Here’s our fantasy premier league tips 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 tips – 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). See his GW3 team 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 anount 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 3 review
The average score of the managers in GW3 was 51 compared to the game average of 50. That’s 1 point and 2% above the game average score. High score of the 10 was 61. The low score was 37. A spread of 24 for a relatively low scoring gameweek.
Although meaningless at this stage. The average overall rank of the top 10 FPL managers is 173k. An improvement of rank of 12k from last week. The best overall rank is 10k and the lowest 782k.
The average total points are 222
The average team value is still £101.1m
My score as you may have seen in my early FFGeek team thoughts article was 43. That was lower than all but 1 of the managers and my total of 228 is better than 7 of the 10 managers although again it’s of little relevance at this stage of the season.
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
Mendy is in 10 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Wan-Bissaka is in 9 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Robertson is in 6 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Foster, Fabianski, and Peltier are in 4 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Boly, Alonso and Coleman are in 3 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Goalkeeper/Defence by team
Man City GK/Defs are represented 11 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
C Palace GK/Defs are represented 10 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
Liverpool GK/Defs are represented 9 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
Watford and Bournemouth GK/Defs are represented 5 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
West Ham, Cardiff, Chelsea and Wolves GK/Defs are represented 4 times in the 10 FPL managers teams
Midfielders
Salah is in 10 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Richarlison is in 9 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Mane is in 6 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Bernardo Silva is in 5 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Mkhitaryan is in 4 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Stephens, Fraser and Jota are in 2 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Forwards
Aguero is in 10 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Zaha is in 5 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Kamara is in 3 of the 10 FPL managers teams
Gameweek 3 captain choice
10 of the 10 FPL managers went with Salah.
The FFGeek poll was 64% Salah and 21% Aguero.
The Site 1 poll in my GW3 captain choice article was 50% Salah and 21% Aguero.
Formations
Sorry didn’t get to this in time this week
Wildcards, chips, transfers and hits
No one used any of their chips this week including the wildcard
Transfers in and out
2 of the 10 managers carried over their free transfer to GW4. I only summarise the transfers when a player is transferred in more than once.
Transfers in
Mkhitaryan was transferred in by 4 managers
Ings and Alonso were transferred in by 2 managers
No one else was transferred in more than once
Transfers out
King and Bednarek were transferred out by 2 managers
No one else was transferred out more than once
The top 10k overall rank vs the 10 FPL managers
I won’t be doing this until GW8 when it will have hopefully settled down. The weeks before hand could see too much rank volatility.
The highest ranked manager
This is his team:
This week he made no transfer. His OR is 10k
The combined FPL managers teams
Here’s a team which tries to make a combination from the most represented players. It fits within the £100m budget. I will use this team as a guide for the template team which is part of the FFGeek alternate strategy teams. The base team is my FFGeek team
So who’s essential?
Anyone or any defensive team that is owned by 7/10 of these managers 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.
That would mean:
A Palace defender (any of the 3), a Liverpool defender (probably Robertson) and a Man City defender (Mendy)
Salah and Aguero (both owned by the 10 managers)
No longer Richarlison (owned by 9 managers) as he is likely to be sold en masse following his 2 match ban
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