The best of the FFScout Community ahead of Gameweek 6

Welcome to our review of the latest talking points in the Fantasy Football Scout Community as we turn our attention to Gameweek 6.

Here we bring to your attention some of the best articles submitted through our Community Trials initiative, which is part of our ongoing mission to support budding contributors and creators.

This piece will also cover the latest in the Community mini-leagues and competitions.

In this week’s Abba-inspired installment of The Great and The Good, Greyhead revealed that current World Chess Champion Magnus Carlsen was among those wielding the Wildcard.

The Norwegian grandmaster waved goodbye to Trent Alexander-Arnold (£7.5m) as he shifted funds into attack: two cheap-as-chips defenders Tyrick Mitchell (£4.2m) and Max Kilman (£4.1m) occupy places on his bench. Spurs duo Harry Kane (£10.8m) and Son Heung-min (£9.4m) replaced Man City pair Kevin De Bruyne (£11.5m) and Phil Foden (£6.6m).

Meanwhile, Az, the co-host of FPL Black Box, was resolute in his decision to avoid Kane as he debated his last-minute Wildcard on a Friday night special of his revamped vodcast. Instead he favoured Chelsea’s Timo Werner (£9.3m) and there was nothing to split the forwards in Gameweek 5 as both returned 16 points.

The Wildcarding managers have four midfielders in common with Son joined by Mohamed Salah (£12.3m), Christian Pulisic (£8.3m), and Jack Grealish (£7.2m). Dominic Calvert-Lewin (£7.7m) and Emiliano Martínez (£4.8m) the similarities at opposite ends of the pitch.

Martinez was compared to Bernd Leno (£5.0m) in an article by El Estadístico, as he searched for his perfect custodian. Two key stats stood out in favour of the German: Arsenal have conceded the highest percentage (51%) of shots outside the box, traditionally these shots are easier to save; and Leno’s made the most successful passes of all goalkeepers (170) – with a Pass Completion percentage of 89, which well help him to earn bonus points.

Potential Transfer Traps were scrutinized ahead of Gameweek 6 by Community Member Jaydutt. Do you agree with the 18 players he suggested you avoid?

And Kroos Kontrol was back with more insights, predicting a redistribution of goals for the ‘Big Six’ and Everton as they embark on tactical changes.

News emerged yesterday that James Rodriguez (£8.0m) is set to miss Sunday’s encounter with Southampton. The Community debated what to do with the highly-owned Colombian in a Hot Topic. 

Everton’s Gylfi Sigurdsson (£6.9m) was one of three low-owned differentials recommended by thepuntmaster this week. As mentioned in the article, the 31-year-old has a say on penalties, free-kicks and corners with a ready-to-leap Calvert Lewin and in-form Michael Keane (£5.1m) to aim for in the middle.

Fantasy Football Scout Mini-Leagues

League code: 5u05vz
Eligibility: Open to all

There are currently 48,245 people participating in the open-to-all Fantasy Football Scout mini-league.

Marcus Jarman takes over at the top as last week’s leader Shahen Withana slips to second. Marcus is currently 31st overall after Triple Captaining Bruno Fernandes for a Gameweek 5 score of 126. This impressive total gave him an outstanding Gameweek Rank of 26. 

This is his 10th season and he has already used all four of his chips. 

Fantasy Football Scout Community Members

League code: Available on Members page and the Scout Leagues widget when signed in.
Eligibility: Open to all those who have a registered Fantasy Football Scout account – paid or free.

Shahen may be trailing Marcus by five points in the open-to-all mini-league, but a total of 422 points is enough for first place in our Fantasy Football Scout Community Members mini-league.

The table below, courtesy of the Mini-League Mate, shows the chip usage of the top 20 managers. Shahen, who is now 71st overall, has only used one chip so far: Triple-Captaining Mohamed Salah (£12.3m) in Gameweek 1. Half the managers in the top 20 are yet to use a chip.

We’re dishing out £2,500-worth of giveaways throughout the season, however only those who have registered a Fantasy Football Scout account (paid or free) will be able to claim a prize. Also, managers must be registered one month in advance of the awarding of a specific prize to be eligible.

The next prize will be the manager of the month award for October, which will be awarded after Gameweek 7.

Head-to-Head Leagues

In League 1, two promoted managers, Tim Hill and Ville Tuominen (aka Santigold), occupy the top two places. Both moved up from League 2 Division 1, and have made 100%-winning starts to the new campaign. Tim’s currently first on rank-difference.

Aleksander Våge Nilsen (aka AleksanderVN), the third member of last week’s leading trio, lost 68-89 to Al Black.

Four managers in the Head-to-Head Leagues are currently in the top 1,000 overall, but only one – Volodymyr Klyuka in Division 15 of League 6 – has an unbeaten record.

