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.
“You’re unbelievable!”
Pep quoted 90s alternative rock band EMF – youngsters look them up – in his gushing appraisal of Erling Haaland (£12.2m) and The Great and The Good agreed as they rushed to secure his services.
The Norwegian Meat Shield, a nickname he must be delighted with, delivered the goods with a brace and any manager foolish enough not to own him now faces the prospect of a home game against Leicester City, a club that appears to have signed their own relegation death warrant.
OVERALL PERFORMANCE
We have a new leader in The Great and The Good as well as a divergence in strategy as FPL Harry takes the top spot and plans for his Free Hit in Gameweek 32, while Ben Crellin studies his spreadsheet and decides that Gameweek 34 is his way to go. It’s going to be close!
Neale Rigg continues his meteoric rise up the rankings like a Newkie Brown Nuclear Missile, as he top scores again with 70 points. In hindsight, his decision to keep Gabriel Martinelli (£6.6m) looks like a masterstroke.
Yet, perhaps the most remarkable achievement this week goes to Joe Lepper who managed the very rarest of things – a grey dot. Whilst others around him were getting green and red arrows, he managed to retain his exact rank of 11,791st.
TRANSFERS
Transfer – Sleep – Repeat was the mindset as moving Ivan Toney (£7.8m) to Haaland was The Great and The Good’s group transfer of choice. Magnus obviously bucked the trend with his move from Kai Havertz (£7.6m) to Ollie Watkins (£7.6m), clearly he is playing his own game this season.
Tom Freeman took a hit to accommodate Haaland but must have psychic powers or be close friends with Frank Lampard, as he dropped Ben Chilwell (£6.0m) just in time for his benching in order to get Alex Moreno‘s (£4.4m) clean sheet.
Those who rolled their transfers – Mark Sutherns and Ben – were punished this week but perhaps they see the long-term gain. Much will depend on what happens when Manchester City face Bayern Munich this week, as to whether they will gamble again on going without Haaland.
The full list of transfers is below:-
- Az – Haaland (Kane)
- LTFPL Andy – Haaland (Toney)
- Ben Crellin – No Transfers
- Fabio Borges – Haaland (Toney)
- Finn Sollie – Haaland, Raya (Kane, Steele)
- FPL Harry – Haaland (Toney)
- Joe Lepper – Haaland (Toney)
- Geoff Dance – Haaland (Toney)
- FPL General – Haaland (Toney)
- Magnus Carlsen – Watkins (Havertz)
- Mark Sutherns – No Transfers
- FPL Matthew – Haaland (Toney)
- Neale Rigg – Haaland (Toney)
- Pras – Haaland (Toney)
- Suvansh – Haaland, Dias (Toney, Gabriel)
- Tom Freeman – Haaland, Moreno (Chilwell, Toney)
- Tom Stephenson – Haaland (Toney)
- Zophar – Haaland (Toney)
TEMPLATE
No prizes for guessing the only change to this template, as we saw Erling enter the building in place of penalty-missing Toney.
The full details for The Great and The Good is as follows, with the number in brackets showing how many teams in which they appear.
Kepa (14), Raya (11)
Trippier (17), Chilwell (14), Botman (14), Shaw (11), Henry (9)
Rashford (18), Fernandes (15), Mitoma (14), March (12), Saka (8)
Watkins (18), Haaland (15), Kane (14)
SEASON STATS
A look now at some of the season stats. FPL Harry is top for team value – although that doesn’t really seem to matter this year – and has also taken the most hits with 44 points given up in transfer penalties. The more aggressive approach has worked well for him.
Contrast that with Magnus who has shown far more restraint with just a minus eight taken all campaign. It may have been wiser to show such restraint when picking his captain, as he sits bottom in this metric and 216 armband points behind Finn Sollie’s very impressive 534. The Hall of Famer has put his trust in Haaland 16 times compared to the measly seven times of the Chess Grandmaster.
CONCLUSION
As inevitable as the Haaland transfer was last week, it looks as though the move for Jack Grealish (£7.0m) from Marcus Rashford (£7.2m) looks equally as template this week, depending on the injury prognosis for Manchester United’s star.
Elsewhere, for those with Haaland hangovers, bringing him in looks like a priority unless they fancy one more gamble before Blank Gameweek 32. The end game is upon us with only a few more weeks to go, so plot carefully and remember that the only rank that matters is the one after Gameweek 38.
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.
