A tough week for our 10 top FPL managers with only 3 getting green arrows. Here’s our fantasy premier league team tips GW14 article where we analyse the teams of 10 top FPL managers. These 10 managers have not finished outside the overall rank of the top 10k in the last 3 seasons. Considering how variable the last 3 years have been this is remarkable consistency and shows an ability to adapt strategy in different seasons. It also gives you a view other than my own on strategy and player selection.
fantasy premier league team tips GW14 – analysing the teams of 10 top FPL managers
If the article is too long there’s a template team for the top 10 FPL managers analysed towards the end of the article.
Firstly, there are 9 new managers in the 10 this season and I’m delighted to say that one of them is our own FFGeek contributor Keith Spencer. Keith’s last 3 years history are 17/18 (3,940), 16/17 ( 325) and 15/16 (9,280).
We’ve also added Paul Williams to the FFGeek team who is also part of the 10 top managers. His history is 17/18 (412), 16/17 ( 1,382) and 15/16 (7,164). See Paul’s last article here
The criteria I’ve always been looking for is managers who’ve finished in the top 10k for the last 3 years when FPL has become considerably harder due to the amount of people playing and the information available.
It took me hours and hours to track down 10 managers who’ve been so consistent and my opinion after doing so is that there are probably only 20 or so in the world that qualify.
The 10 managers stats
These managers are unbelievable and every bit as impressive as last season
1. The overall average finishing overall rank of the top 10 managers in the last 3 seasons is 3,667
2. The top 10 FPL managers have not been out of the top 10k in the last 3 seasons (ie 30 times playing)
3. 7 of the 10 have finished in the top 1,000 in the last 3 seasons
Gameweek 13 review
A tough week for the 10 FPL managers. Only 3 of the 10 had a green arrow
The average score of the managers in GW13 was 41 taking into account point deductions for extra transfers. That’s compared to the game average of 50. That’s 9 points and 18% below the game average score. High score of the 10 was 53. The low score was 33. A spread of 20 for a relatively average scoring gameweek.
The average overall rank of the top 10 FPL managers is 137k. A worsening of rank of 37k from last week. The best overall rank is now in the top 100 and the lowest 934k. The low score distorts the average significantly. The median overall rank is better at 43k a worsening of 10k from last week
The average total points are 814
The average team value is £103.1m
My score as you may have seen in my early FFGeek team thoughts article my score was poor at 39. That was still higher than 5 of the managers and my total points of 815 and OR of 43k is better than 5 of the 10 managers.
The combined total of individual players
I’ve included where there is a minimum of a player in 3 out of the 10 FPL managers teams
Goalkeeper/Defence
Alonso is in 9 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Wan Bissaka is in 8 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Doherty is in 7 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Hamer, Patricio, Digne, Balbuena and Robertson are in 4 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Fabianski and Bennett are in 3 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Goalkeeper/Defence by team
Wolves GK/Defs are represented 14 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
Chelsea GK/Defs are represented 10 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
C Palace GK/Defs are represented 8 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
West Ham and Liverpool are represented 7 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
Brighton and Huddersfield GK/Defs are represented 4 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
Midfielders
Salah and Richarlison are in 10 of the FPL managers teams
Hazard is in 7 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Hojbjerg is in 4 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Fraser and Martial are in 2 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Forwards
Aguero is in 10 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Arnautovic is in 9 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Wilson is in 3 of the 10 FPL teams
Ings is in 2 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Gameweek 13 captain choice
7 of the 10 FPL managers went with Salah
3 of the 10 went with Aguero
The FFGeek poll was 41% Aguero and 29% Mane
The Site 1 poll in my GW12 captain choice article was 33% Richarlison, 23% Salah and 17% Aguero
The top 10k captain choice (from the excellent free site FPL discovery) was 36% Salah and 30% Aguero and 24% Richarlison. This time not close to the FFGeek poll at all.
Formations
6 used 3-4-3
2 used 4-4-2
1 used 4-3-3 and 1 used 3-5-2
Wildcards, chips, transfers and hits
No manager used their wildcard this week the total now is 8 managers who have used it
None have used their triple captain, free hit or bench boost chip
Transfers in and out
I only summarise the transfers when a player is transferred in more than once.
Transfers in
10 of the 10 managers made a transfer.
Digne was transferred in by 4 managers
Richarlison was transferred in by 3 managers
Martial and Jimenez was transferred in by 2 managers
No one else was transferred in more than once
Transfers out
Mendy was transferred out by 5 managers. Twice for Doherty.
