The best of the FFScout Community ahead of Gameweek 7

Welcome to our review of the latest talking points in the Fantasy Football Scout Community ahead of Gameweek 7.

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 Monty Python-inspired installment of The Great and The Good, Greyhead was trying to look on the bright side of life after a Gameweek that refused to wake from its rest. Apparently it was just pining for the Fjords. But with Magnus Carlsen unable to score more than 40 points, I think we can safely assume it’s now an ex-Gameweek.

In an effort to rouse our slumbering FPL teams, our Community writers turned their thoughts to a selection of players enjoying unexpected good form.

FPL Fetish’s “The Fantasy Forgotten” included five forwards costing under £6.0m. Che Adams (£5.8m) has suddenly sprung to life against tricky opponents in Chelsea and Everton after blanking against West Brom. While Patrick Bamford (£5.9m) has discovered his shooting boots after missing 34 of his 44 big chances last season. Tempted?

Or perhaps, like Maxmathews95, you feel Wilfried Zaha (£7.3m) is being unfairly dismissed despite an excellent start to the campaign. He’s already scored more goals this season than in the entirety of 2019/20. Should we be buying him?

Ted Talks FPL highlighted the out-of-position midfielder in his latest bite-size video. Six big chances and a nice trio of fixtures from Gameweek 8 makes him one for the watchlist.

But judging by chances, the best performing assets according to Ted are Harry Kane (£10.9m), Son Heung-min (£9.5m) and Mohamed Salah (£12.4m). The main candidates in this week’s captaincy debate. 

Regular poster Camzy feels the Liverpool man could be the better armband pick, arguing that the directness offered by the Egyptian and Sadio Mane (£12.0m) might be hard for the West Ham defence to withstand. 

Writing in his detailed and thoughtful review, BigManBakar agreed:

No team has recorded more big chances than Liverpool this season, while no player has had more shots in the box than Salah during this spell. Salah also has the best odds of scoring a goal and Liverpool are most likely to score 2.5+ goals according to the bookies this Gameweek.

– BigManBakar

Away from the captaincy dilemma, in a comment on Lateriser’s assessment of West Ham, Giggs Boson felt that Vladimir Coufal’s (£4.5m) security of starts gives him a slight edge over fellow budget-defender Arthur Masuaku (£4.5m). The fixtures improve for the Hammers from Gameweek 8.

Fantasy Football Scout Mini-Leagues

League code: 5u05vz
Eligibility: Open to all

There are currently 48,361 people participating in the open-to-all Fantasy Football Scout mini-league.

Marcus Jarman retained his lead despite slipping from 31st to 57th overall. Nonetheless he had Wilfried Zaha (£7.3m) and Son Heung-min (£9.5m) to thank for his respectable score of 57 in a poor Gameweek for many.

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.

First and second swapped places in our Fantasy Football Scout Community Members mini-league as Arya Kothari moved above Shahen Withana. 

The table below, courtesy of Mini-League Mate, shows the chip usage of the top 20 managers.

To receive your own complimentary Dossier of the Community Members mini-league, please go to https://www.minileaguemate.com/membership to sign-up. The League ID is 584. The Dossier will be emailed to you at the end of each Gameweek.

Yet to play a chip, Arya has been in the top thousand since Gameweek 3 and is now 142nd overall, one point ahead of Shahen. This is Arya’s sixth season playing FPL season, with a best previous finish of 34,282nd in 2015/16.

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, last week’s leaders Tim Hill and Ville Tuominen (aka Santigold) both lost, ensuring we now have five managers tied at the top on 15 points. Aleksander Våge Nilsen (aka AleksanderVN), Olavi Oja  and Cam Black make up the leading quintet of managers. Tim Hill retains first place based on his superior rank.

Out of the top four Leagues, just Peter Tind in League 2 Division 2 and David Stanton in League 3 Division 2 have won all six of their matches so far.

There are still four managers in the Head-to-Head Leagues who occupy a spot in the top 1,000 overall, but only one – Volodymyr Klyuka in Division 15 of League 6 – has a perfect record.

Shahen Withana, who’s second in our Community Members mini-league, managed a narrow victory in Gameweek 6 to move up to third in Division 14 of League 8 on 12 points.

And fellow high-flyers Keith O’Sullivan, in Division 39 of League 7, and Brian Murphy in Division 3 of League 6, have both lost once but lead their respective divisions because of their excellent ranks.

A fixtures table will be published in the Scout’s Guide to Gameweek 7 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 6 was 32 points. This saw a total of 230 managers eliminated. 

The threshold for elimination remains at 6% for Gameweek 7.

4,257 managers have entered the competition to date 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

Rich Booth takes the lead in both RedLightning’s Top 10k Any Season mini-league (league code 8kcvzq) and PDM‘s Top 1k ANY season mini-league (league code 2agvvx).

Rich is 6,847th overall in what is his 11th season. He managed three successive top 2,000 finishes between 2014/15 and 2016/17, including an outstanding 307th overall in 2016/17.

Benjamin Teo remains at the summit of Chaballer’s Top 1k HoF League (league code mr8dyh). But an underwhelming 43 points saw him drop to 43,630th overall. Stephen Brogan moves into second, seven points behind. Benjamin is 547th in our Hall of Fame (HoF) and Stephen is 926th.

Elias Kharma (aka @FPLMason) was one of 13 new entries in RedLightning’s Multiple Top 10k Finishes mini-league (league code 8t42p6) and he went straight in at No 1. But despite joining at the top of the table, he endured a disappointing Gameweek 6 with a below-average 38 points. 

Elias, who previously led RedLightning’s Top 10k Any Season mini-league, had back-to-back top 10,000 finishes in 2014/15 and 2015/16.

A 22-point captain haul from Son Heung-min helped 2017/18 FPL winner Yusuf Sheikh open up a 27-point advantage in the exclusive FPL Champions League. Simon March dropped to fourth as 2013/14 winner Tom Fenley moved up to second.

Pros and Cons

The Fantasy Football Scout Network mini-league is for the Scout Network and includes the Pro Pundits. A bang-on average score of 48 saw Christos Tsaras Sui (aka FPL Greece) drop to 22,727th overall but he nonetheless managed to hold onto first place. 

Closing the gap on Christos with an impressive 63 points was Mat Williams (aka Matzi11a), who takes over at the top of the FFS Mods & Cons mini-league. During his 12 seasons playing FPL, Mat’s achieved three top 4,000 finishes, the best of which was 1,053rd in 2017/18.

Elsewhere, Sng Jungyang remains top of Skooldaze’s FPL Vets 2006 or before mini-league having led since Gameweek 4. While Nwobu Ebube is new leader of Greyhead’s The Next Great and The Good mini-league. Ranked 12,558th overall, this is his seventh season, with a best previous finish of 201k. Last week’s leader, Md Masud Parves, played his Wildcard but only scored 35. It really was a Gameweek to forget for most!

It’s the Final Countdown

There’s just five rounds to go in Fantasy Allsvenskan, but with the Double Gameweek still in progress an update from Meltens will be given on Friday. 

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.