Rotating 4.5 Goalkeepers Update

Further to my previous article on Rotating 4.5 Goalkeepers at the start of the season I thought now, almost a quarter of the way through the campaign, would be a good time to check in and see how my recommendation is working out.

At the start of the season I suggested that a combination of Tom Heaton and Nick Pope (both 4.5 starting price) would combine for no “unfavourable” matches through gameweeks 1 to 9, unfavourable matches being those against teams from last season’s top 9.  First mistake!  Somehow I missed gameweek 3 where Aston Villa played Everton at home and Burnley played Wolves away.  I’ll put it down to pre-season fixture review overload and sweeping that quickly under the carpet let’s see how things are have panned out anyway…

Heaton and Pope have combined for a total of 60 points so far, but of course you cannot have all of those points, one being on the bench each week (assuming you haven’t used the bench boost chip).  The fixture rotation that I went with is SOU, BOU, wol, cry, bha, NOR, BUR, EVE, BHA.  Those in bold are Heaton’s fixtures, while the others were Pope’s.  This has netted me 34 points.  Not great then, given that the theoretical maximum you could have gained from this combination is 43 points, based on rotating correctly for the best score from each keeper each week.  However, sticking with Pope throughout GW 1-9 would have netted me 1 point fewer and with Heaton 7 points fewer; a very small win in a season characterised by small wins so far.  On my wildcard in GW7 I very nearly abandoned the rotating keepers strategy altogether to free up more funds for the attacking positions, by turning Heaton into a 4.0 but thankfully I resisted as it would have resulted in me scoring 2 points fewer overall.  Another small win…

THEORETICAL POINTS

Let’s look at the other combinations you could have had from the beginning of the season and the theoretical maximum for each.  Their unattainable total combined points are shown in brackets for reference.

Tom Heaton and Matt Ryan: 50 (65)
Tom Heaton and Dean Henderson: 47 (66)
Tom Heaton and Angus Gunn: 34 (56)
Matt Ryan and Nick Pope: 43 (71)
Matt Ryan and Dean Henderson: 52 (77)
Matt Ryan and Angus Gunn: 56 (67)
Nick Pope and Dean Henderson: 47 (72)
Nick Pope and Angus Gunn: 48 (62)
Dean Henderson and Angus Gunn: 53 (68)

From this we see that Matt Ryan and Angus Gunn have provided the best theoretical combination so far, maybe a bit of a surprise but Ryan’s high scores have interchanged well with Gunn’s best performances over GW 3-6.   The fixture run for that combination was:  wat, WHU, bha, MUN, shu, new, che, TOT, avl.  6 away games and 3 home games, including 3 top 6 sides.   This might suggest that there should be more weight given towards opponent difficulty than whether a fixture is home or away.  Matt Ryan and Dean Henderson have scored the most points combined altogether, not of much use to us, but a half decent indicator perhaps as they combine for the third best theoretical maximum.

DATA ANALYSIS

I don’t want this to become a stat heavy article and I encourage readers to use the Fantasy Football Scout Member’s Area, so I have summarised some of my findings from the data.  I do, however, think it is really important to draw your own conclusions from the data available and from the data you feel is most relevant, as the way data is presented can be used to reinforce a particular way of thinking or be misleading despite being factually correct.  For my findings though, read on.

What I have found is that Henderson is saving more of the shots he is faced with, closely followed by Pope and then Ryan.

“So Henderson is the one”?

Well, Henderson has actually faced the least number of shots on target, with Ryan having faced the most shots on target.

“Ok so Ryan is the one then”?

Well, Henderson’s xGP (Expected Goals Prevented) is significantly higher than Ryan’s or anyone else’s, accounting for almost all of Sheffield United’s negative xGC (Expected Goals Conceded) delta!  But, Ryan’s xGP is second best and again almost accounts for all of Brighton’s negative xGC delta.

“I’m confused”!

Me too and you can see how presenting one stat could you lead you one way if read in isolation and another stat, another way.  What I think this tells us though is that Henderson and Ryan are currently the two most useful keepers to their teams (in this price bracket).

OTHER ACTIVE 4.5 GOALKEEPERS

With uncertainty in pre-season and injuries rife in the goalkeeper position we have seen a number of other 4.5 or similarly priced goalkeepers getting game time.  Unfortunately, I have not had time to work in any of these options to the fixture or points analysis so instead, a quick word on each.

