Fantasy Football Captain Picks Gameweek 7

Welcome to Fantasy Football Captain Picks Gameweek 7. It’s not that often we get two FPL veterans in the same studio so this smacked of ‘opportunity knocks’. As such we have taken the chance to do something a bit different with the captaincy article this week and grill them while we can on the whys and wherefores of how they actually pick their own captain. And then also get their picks for this week.

How are your own captaincy picks going so far this season?

Cookie:
As Greavsie would say, ‘it’s been a game of two halves really’ – GWs 1-3 were good with Sterling, Auba and then Sterling again performing and then 4-6 have been what can only be described as a shocker in the guise of two Sterling blanks and what can only be described as a ‘FUBAR’ last weekend when I gave Digne the armband. Oooops.
Thanks for asking.

Init:
Pretty decent to be fair. I often think with the captaincy that if they register a goal or a few assists then ‘happy days’ and anything above that is a bonus. It’s just that dreaded blank / 4 point captain that we all want to avoid really. I’ve only suffered that once so far but I was also in the majority in doing so as Kane did the honours in GW3 at home to Newcastle. Or the Kane Trap as it is now becoming known as, but more on that later!

The rest have been; Salah (24), Sterling (12), Kun (32), Kun (12) and Kun (18). That’s 102 points in total and my Vice Captain picks would have yielded just 72.

When you pick a captain what do you look for most; form, fixture or something else?

Init:
I tend to only fish in a small pool of about 3 players from my own team for the armband and so it will come down to which one has the best fixture that week. The best way I can put this is that if Mane has say Man United away and Kun has Sheffield United at home, even if Kun blanked last week and Mane got a hat-trick, Kun will get it. So to answer your question it’s essentially fixture based, but bearing in mind that it’s going on a ‘top’ player regardless of their last result.

Cookie:
Both really and potential. I love the imaginary potential that I seem to be able to convince myself that a certain player may have.

Is it mainly ‘gut feeling’ or do you go deeper and read into stats etc?

Cookie:
I’m not a big stat merchant in all honesty though it’s comforting when I read that stats back up a decision. I’m more of a gut feeling manager.

Init:
It’s ‘gut’ in the above scenario but if Mane, in that example, also had a plum home fixture then yes I’d go down the stats route a bit. I’d look at all the respective teams involved and who has scored the most at home compared to the away teams conceding rate and probably come out with some sort of probability figure.

But if they come out similar then it’s back to the gut!

How often, if ever, do you stray from the ‘norm’ when it comes to picking one?

Init: Very, very rarely. As I say above I usually pick one from about three candidates from my team and they will be your usual suspects.

I remember picking Andy Carroll once but it was an odd DGW and he was the best of a bad bunch who actually had two games. Other than that I picked Alli once as he had a great fixture and was bang in form. He scored as I recall. I did go all hippy this week and voted for Pukki as Vice-Captain in the Site Team. That’s about as adventurous as it’s ever got for me, and that’s over 10 years!

Cookie:
A lot I have a weakness, some (Init) would call it an illness to captain a defender, usually a left back. It rarely works, although Digne did perform one time last season. But in general it doesn’t work, I never learn, I’m a dick and Init despairs of me

This is a tough one, but be honest, are you influenced at all by the weekly captaincy articles?

Cookie:
Occasionally they will help me decide if I have a 50/50 decision to make and they provide an argument or stat that pushes me one way or the other.

Init:
I read them of course and they often throw up some interesting stats and figures and that can influence my thinking for sure.

Ok, so what about the poll, group thinking and all that…

Init:
I find the polls interesting as a gauge but they’re certainly not an influence.

Cookie:
The devil/idiot/gambler in me pushes me away from groupspeak. I rarely look at the poll, in all honesty.

Ok thanks, so onto this week, give us your two picks and your reasons why, this is blue sky thinking, who you would pick if you could have anyone, we shall get onto the reality of your own teams later…

Cookie:
Aguero & Salah – pretty self explanatory I think. Aguero under the lights vs Everton and Salah vs Sheffield United. I’d happily captain either in a heartbeat – I own neither

I would like to add that there are a whole number of excellent looking candidates for the armband this week and this is probably the most open week yet for captaincy choices.

Init:
As Cookie said this is about as open as you can get this week; You could easily make a case for any or all of Kun, Sterling, Salah, Mane, Kane, Vardy and even Auba.

If I had to pick two though it’d be Kun or Kane. Kun could and should have had a couple of hat-tricks in that 8-0 game, on another day and all that… If Everton can manage to concede two to Sheffield United then Christ knows what City can do to them.

As for Kane, we have a strange relationship. Which comes back to the ‘trap’ comment earlier. Anytime Spurs score I fully expect to see his name next to it when I put FotMob on. And more often than not I do. Except when I pick him as captain against some perceived weaker opposition at home. We’ve all been there and done that. Newcastle in GW3 being the most recent example. What’s that definition in the dictionary about insanity again…

And just for fun give us a viable differential.

Init:
Vardy. I wouldn’t necessarily captain him above any of my other picks, or indeed Salah, Mane or Sterling but if you want a differential with potential then this is where I’d go.

Cookie:
Ricardo Pereira home to Newcastle 😉 Not allowed? Oh ok then, Callum Wilson home vs West Ham.

And a final question, who are you actually captaining yourself this week?

Cookie:
Tammy Abraham or KdB, haven’t decided as yet.

Init:
Probably Kun again.

Thanks for reading Fantasy Football Captain Picks Gameweek 7. This article was written by Cookie and Inittowinit WCC & Ashes Winner 2019.

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