The Virtual FPL action continues on Thursday evening, with Gameweek 5 of this simulated season taking place.
The deadline for Fantasy managers, as ever, is at 19:00 BST, with the matches starting an hour later and being simulated one by one every ten minutes from that point.
Ragabolly’s Fantasy game has now reached over 3,000 entries, with full details of the game available via the link below.
READ MORE: How to sign up and play Virtual FPL
GAMEWEEK 4 NOTES
(The full results from Gameweek 4 are available via the Virtual FPL fixtures page or the game’s Twitter account.)
Liverpool finally deliver on stats
Top of the ‘underlying stats’ table for team attacks after Gameweek 3, Liverpool had nevertheless only scored five goals from 86 attacks in their opening three matches.
A walloping was in the offing, then, and it duly arrived on Tuesday as Bournemouth were trounced 5-1 at Anfield.
The Reds were 4-0 up after just 32 minutes, with Sadio Mane (£12.4m) and Mohamed Salah (£12.7m) racking up double-digit hauls and three of their back four compensating for the loss of a clean sheet (this was the first goal they had conceded all season) with attacking returns.
Watford may provide a sterner test on Thursday but the Reds’ fixtures are generally excellent up until Gameweek 13, when things take a turn for the worse.
Mane and Salah are first and second respectively for vFPL points this season, and second and fifth for attacking involvements.
Rashford’s unsustainable returns?
After his brace against Newcastle United, Marcus Rashford (£8.8m) sits top of the vFPL forwards’ list for points and is now the leading goalscorer in the division on five.
Are his returns sustainable, though?
The England international was only involved in five attacks against the Magpies; Mason Greenwood (£4.3m), by contrast, played a part in 16.
His total number of attacking involvements this season is 20, which is inferior to 13 other FPL forwards and 36 short of Bruno Fernandes‘ (£8.5m) total.
As with real life, of course, the ‘better’ players tend to have superior conversion statistics and perhaps don’t need as many chances to deliver.
Still, it’s something to consider, given that his conversion rate (25%) is considerably higher than many other players in the same price bracket.
Martial Benched
We’ve had a relatively easy ride so far when it comes to the Virtual FPL team line-ups, with most of the big-name Fantasy assets having started all four of their sides’ opening quartet of matches.
It may be the case, however, that the threat of rotation increases as the season goes on, much as in real life.
Gameweek 4 saw perhaps the most high-profile benching of this simulated 2019/10 campaign so far, with Anthony Martial (£8.0m) only appearing as a 63rd-minute substitute in Manchester United’s 2-1 win over Newcastle United.
It’ll be interesting to monitor the starting XIs in the coming weeks to see if the premium assets that many of us have invested in are rotation-proof or if we will indeed have to swallow the occasional second-half cameo as the season progresses.
Fixture Swings
Gameweek 5 marks the start of an excellent run for Manchester City, who have had a tough start to the vFPL season up until this point.
Kevin De Bruyne (£10.6m), Raheem Sterling (£11.7m), Riyad Mahrez (£8.4m) and Sergio Aguero (£11.9m) are all ever-present starters in the City attack so far, although the return from suspension of Gabriel Jesus (£9.5m) presents a possible rotation risk.
Jesus and Aguero did, however, start in the same side in Gameweek 1.
Norwich City are about to embark on a similarly appealing run from Gameweek 5-14, with Teemu Pukki (£6.5m) someone we picked out on Tuesday as being top of the shopping list.
Emi Buendia (£6.0m) is perhaps worth consideration, however, as he is ranked seventh among vFPL midfielders for attacking involvement – although he was benched in Gameweek 1, so may not be completely secure in the Canaries’ side.
VIRTUAL FPL PREMIER LEAGUE TABLE
UPCOMING FIXTURES
STATS TABLES
We’ve put together a spreadsheet that details team attacks (both for and against) by Gameweek.
These are documented using the commentary in Virtual FPL.
The updated standings are below:
Data whizz TopMarx has meanwhile set up an excellent spreadsheet of his own which focuses on player information, with the latest figures shown below.
The stand-alone spreadsheet can be accessed via this link, with Fantasy managers able to make their own copy by selecting “File>Make a copy”.
INJURIES AND BANS
Ashley Barnes (£6.1m) and Gabriel Jesus (£9.5m) both return from three-match bans in Gameweek 5 but two more players have been added to the list of suspensions, joining Davy Propper (£4.8m) and Issa Diop (£4.3m) on the sidelines.
Jack Grealish (£6.5m) and Andre Ayew (£5.1m) were sent off after collecting two yellow cards in Gameweek 4, so will both sit out Thursday’s games before returning at the weekend.
Matt Doherty (£6.2m) is among the half-dozen players who had pre-existing injuries but two more Virtual FPL assets have joined them on the treatment table following Tuesday’s action.
John Lundstram (£4.8m) is the most high-profile of the two, although the Sheffield United midfielder will only be absent for one fixture before returning in Gameweek 6.
Gerard Deulofeu‘s (£6.1m) injury is more serious, however: the Watford forward will miss the next eight of the Hornets’ matches.
RANKINGS
We have a new leader in the overall rankings, with Thomas Micallef leap-frogging former number one Andy King.
DeltaFox, who heads the Fantasy Football Scout mini-league, sits just two points off the top.
Three of the top ten Virtual FPL managers in the world are signed up to our mini-league: DeltaFox, Marc Davis and gapester.
A special shout out to Legomané, too, who was the top-scoring manager of Gameweek 4.
The Fantasy Football Scout moderator plundered 104 points in total, enjoying double-digit hauls from Adam Webster (£4.4m), Mohamed Salah (£12.7m) and captain Sadio Mane (£12.4m).
That moved him from 739th in the world to 64th.
You can join the Fantasy Football Scout mini-league by entering the code 9RV4A via the below link.
