Here’s our fantasy premier league wildcard tips GW16 article where I pretend I’m using my wildcard. It gives player suggestions with more longevity than just for the up coming gameweek. There’s the team, a table of stats ad their upcoming fixtures.
fantasy premier league wildcard tips GW16 – the FFGeek imaginary wildcard
So with it being a short gameweek there are no links to other articles so I’ll go into each player in more detail
The FFGeek imaginary wildcard team
My value at the moment is a fairly low £102.3m and the team fits within £103.0m which is hopefully many of you.
Structure
The team is set up mainly to play 4-4-2 and to a lesser extent 5-3-2. That is one of the disadvantages of having Success and Hojbjerg as it means the lack of depth on the bench restricts formation and makes the team less flexible. However, it should mean you have less bench disasters when you get the lineup wrong. That is one of the annoying by products of a strong bench.
If you come onto the site regularly you’ll know I classify players into 3 categories:
Template players (70% of the top 10k or 7 of the 10 top FPL managers I follow)
Bench players – 2 pointers only
Differentials and template replacement players – the rest
This team would have the following template players:
Kane, Richarlison, Fabianski (West Ham defence) Alexander Arnold (Liverpool defence), Doherty (Wolves defence), Luiz (Chelsea defence/Alonso cover)
I suspect after this week Sterling, at the expense of Salah and Aubameyang, at the expense of Arnautovic, will fall into this category.
The bench players are Hojbjerg, Success and Button.
That leaves 4 differentials in Kolasinac, Laporte, Fraser and Sane who will be your primary rank affecting players.
The Stats
Definitions
Pts per 90: the FPL points earned per 90 minutes played in 18/19
Consistency: the % of starts where the player has scored a goal or assist. Sub appearances are ignored.
Av Mins: average minutes of the last 4 matches. Generally I count sub appearances or rotation but not injury absences although there is some discretion there.
xG90/xA 90 – their expected goals and expected assists per 90 minutes played. An xG90 of 0.3 would imply a 30% chance of scoring every 90 minutes based on an average premier league player. I’ve taken them from the excellent free site understat.com
Sh90 and KP90 and – shots per 90 and key passes per 90 minutes played. I’ve taken this from the excellent free site whoscored.com
ATGS GW16 – 1 bookies anytime goalscoring odds. ATGS assumes they start and doesn’t include assist potential.
Player values are as of Friday 7 December.
Goalkeepers
Fabianski
Despite only 2 clean sheets Fabianski is the top equal £4.5m ish point scorer with only Hart making more saves. A great run of fixtures is the hope that the clean sheets will improve.
Crystal Palace (H)
Fulham (A)
Watford (H)
Southampton (A)
Burnley (A)
Brighton (H)
Button is the non playing reserve
Defence
Laporte
With only 1 clean sheet in their last 5 it’s easy to start doubting the Man City defence. Add to that fact that while Laporte is probably the most certain starter, he hasn’t shown much premier league attacking or bonus potential. Those facts mean you’ve got a lot of sceptics on your hands. However, no team has better underlying defensive xG and shot against stats. Furthermore only 3 times have sides got an xG of 1 goal or over in a game against them. I’m betting there clean sheets will improve.
Chelsea (A)
Everton (H)
Crystal Palace (H)
Leicester (A)
Southampton (A)
Liverpool (H)
Kolasinac
A gamble here with the LWB only coming into the Arsenal side in the last 5 games and with Monreal presumably not that far away. However Monreal could be part of the back 3 especially given Holdings injury. With only 2 clean sheets so far this is more about the fixtures and his attacking potential than the immediate defensive prospects although Huddersfield at home is a good entry point.
Huddersfield (H)
Southampton (A)
Burnley (H)
Brighton (A)
Liverpool (A)
Fulham (H)
Alexander Arnold
Liverpool are now the team with the least goals scored and the most clean sheets even though Man City has the better underlying stats. The Gomez injury should help Alexander Arnolds gametime over the coming weeks
Bournemouth (A)
Man Utd (H)
Wolves (A)
Newcastle (H)
Arsenal (H)
Man City (A)
Doherty
It’s no clean sheet in the last 7 for the Wolves defence although Doherty has softened the blow with a goal and an assist. That 7 game run did involve Spurs, Arsenal and Chelsea however which was unlikely to see clean sheets.
