fantasy premier league transfer tips GW26 – analysing the teams of 10 top FPL managers

It was a week of huge highs and lows for the 10 top FPL managers.  Here’s our fantasy premier league team tips GW26 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 transfer tips GW26 – analysing the teams of 10 top FPL managers

If the article is too long there’s a combined FPL managers 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. You can find Keith on twitter here by the way 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 his latest 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

Just to let you know I’ve taken out the person who was distorting the average very negatively and replaced them with someone else meeting the last 3 seasons less than 10k OR. I haven’t amended the calculations below but they will be improved due to the substitution.

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 25 review

A good week for the 10 FPL managers. 8 of the 10 had a green arrow

The average score of the managers in GW24 was 79 taking into account point deductions for extra transfers. That’s compared to the game average of 65. That’s 14 points and 22% above the game average score. High score of the 10 was 121. The low score was 49. A mammoth spread of 72 even for a high scoring gameweek.

The average overall rank of the top 10 FPL managers is 35k a worsening of rank from last week of 1k. The best overall rank is now around the top 500 and the lowest 111k.

The average total points are 1,557

The average team value is £104.6m

You can see my score and rank in the early FFGeek team article which I’ll do today.

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

Wan Bissaka is in 10 of the 10 FPL managers teams

Doherty is in 9 of the 10 FPL managers teams

Digne, Robertson, Fabianski and Bednarek are in 4 of the 10 FPL managers teams

Allison, Shaw, Alexander Arnold, Button, Hamer and Patricio are in 3 of the FPL managers teams

Goalkeeper/Defence by team

Wolves GK/Defs are represented 14 times in the 10 FPL managers teams

Liverpool 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

West Ham GK/Defs are represented 5 times in the 10 FPL managers teams

Everton, Man City and Southampton GK/Defs are represented 4 times in the 10 FPL managers teams

Chelsea and Man Utd GK/Defs are represented 3 times in the 10 FPL managers teams

Midfielders

Salah is in 10 of the FPL managers teams

Pogba is in 9 of the FPL managers teams

Richarlison is in 8 of the FPL managers teams

Sane is in 6 of the FPL managers teams

Son and Hazard are in 3 of the FPL managers teams

Sterling is in 2 of the FPL managers teams

Forwards

Rashford is in 10 of the 10 FPL managers teams

Jimenez is in 5 of the 10 FPL managers teams

Kamara and Jimenez are in 4 of the 10 FPL managers teams

Ings is in 2 of the 10 managers teams

Gameweek 25 captain choice

5 of the 10 FPL managers went with Sane

4 of the 10 managers went with Aguero

1 of the 10 captains went with Sterling

The FFGeek poll was 46% Aguero, 21% Sane

The Site 1 poll in my GW25 captain choice article was 28% Aguero, 24% Sane

The top 10k captain choice (from the excellent free site FPL discovery) was 39% Sane and 29% Aguero. The FFGeek poll this time was very different to the top 10k.

Formations

Not done this week sorry.

Wildcards, chips, transfers and hits

1 of the managers have used their 2nd wildcard

2 have used their triple captain chip in this week.  Both for Aguero.

None have used the free hit or bench boost chip.

There are a number of options on where to use the chip this season so see my latest double and blanks article on where these are likely to be and some strategy options.

Transfers in and out

I only summarise the transfers when a player is transferred in more than once.

9 of the 10 managers made a transfer.

Transfers in

Aguero was transferred in by 4 managers

Sane was transferred in by 3 managers

Laporte was transferred in by 2 managers

No one else was transferred in more than once

Transfers out

Digne and Aubameyang were transferred out by 4 managers

Hazard and Anderson were transferred out by 2 managers

No one else was transferred out more than once

Hits

2 managers took a 4 point deduction for an extra transfer. 1 manager took an 8 point hit

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.

The top 10k average score was 72 compared to the 10 top managers average of 79.

I use 30% as a rule of thumb as a significant variation between the two player sets.

Only 1 player fits that criteria of difference

Robertson is owned by 72% of the top 10k but only 40% of the 10 top FPL managers

All the information is provided by the truly fantastic free site FPL discovery.

So very similar

The combined 10 top FPL managers teams

Here’s a team which tries to make a combination from the most represented players. Please note that it is meant to be a menu of players to help you choose your transfer rather than a realistic team and it’s value is nothing like achievable.

So who’s worth considering as essential?

I define this by either 70% of the top 10k own a player or defensive team or 7 of the 10 top FPL managers own him

Liverpool defence (GK/Def represented 11 times of the 10 FPL managers)

Doherty (Wolves defence represented 14 times in the 10 FPL managers teams).

Salah (owned by 10 of the 10 managers)

Pogba (owned by 9 of the 10 FPL managers)

Rashford (owned by 10/10 FPL managers)

Plus maybes

Wan Bissaka (owned 10 of the 10 top FPL managers but is often a bench player so maybe avoidable)

Richarlison (owned by 8 of the 10 FPL managers) but with a blank in GW27 and 1 return in the last 7 games likely to be sold en masse.

So that’s 5 essentials and 2 maybes. This leaves room for 10 differentials/bench two pointers.

We’re currently in a period where the template is lower than ever and there are multiple theories on how to deal with the double gameweeks and blanks.

It’s going to be a volatile finish to the season

Hope you found the above useful

See the popular transfers in and out in our bandwagons and sinking ships article

If you want to see how any players performed over the season see our cumulative underlying stats article or if just for GW25 see our GW25 review article

Also see our fixture ease article for players with the best upcoming fixtures

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