Fantasy Football Scout community writer Greyhead returns for the 2022/23 season with his series of articles analysing the Fantasy Premier League (FPL) transfers and strategies of some noted Fantasy managers, from serial top 10k finishers to well-known faces.
The Great and The Good this season are the BlackBox pair of Mark Sutherns and Az, Scouts Joe Lepper, Tom Freeman, Neale Rigg, Geoff Dance, Pro Pundits Pras, Zophar and FPL Harry, FPL “celebrities” Magnus Carlsen, FPL General, LTFPL Andy, Ben Crellin, from the Hall of Fame, Fabio Borges, FPL Matthew, Finn Sollie and Tom Stephenson and of course last year’s mini league winner and overall no.2 Suvansh.
“Big time, I’m on my way. I’m making it”
Some huge scores this week amongst The Great and The Good, as Double Gameweek 29 lived up to its big-time billing with wall-to-wall Bench Boosts and plenty of triple digits, plus plenty of arguments about what constitutes a valid bench score.
The lure of doubles saw us all eager to move on our Arsenal players and this lurched into fever pitch with five minutes to go, as Let’s Talk FPL Andy broke the FPL internet by leaking news of Bukayo Saka‘s (£8.6m) benching.
OVERALL PERFORMANCE
Ali v Frazier, Nicklaus v Palmer and Federer v Nadal are all legendary sporting rivalries but we now have to add FPL Harry v Ben Crellin, as this duo continue to duke it out at the top of The Great and The Good’s league table.
It was Harry’s turn to make gains this week, as he played his Bench Boost whilst Ben could only watch on, having played his a couple of weeks ago. In the end, Harry only racked up a nine-point advantage thanks to a triple hit but this is a match-up that will go to the wire, as only four points now separate them. Both are inside the top 1k overall.
This week’s king of the FPL ring was Neale Rigg with 146, putting Ollie Watkins (£7.5m), Kieran Trippier (£6.1m) and Marcus Rashford (£7.3m) alongside differential Brentford goal scorer Ethan Pinnock (£4.4m). The Scout Editor’s sixth successive green arrow places him in the top 100k.
Also on a good run is the aforementioned LTFPL Andy, who took time away from stressing out Fantasy managers to score 143 and move onto a five-digit rank for the first time this season. In fact, 11 of The Great and The Good now sit within the best 100,000.
Elsewhere, the captaincy was up for debate this week. The sensible pick for those who tuck their shirts into their underwear was Rashford, for those braver with their briefs it was a Brighton and Hove Albion midfielder whilst Fabio Borges had his patriotic pants pulled down with his choice of Bruno Fernandes (£9.6m).
TRANSFERS
The excitement of the double gave many an excuse to take a hit or two, with the usual diatribe that a minus four is a minus two on such occasions.
A dozen of The Great and The Good took a hit; Finn spent eight points to reach Mohamed Salah (£12.8m) and Pras joined by hopping aboard the Harvey Barnes (£6.7m) train. Choo choo!
FPL Harry lost his cool completely when hearing that Saka would be sat down to start the match against Leeds United, going wild with a -12 hit. Whilst Dominic Solanke (£5.5m) scored, he will probably still be mad at James Maddison (£8.3m) for disappointing once again.
Elsewhere, it was a rinse and repeat of Fernandes and Luke Shaw (£5.2m) for the majority.
The full list of transfers is below:
- Az – Maddison, Steele (Saka, Ward)
- LTFPL Andy – Shaw, Fernandes (Saka, Gabriel)
- Ben Crellin – Salah (Ward-Prowse)
- Fabio Borges – Shaw, Fernandes (Gabriel, Odegaard)
- Finn Sollie – Salah, Shaw, Fernandes (Saka, Odegaard, Zinchenko)
- FPL Harry – Solanke, Maddison, Shaw, Fernandes (Kane, Saka, Martinelli, Zinchenko)
- Joe Lepper – Shaw, Fernandes (Pinnock, Saka)
- Geoff Dance – Steele, Fernandes (Odegaard, Ward)
- FPL General – Shaw, Fernandes (Gabriel, Odegaard)
- Magnus Carlsen – Rashford (Andreas)
- Mark Sutherns – Shaw, Fernandes (Odegaard, Gabriel)
- FPL Matthew – Shaw, Fernandes (Saka, Pinnock)
- Neale Rigg – Shaw, Fernandes (Gabriel, Saka)
- Pras – Barnes, Shaw, Fernandes (Saka, Zinchenko, Odegaard)
- Suvansh – Shaw, Fernandes (Saka, Zinchenko)
- Tom Freeman – Fernandes (Odegaard)
- Tom Stephenson – Shaw, Fernandes (Zinchenko, Odegaard)
- Zophar – Fernandes (Odegaard)
TEMPLATE
The full details for The Great and The Good are as follows, with the number in brackets showing how many teams in which they appear:
Kepa (14), Raya (13)
Trippier (17), Chilwell (15), Botman (14), Shaw (13), Henry (10)
Rashford (18), Fernandes (15), Mitoma (14), March (13), Saka (8)
Toney (17), Watkins (17), Kane (16)
The Arsenal fell out of the bottom of the template, as Martin Odegaard (£6.8m) and Gabriel (£5.2m) made way. Fernandes and Shaw were the eager new starters.
BENCH BOOST
All featured managers have now played the Bench Boost chip, with Fabio and Ben having deployed it in Gameweek 27. So, who wowed with their woodwork scores?
Neale and Fabio hit the heady height of 33 points so will be pleased with their plank. Unfortunately, Suvansh, Zophar and FPL General will be less satisfied with their substitute scores that failed to total 20.
Of course, the final result will be up for debate as I am sure there will be claims of bench wizardry but I’ll leave others to have that fight.
CONCLUSION
We’re back to normality this week, with just a normal ten fixtures to contend with. However, I suspect most of our time will be spent trying to work out how to fit Erling Haaland (£12.0m) and Salah into our squads over the next few weeks.
Anyway, that’s all from me for now, but remember – don’t have FPL nightmares.
For those affected by any of the topics raised in the above article then you can find me here on Twitter.
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