Fantasy Football Scout community writer Greyhead analyses 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 and Tom Freeman, Scoutcasters Seb Wassell and Andy North, Pro Pundits FPL General, Pras, Zophar, and FPL Harry, FPL “celebrities”, LTFPL Andy and Ben Crellin, FPL Champion FPL Gunz, from the Hall of Fame, Fabio Borges, Finn Sollie, Jan Kepski and Jon Ballantyne and last year’s mini–league winner Marko Miseric.
“Where have all the good men gone
And where are all the Gods?
Where’s the streetwise Hercules to fight the rising odds?
Isn’t there a white knight upon a fiery steed?”
We needed a hero, and a hero we got.
No, not Andy North, whose Wildcard attracted ridicule but ultimately success. Not even Dominic Solanke (£7.2m), as everyone captained him. No, the ultimate hero was Illia Zabarnyi (£4.5m), who decided now was the time to score his first goal possibly since he represented Ukraine at under-17 level.
Come on, own up: who had to Google Luton Town and Bournemouth players prior to this Double Gameweek?
They looked doomed to fail certainly after Saturday’s disastrous events, but all was forgiven after an half-time team talk fired up the Cherries in midweek. If only my own FPL team responded so well to my stern words…
Yes, yet again we all got a bit carried away drafting in the likes of Milos Kerkez (£4.4m), Norberto Neto (£4.7m) and Alfie Doughty (£4.7m) in an attempt to catch that Double Gameweek wave. Some even Triple Captained Solanke, which looked like a fail after that penalty slip. They at least had the last laugh. Say hello, Jon Ballantyne and Marko Miseric!
OVERALL PERFORMANCE
Tom Freeman loves a differential and a Double Gameweek. That again proved true with a score of 92. Yeah, sure, Son Heung-min (£9.9m) was there, but it was the maverick picks of Antoine Semenyo (£4.5m), Ben White (£5.7m) and Ross Barkley (£5.0m) that more than halved his rank. Take a bow, Tom, take a bow.
In the captaincy poll, it was Solanke who topped the charts. One man stood against the army and that was FPL Gunz, but sadly his maverick pick of Carlton Morris (£5.2m) didn’t work out this time.
WILDCARD: ANDY NORTH
He caused controversy when he was let into The Great and The Good and he again ruffled feathers with his Wildcard. I expect a few of his Scout colleagues to give him a wide berth this week – well, wider than usual – for fear of being regaled with his Wildcard tale of glory, which has taken him into the top 40,000.
It was unusual in that it left him with £13.4m in the bank, with that extra cash earmarked for Erling Haaland (£14.4m) and Mohamed Salah (£13.0m).
He brought in four doublers to join Solanke, plus enough coverage to see him through the blank this Gameweek. He also sold Haaland for Morris but let’s not dwell on that.
And finally, finally he brought in Gabriel Magalhaes (£5.3m) into his squad for his one point, missing out on the previous 102 points to his name.
The full ins and outs are below:
- IN: Neto, Zabarnyi, Gabriel, Udogie, Regulion, Doughty, Elanga, Bowen, Palmer, Morris
- OUT: Dubravka, Saliba, Bradley, Taylor, Mitchell, Estupinan, Richarlison, Foden, Gordon, Haaland
TRANSFERS
You can tell it’s double and blank time as this week’s most popular transfer in was a Bournemouth goalkeeper, Neto. The most transferred out? Well, that was Erling Haaland.
It was also another hit-heavy week with two-thirds of them taking a transfer penalty. Yet the best transfer trader this week was one who didn’t, as Joe Lepper timed his move for Son and Zabarnyi well: they both scored, so he was 17 points up in his transfer dealings.
- Ben Crellin: Walker > Kerkez, Areola > Neto
- Jan Kępski: Walker > Zabarnyi, Areola > Neto
- Mark Sutherns: Walker > Kerkez, Dubravka > Neto
- Harry Daniels: Taylor > Gusto
- Seb Wassell: Pau > Kerkez, Flekken > Neto
- Andy LTFPL: Dubravka> Neto, Taylor > Zabarnyi
- Joe Lepper: De Bruyne > Son, Virgil > Zabarnyi
- Andy North: Wildcard
- Pras: Pau > Zabarnyi, Dubravka > Neto
- Fábio Borges: Estupiñan > Zabarnyi
- Zophar: Saliba > Doughty, Haaland > Morris
- FPL General: Haaland > Morris, Estupiñan > Doughty
- Jon Ballantyne: No Transfers
- Finn Sollie: Senesi > Zabarnyi, De Bruyne > Son
- Tom Freeman: Haaland > Semenyo,J.Alvarez > Solanke
- Marko Miseric: Haaland > Solanke, Trippier > Doughty
- Az: Estupiñan > Kerkez, Martinez > Neto
- FPL Gunz: Foden > Barkley, Haaland > Morris, Turner > Kaminski
TEMPLATE
The template lurched toward the south coast this week as the backline went to the beach with Neto coming in for Martin Dubravka (£4.2m) and free-scoring Zabarnyi in favour of Kieran Trippier (£6.9m).
TARGETING YOUR TRANSFERS
A casual glance now, at where The Great and The Good have been targeting their transfers.
The majority of transfer activity has been spent in midfield and defence. Normally you would expect more activity in the attacking areas but the default strike force of Haaland and Ollie Watkins (£9.0m) has prevented much flexibility. Andy North has been the one to play around with his forwards the most.
The more analytical types such as Jan Kepski and Fabio Borges have tinkered the most in defence, whilst Zophar has decided that the middle of the park deserves the most attention.
The most active trader has been FPL Gunz, with 14 more transfers than the frugal Jon Ballantyne.
CONCLUSION
A gaping chasm will appear across the FPL community this week, with half Free Hitting into identical teams and half happy to play with eight or nine and feel smug about how they planned ahead. Will there be an unlikely hero like David Datro Fofana (£5.0m) or will we see the FPL thoroughbreds such as Son shine through?
As always, if you want to dig further into the data then do have a read of the Mini-League Mate dossier. Under ‘Join an existing league’, enter your name and email together with league code MLM0001. It’s all free!
Anyway, that’s all from me for and 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.
