“Endgame – This is the fight of our lives”
There was movie blockbuster hype for GW36 with much expected of the FPL’s superheroes with “Spiderman” Salah, “Iron” Mane and “The Incredible” Robbo all battling to be our Triple Captain FPL! Fortunately, their foes of Huddersfield were slightly less intimidating than Thanos and his sidekicks.
So, who are The Great and The Good? They are Jay Egersdorff, Ville Ronka, The Scout-casters (Joe, Andy, Az, David, Granville and Mark), Eliteserien’s expert Niemi and the last man standing Torres Magic.
OVERALL PERFORMANCE
Mark was the leading FPL avenger this week with a strong 107 points led by his decision to triple captain Salah, but he was also helped by a couple of Wolves Jota and Jimenez.
He is now in his highest overall position for the season and climbs inside the top 1,000 for the first time since GW30 timing his end of season sprint to perfection. He is currently averaging 72 points per game week after hits from GW29.
David hit a century for the first time this season with 104 and moves back into second place replacing Andy, it’s proving an epic battle between these two. All The Great and The Good have now joined the 100 club with Mark and Niemi achieving this landmark three times this season.
Speaking of Niemi he has had a rollercoaster of a season peaking at 17,000 in GW15 he collapsed to 110,000 in GW19 but through expert use of his chips he now finds himself back up to 23,000. He is only 47 behind David, could he snatch the runner up spot from Mr Munday?
TRANSFERS AND HITS
This is a summary of the transfers for this week:
Andy – TAA (Koscielny)
Az – No transfer
David – Salah, Calvert-Lewin (KDB, Firmino)
Granville – TAA, Robertson, Milivojevic (Monreal, Eriksen, Duffy)
Jay – Firmino (Lacazette)
Mark – No transfer
Niemi – Salah, Babel (KDB, Eriksen)
Torres Magic – No transfer
Ville Ronka – Mane (Sterling)
*transfers out are in brackets
Liverpool players were the flavour of the week with TAA, Robertson, Mane and Salah all popular targets and all delivering bumper returns.
Three of the managers held their nerve and rolled a transfer whilst Granville and Niemi were bolder and took a hit with the Eliteserien king being well rewarded for bringing in Mo and the less fancied Babel.
Speaking of hits Mark and Niemi have both taken a more aggressive approach over the last few game weeks taking 5 a piece since GW31 compared to zero between GW25 and GW31. Obviously, this has been driven by the blanks and doubles but a clear lesson that it’s not the number of hits but the timing that counts.
TEMPLATE
After those transfers the template now looks like this:
Ryan, Foster
Duffy, Doherty, Valery, Robertson, Alexander-Arnold
Son, Eriksen, Mane, Sterling, Jota
Aguero, Jimenez, Llorente/Gray/Vardy/Firmino
The template defence has settled with TAA now confirming his place with Vertonghen and Laporte now moving out but the 3rd striker is much less settled, but I suspect Vardy’s form will lead to a rise in popularity.
To predict further changes to the template in the last couple of weeks we can look at the season ticker to suggest United, Arsenal or perhaps Palace players will be the next to join? When we examine The Great and The Good squads Ronka seems best prepared with Pogba and Kolasniac, Andy has kept Lacazette and Granville has Milivojevic.
CHIP CHAMPION
So now the end game is upon us are I thought it would be interesting to see who made best use of the infinity stones/chips?
Although, open to debate due to the differing nature of the chips I would say Niemi has been the strongest here coming top in terms of bench boost and triple captain. These have been a key factor in his return to form since his mid-season blip.
TorresMagic was set to be the holder of the infinity gauntlet until a poor pick of Son for the triple captain armband. Granville could yet steal the honour of being the Sorcerer Supreme of that chip depending who he picks in the next two weeks, Pogba, Rashford, Lukaku?
CAPTAIN AND DIFFERENTIALS
Dominated by Liverpool this week with Mane the overwhelming choice but Mark and Niemi went a different path with Salah which paid handsome returns. As mentioned Torres Magic will be less pleased with his Son pick.
It’s interesting that Mane has not been a more popular choice for the armband this season despite being 4th overall top scorer above the likes of Aguero and Kane. He has only been selected 3.8% by these managers and for Ronka, David and Andy it was the first time they had picked him this week.
A slightly different spin on the differentials this week as I look at those players in the squads not only unique to the rest of The Great and The Good but also under 10% ownership in the top 10k. A couple of names stand out Milivojevic for Granville at 2.69% looks a good choice for those looking to gain ground as does his pick of Moura at 7.56%. Elsewhere, Babel at 1.86% for Niemi and Hojberg at 9.86% for David may prove surprising rank boosters.
CONCLUSION
As we come to the end of the season, we all start to reflect on revised targets for our final positions and I suspect The Great and The Good are no different.
Can Mark make this his 5th time in the top 1,000? Will Andy make it his 3rd time in the top 10,000? Can Az make sure he gets in to the top 50,000 a ranking marker he has only missed once since 2011/2012?
One of the managers should be particularly pleased with his performance to date as David will beat his previous best of 176,000 by some margin but can he get into the top 10,000 club? The endgame is upon us.
Anyway, that’s all from me for now and remember don’t have nightmares.
