Here’s our fantasy premier league teams GW6 article where we give our early thoughts on the FFGeek team for GW6. We look back at gameweek 5 and give our thoughts on the gameweek ahead including potential transfers and captain choice.
fantasy premier league teams GW6 – some early thoughts on the FFGeek team
Firstly if you’re new to the site my last 3 seasons overall ranks are 36k, 17k and 21k
Geek note: If you join our Patreon site you will get access to an FPL contributor tracker team which combines the contributors individual teams each week to show their favourite players, transfers and captains. It will always be completed on a Friday/Saturday in a normal gameweek. There will also be a spreadsheet of each managers teams, transfers and captains so you can drill down further.
You also get:
Joe’s interactive transfer planner and points projection tool
Weekly podcasts with myself and the contributors
FFGeek private leagues
Access to the FFGeek Slack channel for discussion with the contributors and members
$2 and $3 tiers per calendar month. No commitment beyond 1 month
Gameweek 5
GW5 points: 43 (FPL average 52) Total points 296, Gameweek rank 5,099k, Overall Rank: 534k, red arrow 331k, Team Value: £101.1m
Here’s the points:
So a massive 331k red arrow and an overall rank of 534k. On the face of it 4 returning players and 1 with double figure points is at the minimum of acceptable but it was a fairly high average which resulted in the massive red arrow. It’s worth reiterating that overall rank is pretty volatile at the moment and not worth over focusing on. For example Yaniv got 69 this week and moved up 1 million in overall rank.
Picking the wrong captain also didn’t help. The Sterling pick was inevitable for me with the injury news and how poor defensively Norwich were already so I don’t look back with any anger at myself at making the choice. Salah was the leader of the captain poll but it was close enough for a decision to be made.
Although I was disappointed at the choice of Dendoncker ahead of Cantwell on the bench in the end Rico starting made the choice irrelevant.
Players in the firing line
The 2 players in the firing line are Ings and Rico.
I was surprised Ings didn’t start given that Redmond is injured and he played a back 3 which gave him a chance to start as a pair with Adams or even in a 2 behind the striker which is what the formation ended up. In 3 starts and 2 as sub it’s 1 goal and 1 assist and a PPM of 3.2. His underlying stats are also terrible.
While Rico did well my plan at the moment is to have a Soyuncu in there as a defender I can rotate in where I believe a clean sheet will be possible. I can’t complain at all about the assist for Rico but the Bournemouth defence isn’t one I want to hold onto even if I believed that Rico would hold his place over Kelly who could be back in the next couple of weeks.
I’m also questioning Digne although the equation isn’t straightforward. Everton are 11th in goals conceded with 7 goals against but in underlying stats they aren’t actually doing too bad. They’re 6th in xG conceded and 2nd in shots against. Digne has been disappointing from an attacking perspective. He’s 13th in xA90 among defenders and although that’s a pretty volatile stat it isn’t great. Digne is one of the few players where I think I can get some funds from as at the moment I have very little scope
Those players not in the firing line
If you read my 10 top FPL managers article you’ll see that the template as I define it is unchanged.
Those players are 2 Liverpool defenders, Digne, a City defender, Salah, Sterling, De Bruyne and Pukki. I’m not going to go into them individually But will comment on a couple.
I’m sticking with the 2 Liverpool defenders. Both were exceptional in attack and were unlucky not to return more. Furthermore Liverpool with an xA of 0.29 against them and only 8 shots against them were very unlucky not to get a clean sheet.
I have no issue at the moment with Sterling apart from being poor in 2 games even if he statistically he was good vs Norwich. It’s more of do you want to go down the Aguero or Aubameyang road. I think Aguero looked far more of a threat than Sterling v Norwich. He still has the Jesus and minutes issues potentially going forward but I won’t lie that I’m not wobbling that’s for sure. However I’m not wobbling enough to WC or do a switch this gameweek. The captain Poll will be interesting though.
Speaking of City I was visibly shocked at how bad Stones and Otamendi were against Norwich. Zinchenko who’s in my team was also poor and Walker made it a complete set of under performers. However the fixtures going forward are nothing short of ridiculous and even at their partnership clean sheet average of 36% that’s still another 12 clean sheets for £5.5m or so depending on who lines up.
Here’s City’s next 6:
GW6 WAT (H)
GW7 EVE (A)
GW8 WOL (H)
GW9 CRY (A)
GW10 AVL (H)
GW11 SOU (H)
Transfer thoughts
2 free transfers and £1.1m ITB
Ings being the primary target out despite a good fixture home to Bournemouth. I think with Redmond out there surely has to be a chance for him to start. Is he really going to play 2 CDMs and then Ward Prowse behind Adams against Bournemouth as he did at Sheffield?
As replacements, although I’ve been unsure about the 2 Chelsea lads of Abraham and Mount due to the lack of PL data it’s hard to ignore them at the moment and the price is obviously very tempting for both. I have been mainly focused on Haller although last nights game didn’t do that much good. Despite having 3 good AMs my view is that Rice and Noble are just 2 sideways and seem reluctant to pass straight to Haller. Lanzini was continually dropping back to get the ball when he should be higher up the pitch. Anderson was too wide to effect anything and provide any support for Haller. Haller was neat and tidy and I believe he can score but someone needs to get the ball to him. I would caveat all that by saying that evaluating someone on 1 game you watch isn’t really fair and can be unnecessarily prejudicial.
Digne is my natural funder of any move. The only issue is that Everton play Sheffield United next with pretty healthy clean sheet odds of £2.10. Also Chelsea play Liverpool and West Ham play Man Utd so none look like great entry or exit points at the moment so I may just leave it for now.
Ultimately I’m looking for Soyuncu to replace Rico and possibly a Spurs £5.0m or maybe even a Chelsea £5.0m defender as I think Kante and Rudiger plus hopefully some Lampard fixing can help the defence. Better still if Tomori is the CB partner at £4.5m. I would then play 4-4-2 with 1 playing of Soyuncu/Spurs or Chelsea and 1 of Cantwell and hopefully a Dendoncker of last season. 1 more week will help with the Spurs and Chelsea decision.
Something like this graphic below. There’s £0.4m spare so very little price movement flexibility. I could do it now for -4 but the entry points and exit points aren’t great plus I’m also hoping 1 more week will show which Chelsea/Spurs £5.0m is the best choice. It’s certainly not apparent now.
This is how it looks so Rico, Digne, Ings out. Soyuncu, Aurier and Abraham in for future planning.
So given that’s an unlikely set of transfers I may just do the Rico to Soyuncu transfer for the sake of using 1.
lineup issues
So assuming I don’t do the 3 transfers above then the lineup isn’t difficult. The bench will be Rico/Soyuncu, Dendoncker and Greenwood although maybe not in that order
Captain thoughts
I’ll wait for the polls but hard not to see Sterling being given his 3rd chance.
The team then pre any transfers
That’s it. Hope you had a better gameweek than me.
Other posts
Geek note: If you join our Patreon site you will get access to an FPL contributor tracker team which combines the contributors individual teams each week to show their favourite players, transfers and captains. It will always be completed on a Friday/Saturday in a normal gameweek. There will also be a spreadsheet of each managers teams, transfers and captains so you can drill down further.
You also get:
Joe’s interactive transfer planner and points projection tool
Weekly podcasts with myself and the contributors
FFGeek private leagues
Access to the FFGeek Slack channel for discussion with the contributors and members
$2 and $3 tiers per calendar month. No commitment beyond 1 month
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