Maddison was transferred out 2 times
No one else was transferred out more than once
Hits
1 manager took an 8 point deduction for extra transfers and 2 for a 4 point deduction.
The leading manager’s team
Here’s the top scoring manager who’s currently in the top 100
An good score of 53. His transfer this week was Digne in Chilwell out.
If you saw my early FFGeek team article you’ll see how I categorised players:
He has 7 template players in Doherty, Alonso, Wan Bissaka, Richarlison, Salah, Aguero and Arnautovic. No Hazard or Liverpool defender.
He has 1 bench warmer in Hojbjerg
and 7 differentials
Category 1 differentials Fabianski, Patricio, Yedlin, D Silva and Wilson. This is a good set of differentials. Wilson could be his next out. He has 1.2m ITB
Category 2 differentials in template replacements with Digne for a Liverpool defender and Mane for Hazard
The top 10k overall rank vs the 10 FPL managers
The schedule shows the players in the top 10k overall rank teams percentage wise vs the 10 top FPL managers I follow.
GKs | Top 10k | 10 FPL managers |
Patrício | 28 | 40 |
Ederson | 24 | 10 |
Ryan | 13 | 10 |
Fabianski | 12 | 30 |
Alisson | 6 | 10 |
Hart | 5 | 10 |
Pickford | 3 | 0 |
DEFs | ||
Alonso | 83 | 90 |
Robertson | 79 | 40 |
Wan-Bissaka | 76 | 80 |
Doherty | 55 | 70 |
Laporte | 26 | 10 |
Bennett | 25 | 30 |
Alex-Arnold | 20 | 20 |
Digne | 17 | 40 |
Balbuena | n/a | 40 |
MIDs | ||
Hazard | 83 | 70 |
Richarlison | 82 | 100 |
Salah | 72 | 100 |
Fraser | 43 | 20 |
Mané | 29 | 20 |
Martial | 27 | 20 |
Højbjerg | 16 | 40 |
Sterling | 15 | n/a |
FWDs | ||
Agüero | 90 | 100 |
Arnautovic | 67 | 90 |
Wilson | 51 | 30 |
Jiménez | 37 | 20 |
Success | 9 | 20 |
Murray | 6 | 10 |
Lacazette | 6 | n/a |
Mitrovic | 5 | n/a |
The top 10k average score was 45 compared to the top 10 FPL managers of 41
I use 30% as a rule of thumb as a significant variation between the two teams and the only player that are different to this extent are
Robertson is the only point of difference with 79% of the top 10k owning him vs 40% of the 10 top managers. That is smoothed out though by 7 of the 10 managers owning a Liverpool defender.
I’ll say it again that I’m quite shocked at the lack of variation in the 2 sets of teams. Even as recently as last season they would have been very different. There are no battle grounds at the moment.
All the information is provided by the truly fantastic free site FPL discovery.
The combined FPL managers teams
Here’s a team which tries to make a combination from the most represented players. It is meant to be a menu of players rather than a realistic team. The TV is £104.0m.
So who’s essential?
The template is strong at the moment but with the performances of Sterling and Sane plus the good fixtures of Arsenal and Spurs coming up we could be looking at a sea change. Your weekly transfers will be crucial to your rank. The template could easily be broken up and a key part of your season could be when and if you make those changes.
Anyone or any defensive team that is owned by 7/10 of these managers or by 7/10 of the top 10k I would take a lot of convincing not to own irrespective of my thoughts about them. In terms of serious managers likely to finish with high overall ranks I won’t be getting left behind by players that are owned by a large proportion of these managers or by a large proportion of the top 10k.
That would mean:
Alonso 9/10 top 10 managers and 83% top 10k) and a Wolves defender (represented 14 times in the 10 managers teams (Doherty for me). A Liverpool defender has hit the 70% of teams of the 10 top FPL managers. Also top 10k teams Robertson 79% and TAA 20%
Hazard (owned by 7/10 managers and 83% of the top 10k) and Aguero (owned by 10/10 managers and 90% of the top 10k).
Salah also now has that status owned by 10/10 of the managers and 72% of the top 10k. Richarlison is now owned by 19 of the 10 top 10 FPL managers. He is owned by 82% of the top 10k
Arnautovic (9/10 FPL managers and 67% of the top 10k) also comes into that categroy
Wan Bissaka is owned by 8/10 top 10 managers and 76% of top 10k. However given he’s often benched you would argue that they weren’t essential.
That’s it. Hope you found it useful
See our fixture ease article for players with the best fixtures ad well as the bandwagons article for the most transferred in
Also the players underlying stats for GW13
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