Shahen Withana, who tops our Community Members mini-league, lost to Adam Szymon and has dropped to fifth in Division 14 of League 8 on nine points.

Fellow high-flyers Goran Lakic, in Division 29 of League 7, and Edo Fili Avdic of Division 25 of League 9, have both lost once but lead their respective divisions because of their superior ranks.

A fixtures table will be published in the Scout’s Guide to Gameweek 6 ahead of the deadline. However, if you can’t wait to find out who you are playing next, follow this link. Use your browser’s find in page function (Ctrl+F) to locate managers.

All this information and more is contained in the main Head-to-Head page. 

Last Man Standing

League code: 48n69x
Deadline: Open now until Gameweek 18*
*entrants must pass all previous safety scores to qualify

In TorresMagic’s Last Man Standing the safety score for Gameweek 5 was 51 points. This saw a total of 218 managers eliminated. 

The threshold for elimination remains at 6% for Gameweek 6.

4,220 managers have entered the competition so far and it is possible to join up until Gameweek 18 – although you must pass all previous safety scores to qualify.

Aside from bragging rights, the winner will receive a free Fantasy Football Scout Membership for the 2021/22 season.

You are able to keep tabs on the action throughout the season via Ragabolly’s website Live FPL.

Elite Community Mini-Leagues

Despite slipping to 6,541st overall, Elias Kharma (aka @FPLMason) is still top of RedLightning’s Top 10k Any Season mini-league (league code 8kcvzq). Gianni Zeps is now level with him on points but has made a greater number of transfers.

Jan Kepski is the new leader of PDM‘s Top 1k ANY season mini-league (league code 2agvvx) and is 10,626th overall. This is his seventh season playing FPL, and he finished in the top 1,000 for the first time last year, coming 936th.

A successful Wildcard takes Benjamin Teo to the summit of Chaballer’s Top 1k HoF League (league code mr8dyh). A Gameweek score of 92 moved him up to 19,302nd overall.

Benjamin is 547th in our Hall of Fame (HoF) with a season history dating back to 2006. He achieved eight top 10,000 finishes in ten seasons between 2007/08 and 2016/17, the best of which was 219th in 2009/10.

John Forshaw is the new leader of RedLightning’s Multiple Top 10k Finishes mini-league (league code 8t42p6). John is 122k overall, having risen over two million places since Wildcarding in Gameweek 3. He is in his 13th season with two previous top 10,000 finishes, the better of which was 3,803rd in 2012/13.

Simon March has closed the gap to 25 points on FPL Champions League-leader Yusuf Sheikh as 2013/14 Champion Tom Fenley drops to third. Yusuf, who won FPL in 2017/18, is currently ranked 262k overall.

Pros and Cons

The Fantasy Football Scout Network mini-league is for the Scout Network and includes the Pro Pundits. In Gameweek 5, Christos Tsaras Sui (aka FPL Greece) increased his lead at the top and is now 13,726th overall. Christos finished an impressive 200th in 2017/18.

In the FFS Mods & Cons mini-league Lee Cowen (aka Granville) has bounced back from his rough Gameweek 4 to regain the lead. He is now 131k overall, and six points ahead of Mat Williams (aka Matzi11a) in second.

Elsewhere, Sng Jungyang remains top of Skooldaze’s FPL Vets 2006 or before mini-league and has moved up to 66,256th overall after Wildcarding in Gameweek 5. While Md Masud Parves still leads Greyhead’s The Next Great and The Good mini-league, but has slipped to 19,302nd overall.

It’s the Final Countdown

There’s just six Gameweeks to go in Fantasy Allsvenskan, and Love Hallerby has reclaimed top spot in the overall standings, opening up an 11-point lead. 

Also the No 1 in our FFS mini-league, Love scored 64 points despite his captain Stefano Vecchia only managing four points against Östersund, who were missing their first-choice keeper. The main contributors were Elohor Godswill Ekpolo (9 points), Eric Kahl (11) and Sebastian Larsson (9). 

The amorously-named manager appears well placed to take advantage of the upcoming Double Gameweek, with eight players set to feature twice.

Second-placed Niklas Tysander is ranked eighth overall and trails Love by 45 points. He played his Wildcard to load up on Double Gameweek players and managed an above-average 59 points. Niklas was another to put his faith in Stefano Vecchia, who fired off seven shots (two on target) but failed to convert.

Third-placed Jonathan Fletcher is 12 points behind Niklas and 20th overall. He captained Aron Jóhannsson for the favourable home game against Mjällby and managed to squeeze 12 points out of him as he reached 64 points all out in Gameweek 24.

Thank you to Meltens for the update. 

Get involved

To join a featured mini-league that you are eligible for, simply enter the League code in the ‘Join private league‘ section on the FPL site. Any questions relating to community competitions please email geoff@fantasyfootballscout.co.uk or comment below this article.

Thank you very much to RedLightning for his contribution to this article.