Learning from The Great and The Good: End of season awards

“No more pencils no more books no more teacher’s dirty looks. Out for summer out till fall we might not come back at all. School’s out forever school’s out for summer”

The Great and The Good end of term awards party is in full swing, Az and Andy are drinking shots at the bar, David is eyeing up the karaoke, and Mark is drunkenly telling everyone how much he loves them.

This fictitious party will no doubt end in tears, but it does give us a chance to look back at the highs and lows of the last season and hand out a few awards. As with all good parties Top Marx and his Hall of Fame cronies have promised to gate crash at the end although hopefully no one will get sacked from any selfies this time.

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

So, the first award is also the biggest with the honour of the best overall performance going to… dramatic pause…. Mark. The table below shows the final ranking following the events of GW38. Although Mark didn’t quite make the top 1,000 due to an audacious eight-point hit, more on that later, he proved himself to be the greatest of The Great and The Good with a lead of 80 points over 2nd placed Andy.

This is his 9th finish in the top 5,000 and he has had another incredible season not falling out of the top 10,000 since GW19 despite being outside the million mark in GW4.

Surprisingly, he was the lowest scorer in the final week with 39 points after hits with Az, in a reversal of recent fortunes finishing on a high with a massive 85 points. This was due to his Liverpool triple of TAA, Robertson and his captain Mane along with a smart Redmond transfer.

I have also borrowed Top Marx’s graph which shows the ranks of The Great and The Good over the 38 game weeks. The vertical scale is from rank 1 to 2m. The distance between the ranks corresponds to the number of points separating them. For instance, there were 390 points between rank 1 and rank 100k and 187 points between 100k and 1m.

The level of difficulty to reach the higher ranks increased throughout the season, back in GW8 the gap between rank 1 and 100k only at 136 points at that stage. Adam Levy’s domination is also highlighted as he was clear 87 points from number 10 at the end of the season whilst the early leader in GW8 only had a 21-point gap.

The Great and The Good’s average OR was 53,000 and the end of season chips played a big part in the general improvement over the last few weeks but not enough to hit the season peak of 47,000 in GW17. Looking back the festive period and the first double game week with the Sane no show hit the managers hard, particularly Ronka who dropped from 817 in GW16 to a final OR of 47,000, his worst ever season.

MOST POPULAR FORMATION

The one that literally no one has been waiting for is the award for the most popular formation. 3-4-3 was the clear winner with 44% of the votes. As a formation can’t pick up an award instead Joe makes his way to the stage, he has deployed the formation 68% over the full season. Get better soon Joe!

TRANSFER WHEELER DEALER

To build the limited tension for the manager with the best transfer record let’s first look back at a summary of the transfers for this week:

Andy – Sterling, Redmond, Wilson (Eriksen, Son, Jimenez)
Az – Redmond (Son)
David – Redmond, Salah (Hazard, Son)
Granville – Rashford, Babel (Son, Murray)
Jay – Vardy, Kompany (Firmino, Doherty)
Joe – Redmond (Son)
Mark – Walker, Anderson, Vardy, Mitrovic (Vertonghen, Calvert-Lewin, Firmino, Son)
Niemi – Rashford, B.Silva (Son, Jimenez)
Torres Magic – Redmond, Salah (Hazard, Son)
Ville Ronka – Moura (Son)
*transfers out are in brackets

There was a degree of last day of term madness in the transfers with Mark taking the headlines with an eight-point hit including Felipe Anderson and involved him captaining Vardy, this time the gamble didn’t pay off.

Redmond was the most popular transfer with David and Torres Magic both taking a hit to bring him in alongside Salah.

Including these final moves into the table below gives us a view of the transfer success of The Great and The Good based on the data provided via FPL Statistico. This doesn’t reflect the fact that transfers are generally made with more than one fixture in mind, and that patience in an underperforming player can pay off.

I am pleased to say the winner is Joe with 154 points after hits to beat a following pack of Granville, Niemi and David by a clear 12 points. His transfers have been consistent over the season, but the last 10 weeks highlights include Mane for his double-digit haul in GW 30, Tielemans in GW33 and of course Redmond in the last game week.

BIGGEST BANKER

Recognizing outstanding contribution to team value is the next award and the winner is Granville with 106.5 at the end some 4.1 million better than Jay.

His strong financial performance coincided with a strong finish to the season with 8 out 10 green arrows in the last few weeks and a strong final GW with 78 points, helping him to his highest position of the season at 23,000.

KING OF THE CAPTAINS

So, the final award of the night goes to the manager who has consistently picked the best armband throughout the season and as I open the envelope I am pleased to announce that the winner is La La Land. Of course, I joke which I appreciate is not always obvious, the winner is Mark with a 17.5 average despite a last weekend miss on Vardy.

The graph below shows the captain choices over the season and reflects the huge popularity of Salah at 36.6% yet at an average of 16.8 points when selected he has underperformed against Hazard at 20.1.

Mane was the popular choice in GW38 and rewarded Joe, Az and Granville with a brace, maybe more faith should have put on him throughout the season he averaged 26.2 points even though only selected 4.5%.

CONCLUSION 

That’s it dear reader but before I go and in true Oscar tradition I would like to say a few teary thank you’s. I apologize for the self-indulgence.

Firstly, to Geoff for foolishly agreeing to post my gibberish and kindly editing it into something readable. To TopMarx for lending me his spreadsheet and having the patience of a saint when I break it repeatedly.

To my family, well my FPL family the Manager Melee Runners Up The Godfather : Pardew for allowing me to join their team in what was one of my personal FPL highlights.

To The Great and The Good themselves for putting up with my stalking and light ribbing, you have been a joy to follow.

Finally, to you the reader, thanks for those who have followed along and the nice comments along the way. The Great and The Good will be back due to unpopular demand but in a slightly different format and with a couple of new faces.

Anyway, that’s all from me for now and remember..

Just as the event is about to close there is a rumble of thunder, a crash of lightning and an ominous silhouette appears at the door. TopMarx enters the building with his Hall of Fame cronies to determine who will be the ultimate victors between the Hall of Fame and The Great and The Good.

More to follow..