With the next Fantasy Premier League (FPL) deadline almost here, we’ll be hearing from our panel of guest writers.

Here, three-time top 500 finisher FPL General – sitting at 43k in the world this season – talks us through Gameweek 23, plus his plans for Gameweek 24 and beyond.

Gameweek 23 Review

63 points in Gameweek 23 resulted in another small red arrow from 42k to 43k. It feels like I’ve been treading water rank-wise for a while now (as you can see from the graphic below). With no chip being deployed this week, there’s likely to be more pain to come with others playing Triple Captain and Assistant Manager chips. 

My goal for the season is another top 50k finish. Anything better than that would be a bonus. I don’t have specific plans on when I’m going to activate the second Wildcard, Assistant Manager, Bench Boost and Free Hit chips (Triple Captain is already gone). The fixture landscape will become clearer in the next few weeks, so I’ll start to think about long-term strategy then. For now, I’m focusing on getting as many points as possible in the upcoming Gameweeks.

I’m not worrying too much about Blank Gameweek 29; I’ll just Free Hit that week if my squad needs it. I’m keen to avoid falling into the trap of swerving good short-term picks in favour of less desirable players just because they have a confirmed fixture in Gameweek 29.

I used one free transfer last week to switch from Jacob Greaves (£3.9m) to Trent Alexander-Arnold (£7.3m). It was all going to plan until Greaves popped up and wiped the double Liverpool clean sheet! That was one of the most painful moments in the campaign so far.

Elsewhere, Gabriel Magalhaes (£6.4m), captain Mohamed Salah (£13.7m), Bryan Mbeumo (£7.8m), Anthony Gordon (£7.7m) and Alexander Isak (£9.5m) all did the business. The Mbeumo penalty drama wasn’t good for the heart! 

Ismaila Sarr (£5.7m) is on the chopping block this week having blanked in five of his last six appearances. The obvious place to look for replacements is at Bournemouth. Justin Kluivert (£5.7m) is particularly eye-catching but they’ve got Liverpool this weekend, which isn’t ideal. 

Double Gameweek 24 Bus Team

I’ve got two free transfers available with £0.9m in the bank. The first option is to roll, which I might end up doing. However, I don’t love the idea of starting Sarr or Gabriel this week. I think I’d prefer to have Kluivert in the XI over those two despite the tricky fixture. That’ll bring the Sarr to Kluivert move forward a week. It would be a bit of an insurance policy against my double Liverpool defence as I’m not feeling too confident about a clean sheet for them at the Vitality Stadium. 

There’s enough cash available to make a sideways switch to Eberechi Eze (£6.7m), who I think is now the best Crystal Palace midfielder to own. But when Bournemouth have such good fixtures after the Liverpool game, it’s hard to look past their assets. I still like Antoine Semenyo (£5.6m) as an option too, while Dango Ouattara (£5.0m) has been very impressive playing as a false nine. All that being said, Kluivert with penalties is the one I want. 

Earlier this week, I could’ve afforded a switch from Leon Chiwome (£4.5m) to Iliman Ndiaye (£5.5m). I strongly considered the move but in the end, it didn’t feel quite right, so I decided against it. I’ve been enjoying not having benching headaches in attack each week and I wasn’t keen on locking away another £1.0m on the bench. In that scenario, I would’ve played Ndiaye over Sarr this week then shipped the Crystal Palace man next week. The funds were pretty tight and I would likely have been priced out of Kluivert next week which was another factor in not doing it. The Double Gameweek devil on my shoulder keeps whispering Beto (£4.9m) to me. Double Gameweek fever is always a tricky one to shake off! 

In summary, it’s either going to be a roll to three frees or making the Kluivert switch. I’m leaning towards making the transfer and having two frees for Gameweek 25. I’m giving Salah the armband – no thought required there! 

Best of luck for the Double Gameweek folks and have a great weekend.

Check out this week’s video with Joe on the Fantasy Football Scout YouTube channel and the latest episode of the 59th Minute Podcast.