Here’s our imaginary wildcard team to help you with your choices in the January wildcard plus some talk about approach
fantasy premier league wildcard tips – the FFGeek imaginary wildcard for GW23
Approach
There’s alot of talk among FPL managers about how you approach the wildcard and different strategies for different current rankings. There is a general tone around the further back your rank is the more risk you take. While there;s no right way to play FPL or even a common objective among all managers I personally don’t think whatever your rank there’s no need to panic and with 16 rounds to go there’s alot of fantasy football to be played. A few differentials and getting the right captain option when there is a big split of choices can easily move you up the rankings. My general philosophy of having a core of high ownership essential players to protect you from massive ranking drops and then look to advance through a few differentials is a simple philosophy. I haven’t talked through individuals below in a huge amount of detail but there is a load of detail in the “ones to watch” articles.
Firstly I’ll show you the team which has a value around £104m (slightly higher than my value as I don’t take enough care of my teams value) and then talk through how its made up
Here’s the team:
The GK and defence
There are 2 defensive teams head and shoulders above the rest and they are Chelsea and Southampton. I’ve gone for Terry and Bertrand for coverage of these teams. I would have saved money for Alderweireld but his injury has prevented that. Chelsea and Southampton will in the main be ever present home and away in the lineups.
The tricky thing after that is the difficulty of traditional home and away rotation so far this season. The home and away clean sheets is approximately 57% and 43%. However if you look at my defensive “ones to watch” article and strip out Southampton and Chelsea, 6 of the remaining 8 sides in the ranking have got more clean sheets away than home. Therefore I’ve picked the best defensive teams for the job even though WBA, Sunderland and Arsenal all play home and away at the same time, at least in the short term. You may disagree and I could understand but I’ve gone for the best teams defensively with regard to value and thats how it’s fallen. It will be a case of looking at which team has the best fixture irrespective of home and away.
I’ve then doubled up on WBA with the GK and RB Wisdom who have good fixtures and seemed to have been boosted by the Pulis effect. I’ve gone for the single GK with his reserve as backup to save funds and due to the unpredicatability of home and away clean sheets. A defensive double up is an effective if risky way of moving up the rankings. The Mirallas missed pen and subsequent clean sheet for WBA against Everton for example moved me up 10k in rankings from 33k at the time to 23k.
Bellerin is my cheapie Arsenal gamble. At £4.4m he’s outstanding value and the only gametime risk in the defensive lineup. Lastly I’ve gone for the value and solidity of £4.2m Van Aanholt of Sunderland
The attack – the essentials
As I said to avoid huge drops in rankings (and to avoid watching games behind the sofa) I’ve covered the high ownership attacking players. These among the leading managers and the general playing population are Sanchez, Hazard, Costa and Kane. Kane perhaps has the fixtures to take a gamble on not owning but he’s such good value it seems unecessary.
Having covered that I’ve gone for Aguero who isn’t particularly high ownership but to me is the best and most dangerous player in FPL. He has the potential to be captained virtually every week and is the outstanding player in FPL.
The differentials
At the moment that leaves little room for the remainder of the squad. So I’ve gone for 2 players with low ownership and good fixtures. If you have the cash you may want to gamble on Di Maria who has excellent fixtures or Oscar (taking out Terry) or Cazorla/Walcott all who have good fixtures. However I haven’t been so careful with my cash so I don’t have those options.
Punceon has 2 goals and an assist in his last 2 and the next 3 fixtures against teams that really haven’t shown much defensive mettle
Everton (H)
Leicester (A)
Newcastle (H)
Tadic has been inconsistent but has 2 goals and an assist in his last 4 and has the following next 6 fixtures:
Swansea (H)
QPR (A)
West Ham (H)
Liverpool (H)
West Brom (A)
Crystal Palace (H)
Hope that gives you some food for thought and good luck if you’re wildcarding
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fantasy premier league wildcard tips
fantasy premier league wildcard tips
