Learning from the Great and the Good 19/20 – Gameweek 13

“Trying to make a move just to stay in the game. I try to stay awake and remember my name. But everybody’s changing and I don’t feel the same. Everybody’s changing and I don’t feel the same”

Everybody was changing this week with the arrival of Mourinho at Spurs and Pochettino’s availability in the job market appearing to kick start the managerial merry-go-round, with Silva, Emery, Pellegrini plus possibly Solskjaer looking nervously over their shoulder.

These real-life changes will have implications for the FPL landscape with Jose’s arrival already leading to many reconsidering the benefits of Kane, Son and even Aurier.

One thing that isn’t changing any time soon is VAR’s ability to bring joy and despair in equal measure to The Great and The Good with its evil glare ruining the fortunes of Sterling captainers and Maddison owners this week but giving the Vardy party a boost.

As a reminder The Great and The Good are a handpicked group of FPL celebrities (?), FF Scouts or Pro Pundits who I will follow to see what we can learn as they navigate their way through the season. They are the Scouts (Mark, Joe, David, Geoff and Neale), FPL “celebrities” (Az, LTFPL Andy, FPL General and Jules Breach) and finally from the Hall of Fame we have Ville Ronka, Matthew Jones and Sean Tobin.

OVERALL PERFORMANCE

What’s that coming over the hill? Is it a Joe? Say it quietly but FPL’s Duke of the Dullards is having a fine season and sits poised on the shoulder of Neale, with an eye on Jules, ready to make his sprint for the lead with the top score this week of 70 points.

Joe looks well set for the busy schedule ahead with his VAJazzle front line, a good structure with all the price points covered and 2.6 million in the bank, although he does still have Otamendi in his squad, for comedy value one assumes.

Az and Andy both scored in the seventies but took hits so sit just behind Joe this week although were the biggest climbers in the rankings – Az has gained over 1 million places in the last two weeks so at this rate he will be Xmas no.1!

It pains me but down in The Great and The Good basement dwell Mark and Ville Ronka who failed to hit the average score of 49 this week, each suffering consecutive red arrows and the added frustration of seeing 16 points on their benches thanks to Cantwell plus a United youngster each (Williams and Greenwood respectively). If I dare be so bold, my one piece of advice – BUY VARDY!

The Great and The Good were divided over the armband with Mane, Vardy being the most popular choices whilst Mark, Geoff and Neale were left cursing Sterling’s disallowed goal. Elsewhere Ville Ronka must have been using some Finnish swear words as Lacazette stole all Aubameyang’s points leaving his captain with only an assist to his name.

TRANSFERS

This is a summary of the transfers for this week :

Andy – Maddison, Mané (Salah, Yarmolenko)

Az – Maddison, Soyuncu (Hudson-Odoi, Pereira)

David – Mané (Salah)

FPL General – No transfers

Joe – Mané (Salah)

Jules Breach – Mané (Salah)

Geoff – Rashford (Pukki)

Mark – Maddison (Yarmolenko)

Matthew Jones – Mané (Salah)

Neale – Mané (Salah)

Sean Tobin – Mané, Jimenez (Pukki, Salah)

Ville Ronka – Tielmans (Mount)

*transfers out are in brackets

Salah to Mane was THE transfer to make this week with seven of them making this move and the initial results were positive with Mo benched and Sadio scoring.

Building up the Leicester stockpile was ongoing with Maddison the favoured option but the transfers that caught my eye were Geoff’s move for Rashford and Sean Tobin’s acquisition of Jimenez both of which brought immediate returns.

Jimenez looks a good purchase as he tops the shots in the box table over the last four weeks, but I would start saving for Rashford as he could be a Xmas cracker as he sits 3rd behind Vardy in this stat plus has some lovely fixtures from gameweek 17.

Sean Tobin took a hit to bring in the Wolves front man which was only his second of the season, whilst Az took his sixth of the campaign with double swoop for a couple of Foxes.

TEMPLATE

The template for The Great and The Good looks like this :-

Pope (10) Button (5)

TAA (11) Lundstram (10) Tomori (8) Rico (7) Soyuncu (6)

Mane (11) Mount (9) KDB (8) Sterling (6) Martial (6)

Abraham (12) Vardy (10) Jimenez (4)

* brackets show number of teams they appear in

The Egyptian King is dead, long live the Senegalese prince as Salah not just leaves the template but every single squad with Mane now appearing in all but FPL General’s team.

Form shows that Mane is the preferred option, he has scored 28 more than points than Salah over the last six weeks, but can I suggest that this may be a good time to bring in Mo as a differential and double up as he could explode, ankle-permitting, over the next four weeks. Will any of The Great and The Good gamble?

Mason Mount’s position in the template could also be under threat as he was benched this week with his Chelsea team mates Pulisic and Willian being strong contenders but think carefully as the busy European schedule may see us enter a period where the phrase the “Lampard Lottery” becomes commonplace as Frank juggles his team to accommodate the marathon of matches ahead.

TEAM INVESTMENT AND VALUE 

Average Cost of Player looks like this across the teams based on week 1 prices.

Goalkeeper – 4.3

Defender – 5.1

Midfielder – 7.5

Forward – 7.7

ITB – 0.8

There has been a shift in funding over the first 13 weeks, in game week one it was about big at the back with an average spend of 5.6 million in defence, but the biggest move has been in midfield with a drop from 8.7 million to 7.5 million since the start of the season.

No doubt that the emergence of Lundstram and Vardy have played a pivotal part in both trends and we are a long way from the cheap 6.5 forward lines and Liverpool/City double defence that was so in fashion as the campaign kicked off.

This season is a good argument for flexibility and spread of price points in your team structure as those that have done well have had the ability to shift spend at speed.

Mark is the biggest spender in defence with double Reds defence and Mendy, surely, he will sacrifice the City full back soon to finally get Vardy in his squad, he has the lowest average expenditure on forwards.

Az is at the other end of the spectrum with an average of 9.2 on strikers whilst Matthew Jones is big in the middle with an average of 8.7 per player. Weighing up where to spend their money are Joe and Sean Tobin with over 2 million in loose change to spend on next week’s transfers.

CONCLUSION

The managerial press conferences round ups, expertly summarized by Neale, form a key part of our game week planning but more importantly this week we should focus our attention not only on the team news but also on who is the manager delivering that news.

The captaincy decision is another tough one but if Silva and Pellegrini stay another week surely Vardy and Abraham owners will be counting the points, but if they win the sack race before kick-off a potential new manager bounce will make us think twice about the crucial armband decision.

Similarly, we have already seen the impact of Mourinho on the interest in Son, Kane and an Emery exit will makes us think again about Lacazette and Aubameyang with those delicious fixtures.

It’s worth The Great and The Good staying on top of the managerial hot seat hit list if they are to see success over the busy upcoming schedule.

Anyway, that’s all from me for now and remember don’t have nightmares.

For those effected by any of the topics raised in the above article they can find me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Greyhead19

Likewise, if you want to keep up with the Tweets of The Great and The Good you can find them here

https://twitter.com/SkontoRigga

https://twitter.com/FFScout_Geoff

https://twitter.com/matthewpenycae

https://twitter.com/LetsTalk_FPL

https://twitter.com/DavidMunday815

https://twitter.com/ffscout_az

https://twitter.com/FFScout_Joe

https://twitter.com/FPLGeneral

https://twitter.com/julesbreach