Here’s another FPL season review article where we analyse and compare the FFGeek team that finished 17k overall to 5 of the 10 top FPL managers I follow who again finished in the top 10k overall rank. Hopefully there will be some learnings for next season
FPL Season Review – Comparing The FFGeek Team To The 10 Top FPL Managers
Introduction
The idea here is to analyse the FFGeek team that finished in 17k overall rank last season and then compare it to the 5 managers of the 10 top managers I follow who finished in the top 10k this season. Hopefully there will be some learnings for next season which I can assess in the hope of improving my rank next season
The data comes from FPL statistico
The comparison schedule
So where did the FFGeek team perform worse?
The comparison I’m going to do is my team vs the average of the 5 managers who finished in the top 10k.
There’s quite a points difference of 75 points for my team at 2,472 vs the average of the 5 managers at 2,547 so it will be interesting to see what contributed to that
The Captain score
This is the most significant difference. My total captain points were 574 vs the average of the 5 of 635. that’s 61 points and almost the whole of the 75 points I’m behind.
Now regular readers know that I go with the polls every week and treat the captaincy choice as a shield rather than a sword. Now the polls aren’t always clear cut and often you need to make a choice of 2 or 3 that are very close.
My impression of the 10 top FPL managers is that they mainly followed the captain favourite if it was significantly clear cut. Therefore I don’t think my approach is wrong and I don’t need to go totally maverick in my approach to the captain choice I just need to be better when there are choices to make. A change of approach maybe needed for those situations?
Individual captain player picks
Further down the schedule are the individual captain choices and the times a player was chosen and there average PPM.
What’s interesting about that is that I pretty much got my captain choices from the same small group as the 5. They were Salah, Kane, Fernandes, De Bruyne and Gundogan. Everybody strayed from that group a few times but not significantly. My recollection is that they used Salah far more than me.
I was behind in the PPM on all the players except, ironically, Fernandes. Again, Ironically given my love for him, that it was Salah who I chose less and had the biggest gap against the average in PPM. If I had made the same choices of Salah as the average that would have given and additional 63 points which again pretty much explains the gap.
I think the Salah point isn’t about an analysis deficiency it’s about a captain trust thing. Who do you want as your default captain if it isn’t obvious who to pick from the polls? Salah and Kane to me make the most sense. High shot volume, great xG and xA. Very advanced up the pitch. Perhaps I need to think about a default when things aren’t clear? Alot to ponder.
Player position point distribution
Here I was ahead over the average of the 5 on GK Points per Match but behind on Forwards points per match but similar on defence and midfield.
I don’t think that specific point is significant given it depends on your cash spend distribution. Although I came out roughly neutral on the overall average that was due to the GK PPM of which there is obviously only 1 compared to the other positions. As a general point this is about inferior player choice.
Goals and clean sheets
I was behind in assists and clean sheets and less so on goals. Assists and clean sheets added up to 40 points before any bonus accruing so quite significant. Again it depends on how you spend your funds but there was no goals scored boost to counter that so it really means my player selection could have been better.
The best performing players
Not much here. My Salah and Kane points were virtually the same on similar volumes played. Fernandes I did about 18 points worse for 1.6 times played less so that was reasonably significant. So it was more around the other players outside those that I fell behind.
Summary
My total points vs the average of the 5 top managers who finished in the top 10k was 75 points.
It appears my captain choices were the main difference and their use of Salah rather than mine being the key.
The player position distribution and the goals, assists and clean sheets were all inferior to the average 5 which just comes down to inferior player picks.
I matched them pretty much in Salah and Kane points but a bit behind in Fernandes. Those weren’t the players that got them ahead of me
Hope you found it interesting especially if you compare it to your team
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