropped to £12.5m while his teammate, who shared the Golden Boot with Salah in 2018/19, has risen to £11.5m.
The price gap between the two players was £3.5m at the start of 2018/19.
Owning both premium midfield options isn’t impossible, of course, but it would leave a shortfall of cash elsewhere and sacrifices would have to be made in other positions.
Given Manchester City’s favourable-looking run of matches from Gameweeks 1 to 11, many FPL bosses will be needing a considerable chunk of their £100m budget to acquire Raheem Sterling (£12.0m) and/or Sergio Aguero (£12.0m), too.
Liverpool’s opening eight fixtures are among the most appealing in the top flight and indeed the Reds sit second in our Season Ticker from Gameweeks 1 to 8.
Jurgen Klopp’s side face newly promoted Norwich City and Sheffield United during that run, as well as three teams who finished in the bottom eight of the top flight last season: Newcastle United, Burnley and Southampton.
The Gameweek 3 visit of Arsenal, who kept fewer away clean sheets than any Premier League club in 2018/19, is also enticing from an attacking perspective.
In this latest Members’ article, we will run a direct statistical comparison to weigh up the pros and cons of each asset.
As well as the usual goal threat and creativity comparisons, we’ll be assessing their record against ‘lesser’ sides (given Liverpool’s favourable run at the start of 2019/20) using our new Flat-Track Bully tool.
4 years, 9 months agoThe prices of defensive options this year don't make sense.
Some years ago FPL made a decision to lower the prices across the board on defensive options. This difference was the most noticeable on higher tier players like Cech and John Terry. Since then 6.0 (De Gea 18/19) has been established as the highest price point for GK, and 7.0 (Alonso 17/18) as the highest price point for defenders.
Last season Liverpool absolutely smashed the park defensively. They set new records for defenders. There were still other options to keep them somewhat in check. Digne and Pereira at 5.0 offered offensive returns to compensate for unreliable CS. Doherty at 4.5 offered early on offensive returns for a team that looked solid at the back. AWB at 4.0 was an obvious squad inclusion. Mané's surge in spring offered dilemmas for those that doubled up on Liverpool, and TAA's injury spells came out of nowhere and kept owners in the dark.
FPL have done the exact opposite in defence of what I wanted them to do. The top 6 has been established over the last few years. It's almost impossible for a team outside the top 6 to deliver 0.3+ CS per game. Only 5 teams have managed it the past 3 seasons(Southampton 16/17, Everton 16/17, Burnley 17/18, Palace 18/19, Everton 18/19). None of the teams outside the top 6 have managed a CS in 40% of their games the past 3 seasons. The top 6 teams have however managed 0.3+ CS per game in 16 out of 18 attempts these 3 seasons. 11 out of 18 times they kept CS in 40%+ of their games. 3 times they kept a CS in 50%+ of their games.
There's a reliability among the top 6 teams that can't be found elsewhere. Yet FPL have decided to consistently overprice midtable teams compared to the top 6. This year it's even worse, as FPL refuse to acknowledge that the 7.0 ceiling for Robertson is too low. They were willing to put a 200+ points defender at 6.5 with only a 0.5 price increase, while players like Doherty, AWB, Digne and Pereira rose by 1.0-1.5. Maguire averaged 3.0 points per game but is somehow still a 5.5 defender. Evans did terribly last season, but seemed nailed on at the end. For a lacklustre Leicester defence he's priced at 5.0 despite being a massive rotation headache. For 5.5 you can find Zinchenko that was also nailed on at the end of the season, but for a 20 CS a season team. Which uncertainty would you rather live with?