Aaron Ramsdale (BOU) – At the beginning of the season the Bournemouth keeper situation was as clear as Brexit, but Ramsdale has played every minute so far and gained a respectable 31 points from 1 assist, 1 clean sheet and save points on 4 occasions.

Wayne Hennessey (CRY) – Just one game played with Vincente Guaita’s recent injury, but he seems unlikely to be the number 1 going forward.  4 points against Manchester City is a decent return though.

Adrian (LIV) – A 4.5 goalkeeper available from a top 6 side?!  A gift from the FPL Gods!  Well no, actually, a modest 23 points including just 2 clean sheets in 7.5 games.  His time seems to be up now Allison Becker has returned to first team action.

Tim Krul/Ralph Fahrmann/Michael McGovern (NOR) – The last 3 gameweeks have seen 3 keepers make appearances for Norwich and a 4th added to the game just in case.  The injury situation plus the fact they have conceded the most goals so far, suggests everyone should steer clear.  Although this combination has curiously scored more points combined (30) than Adrian and Allison have so far this season (26)… Krul looks to be back to fitness and the clear number 1 for any serious mavericks out there.

Paulo Gazzaniga (TOT) – A bad injury to Hugo Lloris sees Gazzaniga step in.  Not much to write home about so far, with no clean sheets in 3 games, but has picked up a save point on 2 occasions.  If Tottenham can return to some form, the fixtures are there for Gazzaniga to capitalise, after a trip to Anfield this weekend.

Roberto Jimenez (WHU) – And lastly, another injury enforced call up.  Roberto hasn’t instilled a lot of confidence in the FPL community so far, but in 2 and a half games has collected 4 save points and a bonus point, despite no clean sheets and conceding 5 goals in that time.  Home games against two of the leagues least potent in front of goal up next (SHU and NEW) could perhaps see clean sheets come his way.

“SO, WHAT SHOULD WE DO?”

Well the data so far is pointing to a season long combination of Henderson and Ryan.  With them separated by 1 point in FPL and a healthy theoretical maximum points combination it would seem to be borne out by the actual scores and not just the underlying stats.  This assumes you can correctly predict who will have the best score of the two week to week.
The fixtures for the next 6 gameweeks for Ryan and Henderson are a mixed bag with 3 weeks of unfavourable matches for both at the same time.  Does that matter?  Perhaps not given the form of teams like Wolves, Man. Utd and Spurs with their European commitments.

My original recommendation for Gameweek 10-31 based on fixtures alone was to transfer Pope out for Henderson, to have just 2 unfavourable matches over this time period, both of those being a trip to Wolves for each keeper (I have triple checked this!).  You could go on to GW35 with this combination with just two more unfavourable fixtures, both at home, against (you guessed it) Wolves!  The caveat to that is that this is before fixtures get rearranged due to cup runs, etc. so we cannot guarantee this combination will pan out exactly like this.

WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?

Given that my original recommendation hasn’t worked out particularly well so far, I wouldn’t suggest you follow my plans, but for the purpose of concluding I can tell you that I would like to transfer Henderson in for Heaton.  Looking ahead in the medium-term Burnley and Sheffield Utd have the best fixture run combination on paper between GW10 and GW19, although it seems fixtures aren’t everything this season.

In truth, I should have made the switch on my wildcard, which I triggered earlier than planned and now I’m faced with using a free transfer on a goalkeeper if I want to do this.  I personally prefer to have a choice of keeper week to week, than be staring at a poor fixture run.  I have heard many people say FPL is a game you play against yourself, more so than the near 7 million other players in the game and I tend to agree. There is a lot of psychological influence involved and for me having the choice is a positive and helps me maintain a positivity about my team, rather than potential negativity which may lead me to make different or desperate decisions to make up for it.

Ultimately, you have to make the choice you feel is right and justify it to yourself.  If it doesn’t work out but there was a solid basis to your choice (data, fixtures, etc.), then you can put it down to bad luck.  If this season so far is anything to go by, there is plenty of that going on anyway, so perhaps some proof that playing your own game is the way forward; it will probably beat my way anyway.

Good luck all.