After playing Fantasy Premier League for six years now, finishing 141st has been my best finish to date.
I believe reflecting on what went well, and what didn’t is key to progressing as a fantasy manager.
I went back through my Gameweek history with a fine comb and found some resonating themes which I believe can be applied as we go into the 2020/2021 season.
1. Put your faith in the heavy hitting midfielders.
When I say this, I mean for both budget allocation and the captaincy. The premium midfielders have a far higher ceiling than strikers. Over the season 5 midfielders scored 200+ points, this was only achieved by two strikers.
2. Focussing your transfers further up the field.
Using transfers on defenders and goalkeepers can work, but it is rare. I went with Trent Alexander-Arnold, Andrew Robertson and Çaglar Söyüncü for most of the season, and it meant I could use transfers on higher impact moves.
3. Be aggressive with the wildcard.
Gameweeks 1-8 are the most volatile of the whole season, I saw an opportunity in Gameweek 3 and went for it. By the time Gameweek 5 had come around the team I had was vastly unaffordable to the competition.
4. Have a great support community.
Having a group of individuals, or a few key contacts who you know you can trust is absolutely vital. Bouncing ideas off people you trust is a really great way to self-reflect on your decisions.
5. Take information from sources you trust.
Whether that is reading articles, listening to podcasts, searching through Twitter, or following good managers, make sure that the information and people you are using are ones that you trust and are reliable.
6. Not actively caring about team value.
Accumulating team value is great, but it should not be a priority. I would not advise moving early, except if you have the exact cash for a move.
7. Never be afraid to double up.
Some of my most successful periods of the season were when I had numerous doubles up including:
- Double Wolves defence post restart
- Double Liverpool fullbacks pre-restart
- Kevin De Bruyne and Raheem Sterling
- Anthony Martial and Bruno Fernandes
- Tammy Abraham and Mason Mount.
Sometimes to truly benefit from a team’s form or fixtures you will need more than one.
8. Never having much money tied up in strikers.
This one is up for debate considering some of the nicely priced forwards we have ahead of the 2020/21 season, but I am still going to stick to it. I am a strong believer that 352 and 451 are the formations of the future.
9. Don’t punt with the captaincy.
Picking a consistent and reliable captain really is the difference between a good and a brilliant season. Captaincy isn’t the place to punt, your 6th/7th attacker is where you should be doing that.
10. Listen to yourself.
Take in all the relevant information you need from different sources, but make sure that final call is always your own thinking. That way, even if it does go wrong you will have nobody to blame but yourself. It will help also help your decision making in the future.
To conclude, I would suggest the most important aspect of FPL is to be flexible. FPL is an exceptionally dynamic game and things change all the time. Despite writing these 10 themes which I think could be indicative of a good season this year, they are not set in stone. Adapting to your surroundings quicker than the pack is how you can prosper in FPL.
3 years, 7 months agoNice article mate, definitely a bunch of stuff I agree on, despite having never finished in the top 150 🙂
Love a good double up and definitely won't be punting with my captaincy, unless Duffy becomes an option again 😉