Gameweek 10 is almost upon us and surely it can’t be as bad as Gameweek 9, right?
The lowest average of the season had many in despair.
The FPL community has been quieter than usual this week as managers lick their wounds.
I managed a score of 42 which was respectable considering some of the horror stories from the weekend.
The Punishers
Going into Gameweek 10, Anthony Knockaert (£5.5m) is causing me a headache. He came in on a double move in Gameweek 8, alongside Marko Arnautovic (£7.0m), to replace David Silva (£8.5m) and Callum Wilson (£6.5m). It’s safe to say, those were not my best transfers of the season! Wilson must have known I had sold him as he gave a salute in his goal celebration to rub salt in my wounds.
In hindsight, I should have been more patient with him as he still had three good fixtures and excellent underlying statistics despite going five games without a goal. I was hell-bent on getting Arnie in for the Brighton game which meant sacrificing Silva who also punished me with a nine-pointer in the 5-0 win over Burnley.
Knockaert hasn’t worked out and is now a rotation risk having sat out the Gameweek 9 fixture against Newcastle. He’s likely to be my transfer out this week.
The reason I went cheap with the Silva replacement was so that Andrew Robertson (£6.4m) could come in for Jose Holebas (£4.8m) in Gameweek 9 which worked out well. The Scottish Roberto Carlos was phenomenal again in the Champions League last night.
Salah and the Liverpool defence
Another player who impressed for Liverpool against Red Star Belgrade was the runaway leader in this week’s captaincy poll, Mohamed Salah (£12.8m). A brace, including one from the spot, has his owners feeling confident of a big haul at home to Cardiff this weekend. Non-owners will no doubt be looking at ways to get him.
Hat trick please Mo ©.
Trent Alexander-Arnold (£5.1m) owners are worried after he missed his second game in a row. Dejan Lovren (£4.9m) has come in and posted back-to-back nine-pointers. The Croatian was an unused substitute in the Champions League in midweek which suggests he may start against Cardiff. If so, the big question is – who starts at right back, TAA or Joe Gomez (£5.1m)? If I owned TAA, I’d give him one more week if you have a solid first sub who can come in if he misses out again.
Knockaert replacements
Roberto Pereyra (£6.2m), Andre Schürrle (£6.0m), Kenedy (£4.9m) and Josh Murphy (£4.8m) are battling it out for a place in my Gameweek 10 squad.
Pereyra and Schurrle have four goals each, while Kenedy and Murphy have the favourable fixtures between now and Christmas and are much cheaper. More research is required before I come to a decision but I’m leaning towards going cheap and using the cash saved to improve things next week.
Benjamin Mendy (£6.3m) is top of my ‘Wanted’ list for Gameweek 11. Once he’s back in, the next step will be to figure out which Man City midfielder is worth the investment. A task I’m not looking forward to!
Good luck to all in Gameweek 10.
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