In his latest article, three-time top 200 finisher Lateriser looks ahead to Double Gameweek 33, discusses Manchester City players and shares his initial chip strategy thoughts.
Well, Arsenal’s loss to Southampton on Saturday has truly thrown the cat amongst the pigeons in terms of making chip strategy a fairly diverse decision. There’s no real ‘clear’ option now. With the Gunners having no blanks or doubles, I think things have worked out fairly decently for those who have already used their Wildcard early.
MAN CITY: A SETTLED SIDE?
Let’s talk about Manchester City first. They are out of Europe and will largely focus on the league and the FA Cup. We might have also received clues in the last two games as to how Pep Guardiola’s team might line up in the final stretch of the season.
Guardiola is the kind of manager who, if something is working, doesn’t tend to change it for a ‘period’ or until he feels the need to overhaul things.
Across the two convincing performances in the cups against Arsenal and Liverpool, Guardiola made only one change: that was at centre-back, as Marc Guehi (£5.1m) was ineligible to play in the Carabao Cup final.
Above images from Fotmob
The front six and full-backs remained the same for Guardiola in both teams, which indicates he might have found his team for the final stretch of the season.
The longevity of the team is slightly questionable, as a lot will be dictated by the result of the massive game against Arsenal in Gameweek 33, but with City otherwise just having the FA Cup to focus on, and having another double in the future as well, it’s just fine to go for three from that team.
WHICH THREE CITY PLAYERS?
In my opinion, Erling Haaland (£14.4m) and Nico O’Reilly (£5.0m) are pretty locked in as picks for anyone who wants to go there. O’Reilly is joint top with Virgil van Dijk (£6.3m) for big chances in the last six matches and despite playing as a full-back, his role as a box crasher remained in both the cup games. Let me cite some stats for some of the picks.
Guardiola has dropped his ‘two up front’ experiment in the last two cup games. Because of that, we’ve seen an improvement in Haaland’s output. This came to the fore in the game against Liverpool. Antoine Semenyo (£8.2m) wasn’t as central as before and held the width to a large extent, which is shown in his expected assists (xA) numbers. O’Reilly’s ceiling is just really high, as was visible in the game against Arsenal, and he even had a couple of assists against Liverpool. He’s just a lock whichever way you look at things.
The third Manchester City pick is up for debate. All of Semenyo, Rayan Cherki (£6.3m) and Matheus Nunes (£5.3m) are in contention, in my opinion. There’s not much between the stats of the two attackers but Semenyo does have a slightly higher propensity for goals, whereas Cherki assumes more of a creative role. If you don’t want to double up on City’s attack, Nunes is a pretty nailed defender with attacking upside.
CHELSEA V MAN CITY: NOT NECESSARILY A ‘TOUGH’ FIXTURE?
One of the big bones of contention when it comes to Wildcarding in Gameweek 32 are two of this weekend’s fixtures: Manchester City v Chelsea and Manchester United v Leeds United.
The problem, in a nutshell:
- Manchester City and Chelsea will be popular on a Wildcard but don’t have the best Gameweek 32 fixture.
- Manchester United assets are in line to be sold/replaced as they don’t have a Double Gameweek but they have a favourable-on-paper home fixture in Gameweek 32.
However, I think that having attackers from Man City or Chelsea in Gameweek 32 is fine. City have conceded 1.0 xG or more in four of the last six games, while Chelsea aren’t in the best defensive moment, are injury-hit at the back and will not call upon Enzo Fernandez (£6.5m). The City defender you’re probably looking at has attacking upside, too.
As for Chelsea attackers, Joao Pedro’s (£7.8m) underlying data has been great for a while and even Cole Palmer (£10.6m) is sounding positive now:
“Yeah, now I feel good. I feel like I’ve turned the corner. Physically, I feel good now. I can finally shoot again. I can do everything again. So yeah, it’s just about kicking on and performing.” – Cole Palmer
Being a United fan, I can say that we’re not as convincing against a deep block – something I fully expect Leeds United to employ – as we are against teams that come out and play. Think of our performances against Everton and West Ham United.
Despite this, many Wildcarders will still probably hold Bruno Fernandes (£10.3m) in Gameweek 32!
LATERISER’S CHIP STRATEGY THOUGHTS
I haven’t fully made my mind up but as things stand, I am leaning towards a Wildcard either in Gameweek 32 or Gameweek 33. For context, I still have my Wildcard, Bench Boost, Free Hit and Triple Captain in play. I would like to use my Triple Captain in the Manchester City double that is still pending.
One of the biggest advantages of a Gameweek 35 Wildcard, in my opinion, is information. So much depends on the result of Arsenal v Manchester City in Gameweek 33. If the Gunners win, they’ve pretty much got the title in the bag. Should that happen, even Arsenal defenders might be dodgy on a Gameweek 35 Wildcard, especially if they have progressed in the UEFA Champions League. The two-legged semi-finals of that competition are on either side of Gameweek 35.
Gameweek 32 Wildcarders, meanwhile, might not have enough Arsenal and Crystal Palace players in their initial squads. These are teams that might be popular on a Gameweek 35 Wildcard, with Palace likely to double after that point.
On top of that, a few more weeks of action may give us a steer on which teams will have end-of-season motivation or be ‘on the beach’. That’s an advantage of a later Wildcard, in case you are weighing things up like me.
Pras, Zophar and I will discuss these factors in depth on this week’s episode of The FPL Wire.