Newcastle (A)
Bournemouth (H)
Liverpool (H)
Fulham (A)
Spurs (A)
Crystal Palace (H)
Luiz
Despite 2 calamitous performances against Wolves and Spurs it’s still 3 clean sheets in the last 6 for the Chelsea defence. Also non top 6 sides have only got an xG of greater than 1 goal twice in the first 15 games. So there are positives there. The gamble with Luiz is that he didn’t play vs Wolves (although neither did Jorginho). I’d rather have Alonso but the price difference makes it difficult to justify and fit other things in the team.
Man City (H)
Brighton (A)
Leicester (H)
Watford (A)
Crystal Palace (A)
Southampton (H)
Midfield
Sterling
The midfield tap in merchant is an incredibly dangerous player who’s ability to be in the right place at the right time is probably unparalleled with midfielders. It’s incredible to think he’s returned in 9 of his 12 starts for 8 goals and 7 assists and has a PP90 of 9.2
Chelsea (A)
Everton (H)
Crystal Palace (H)
Leicester (A)
Southampton (A)
Liverpool (H)
Hojbjerg
Just there as a fairly guaranteed starter to come off the bench with little points potential . Is on 4 yellow cards so hard to see how he avoids a 1 game suspension before December 31.
Cardiff (A)
Arsenal (H)
Huddersfield (A)
West Ham (H)
Man City (H)
Chelsea (A)
Fraser
Only his team mate Wilson has more FPL assists than Fraser’s 7. Only David Silva has a better xA when on the pitch than Fraser and that’s only just. Has tricky fixtures but the price means the occasional benching isn’t the end of the world.
Liverpool (H)
Wolves (A)
Brighton (H)
Spurs (A)
Man Utd (A)
Watford (H)
Sane
The fact that Sane has returned a goal or assist every time he’s started says alot. Lack of early season gametime, no World Cup and the injured Mendy meaning he is the left hand side’s width, in theory means he should have reasonable gametime security.
Chelsea (A)
Everton (H)
Crystal Palace (H)
Leicester (A)
Southampton (A)
Liverpool (H)
Richarlison
For the first time in a while Richarlison played AML rather than CF and he produced one of his better performances with a goal, 6 shots and an xG of 0.82. 7 goals and 1 assist in his 13 starts is a pretty good return
Watford (H)
Man City (A)
Spurs (H)
Burnley (A)
Brighton (A)
Leicester (H)
Forwards
Kane
4 goals and 2 assists in his last 5 games, returning in all 5 with some decent shot volumes and it’s a sign that the 17/18 Kane could be back.
It’s a pretty decent fixture list coming too.
Leicester (A)
Burnley (H)
Everton (A)
Bournemouth (H)
Wolves (H)
Cardiff (A)
Success
Just there to come off the bench. Started 6 of the last 7 games.
Everton (A)
Cardiff (H)
West Ham (A)
Chelsea (H)
Newcastle (H)
Bournemouth (A)
Aubameyang
The leading FPL point scoring striker with 10 goals and 3 assists from 13 starts and 2 as sub. His underlying stats could be better with Aguero, Morata and Vardy all having better non penalty xG90. However this is more about fixtures and captain potential.
The problem is the unpredictability of EMery’s selection. Emery has only ever played 1 striker and up until the last 2 games that has mostly been with Lacazette as CF with Auabmeyang as a left sided attacking midfielder.
Not surprisingly there’s a decent disparity in Aubameyangs stats between playing AML and playing CF. With Emery now going to 3-4-2-1 it makes it look like a more 1 striker pick each week. However substitutions with Lacazette on v Man Utd and Arsenal made it a 3-4-1-2 which could be implemented against the lower ranked sides.
However I can theorise to the cows come home the upshot is this is Unai Emery so who knows? I’m not even sure Aubameyang starts in GW16? Lacazette could easily return to CF. However that is the risk you take for the fixtures.
Huddersfield (H)
Southampton (A)
Burnley (H)
Brighton (A)
Liverpool (A)
Fulham (H)
Make sure you vote on our captain and transfer polls. Also see what the 10 top FPL managers are doing. These managers have finished in the top 10k each of the last 3 seasons
There’s also our Arnautovic replacements article and the FFGeek early team thoughts article
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