Fantasy Football Scout community writer Greyhead presents his series of The Great and the Good articles, analysing the transfers and strategies of some well-known Fantasy Premier League (FPL) managers.
The Great and The Good this season are the BlackBox pair of Mark Sutherns and Az, Scouts Joe Lepper and Tom Freeman, Scoutcaster Andy North, Pro Pundits FPL General, Pras, Zophar, FPL Harry and Lateriser, FPL “celebrities” Ben Crellin, Luke Williams and FPL Fran, Hall of Famers Fabio Borges, Jan Kepski, Markku Olaja and Seb Wassell, plus last year’s mini-league winner Geraint Owen.
“You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe”
The offer in Gameweek 27 was to take the blue captaincy pill of hope in Cole Palmer (£11.1m) or the red pill of inevitability in Mohamed Salah (£13.8m). In the end, there were only minor gains for those who decided in Mo we trust.
As Pras pointed out, Palmer did register over 1.0 expected goals (xG). However, we should’ve instead been concentrating our efforts on fellow Chelsea assets Levi Colwill (£4.4m) and pre-season draft darling Christopher Nkunku (£5.7m).
In other news, Alexander Isak (£9.4m) went missing again, leading to either bench jam or dismay. He then returned for Sunday’s FA Cup clash but limped off once more – the Swedish soap opera continues.
Worsening the forwards famine even further, the red mist descended on Matheus Cunha (£7.0m), and there was an attempted decapitation of Jean-Philippe Mateta (£7.5m) too.
OVERALL PERFORMANCE
Our top scorer from Gameweek 27 was Jan Kepski. Despite still lurking outside of the top million, this is a manager with a trio of top 1k finishes throughout the last five seasons – which showcases how challenging this FPL campaign has been.
This week, Jan’s decision to go all-in on Chelsea inspired 76 points, as the transferred in Pedro Neto (£6.2m) sat alongside Colwill and Palmer.
He also has two Brighton and Hove Albion forwards, with the love him or hate him Joao Pedro (£5.4m) and Danny Welbeck (£5.5m), the latter being his super sub for Isak. Plus, he was one of many who kept faith with double Arsenal defence – he looks well set up for Blank Gameweek 29.
Talking of bench jam, Harry continues to find the FPL four-leaf clovers, this time getting 18 points from initial substitutes Justin Kluivert (£6.1m) and Vitalii Mykolenko (£4.4m). I don’t know how he sold his soul to the FPL Gods but let’s hope it’s worth it.
In terms of weekly scores, Ben Crellin was not far behind Jan on 75, although he took a different route to points via Bruno Fernandes (£8.3m). The Portuguese playmaker has consecutive double-digit returns and gets to face Leicester City in the blank.
Pras remains top and, with another green now, sits just outside the top 5k. But Lateriser is on a hot streak, with another green arrow meaning he’s averaged over 92 points in the last five weeks.
TRANSFERS
One of the reasons for this recent rise has been Lateriser’s more aggressive transfers. For example, he correctly bought Nkunku for his 12 points.
When looking at trades, much of the investment was focused on preparation for Gameweek 29. Jarrod Bowen (£7.4m) proved to be a moderate success whilst, with post-FA Cup hindsight, Cunha looks to be yet another example of this season’s series of unfortunate events.
THE GREAT AND THE GOOD TEMPLATE
In good news, we have the pretty template picture back!
The forward line continues to be the most turbulent area; this week Cunha tries his luck in joining the template but it clearly all got too much for him.
IT’S ALL ABOUT THE BASE
Meanwhile, looking at the base points table, this looks purely at tallies before captaincy or chip usage is taken into account.
FPL Harry tops this table and Fabio Borges sits third – neither have played their Assistant Manager chip so far, so Pras should be wary of a late surge.
The proportion of captaincy contributions ranges between 27 and 33 per cent, which is higher than previous seasons. Mo’s machine-like consistency is a key factor here.
Ben Crellin has been the smartest here, leading the armband scores because he keeps picking the right moments to differentiate.
CONCLUSION
Despite the break in FPL activity, we shouldn’t take our eye off the Fantasy ball. FA Cup consequences have already made the decision of whether or not to Free Hit in Gameweek 29 tougher than before. What will the European events bring?
Anyway, that’s all from me for now and remember: don’t have FPL nightmares.
Those affected by any of the topics raised in the above article can find me here on Twitter or BlueSky.
