The Gameweek 5 post-mortem begins with the key Fantasy Premier League (FPL) talking points from Liverpool v Bournemouth.
SLOT ON DARWIN
After Luis Diaz‘s (£7.8m) benching in the San Siro on Tuesday, this time it was the turn of Diogo Jota (£7.6m) to watch on from the sidelines.
Darwin Nunez (£7.2m) took over line-leading duties, marking his first start under Arne Slot with a superb curling finish.
Jota didn’t even get onto the field at Anfield on Saturday, with Federico Chiesa (£7.0m) and Cody Gakpo (£7.2m) sent on for Darwin and Diaz. Those two alterations interestingly saw Chiesa spearhead the attack for the final 20 minutes, the Italian trying to get in on the act with a 30-yard shot and an (offside) effort that hit the post.
It’d be premature to completely write Jota off. No doubt his time will come again, just like Darwin’s did on Saturday. Diaz’s Gameweek 5 pitch-time was even in question after Gakpo’s excellent performance in Italy, just to show how quickly things can change.
But after Darwin’s goalscoring contribution against Bournemouth, Jota has it all to do to get back in the side against Wolverhampton Wanderers next weekend.
Arne Slot praised Jota’s Uruguayan positional rival after full-time.
“That’s what I noticed as well [his off-the-ball work]. Of course, I play a striker because I like him to score goals, I play a winger because I like them to assist or to score goals. Because if you want to win a game, you need to score goals. But it also helps if you keep a clean sheet.
“We just spoke about the lead-up to both goals, Ibou was involved in this – but keeping a clean sheet, Darwin is also involved in this because of the reasons you just told me. So first and foremost, they have to work really hard for the team. In the beginning of the season it was Mo who made the difference and with Lucho and then it was Cody [Gakpo] and Diogo [Jota] who’s been involved in goals – and today it was Lucho and Darwin. That’s all we want to see.” – Arne Slot on Darwin Nunez
Liverpool are next in action on Wednesday, when they face West Ham United in the EFL Cup. Where there is a midweek fixture, there is always hope. An injury to Darwin or 90 minutes for the Uruguayan (Slot hinted below that he may get another run-out), then Jota is possibly back in the frame.
Really, though, Jota is a long way from being the horse to back in terms of guaranteed Gameweek 6 minutes.
“I think consistency you get by two things – you get by work-rate and you get it by team performance. If the team performance is not consistent, it’s so difficult for an individual to be consistent as well. We just have to create our habits day by day on the training ground and in the games to get this consistency. Because while working on your habits, you create consistency. That’s what we try to do every day and [Darwin] showed today a good game and maybe he can show Wednesday again, but let’s wait and see.” – Arne Slot on Darwin Nunez
SEMENYO CATCHES THE EYE AHEAD OF JUICY DOUBLE-HEADER
As did seem likely, Bournemouth’s adventurous approach opened up more space for Liverpool than they had against the parked Forest bus last weekend.
Diaz was lively even before his goal, twice testing the returning Kepa Arrizabalaga before netting his brace. Ibrahima Konate‘s long ball over the top set up the first, Trent Alexander-Arnold‘s run and pass the second. Having flirted heavily with attacking returns in the first four Gameweeks, the right-back finally delivered.
Mohamed Salah (£12.7m) salvaged an assist for Darwin’s strike to avoid a second straight blank. There’s no real cause for panic here – he had four shots, the best of them being a close-range effort saved by Kepa – but the Gameweek 6 debate will no doubt be over whether Diaz + £4.9m can trump the Egyptian.
Above: Diaz has overtaken Salah in the FPL points table, although the Egyptian still leads 3.92-3.19 for expected goal involvement (xGI)
“This team today, Bournemouth, created much more chances against us than Nottingham Forest did. On the other hand, we created much more than we did against Nottingham Forest, so if you face a low block normally you don’t concede a lot of chances. I expect the longer we work together if we play against a low block that we can create much more. It’s a bit weird that we didn’t concede today and we did concede against Nottingham Forest because looking at the chance creation, today the other team created much more than Nottingham Forest did.” – Arne Slot
As Slot said above, Bournemouth went for it. The Cherries had as many shots as their hosts, even if Liverpool carved out the better-quality opportunities.
Antoine Semenyo (£5.6m) was a particular threat. A marginal offside prevented him from busting the Liverpool clean sheet early on, while he went on to have as many shots (four) as anyone else. In fact, he’s had more goal attempts (24) than any other Premier League player this season.
The Cherries as a team are second for shots in 2024/25, so there’ll be plenty of intereste in the next two fixtures: Southampton (h), Leicester City (a).
Anyone on a Gameweek 8 Wildcard, for instance, could take a two-week punt on Semenyo and offload him for the subsequent run:
2 months, 21 days ago0.2m off doing Jota and Barco to Mbuemo and Gabriel. What one should I proritise? Or should I sell Konsa or Robinson to fund Gabriel?