FF247 Fantasy Football Site Team GW1
Knee deep in…
It seems like only yesterday that we were picking our GW38+ team… oh, hang on. Well, we might not be refreshed but we are certainly back regardless and much like many an FPL manager we have been struggling to find those dirt cheap defenders, whilst being knee deep in premium mids and wondering how on earth we then go about accommodating the Manchester contingent once they bother to grace us with their presence. Let’s go and see how we have decided to tackle it all, but first a quick recap on how last season ended for us:
2019/20 Result
Could have been better, could have been a lot worse. We wrapped up the season in GW38+ with 65 points. That saw us get a small red arrow but we only dropped a few thousand places. Overall we landed at 45,446th. Not great but not bad. Pre-lockdown we rose from about 165k to 45k so we were pretty pleased overall. That saw us with another top 50k finish, which we have now achieved in 4 out of our 6 attempts, and it’s also 5 out of 6 in the top 100k with 2 top 6k finishes in there. Again not bad, but nothing to write home about yet.
GW1 Musings
Goalkeepers
We’ve gone for two rotating £4.5mln keepers between the sticks. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea but unfortunately there isn’t a clear set and forget £4.5mln option like Pope this season. Brighton’s Mat Ryan and Southampton’s Alex McCarthy rotate pretty nicely, giving us a fixture run of Palace, Newcastle, Burnley, WBA, Palace (again), WBA (again), Villa, NEWCASTLE, Villa (again), MAN UTD, *play each other*, SHEFF UTD, Fulham, SHEFF UTD (again), Fulham (again) and WEST HAM over the first 16 weeks of the season. Hopefully we can just leave them rotating and watch the clean sheets and save points roll in. All for just £9mln!
Defenders
Some of this is quite easy to explain, some not so much and other bits may require major surgery sooner rather than later!
The easy one is of course Trent, no explanation needed there. What we didn’t see coming was that he would have company in the (rather large) shape of Big Virg alongside him. One of our earliest votes was to decide which Liverpool assets to have with the intention of building from there. Rather surprisingly Salah was usurped by Andy Robertson leaving us knee deep in Liverpool defenders (quasi-midfielders). Which rather begs the question of how VVD got in there… Long story short, we needed a £0.5mln buffer in the bank to accommodate the arrival of said Mancs and so a downgrade was needed along the way (even that plan changed but more on that later..). Whilst considering a myriad of options our minds raced back to Kop’s Tips Article and his preference of VVD over Robertson. The rest is history.
With that pair set to be two of our intended back three every week we sort of lost interest in the others (as you’ll soon begin to notice) as only one of them will ever be called upon, barring any disasters. So cheap and cheerful was the order of the day. Burnley usually offer good value at the back and so Charlie Taylor got the call up. Ruben Vinagre is one of the cheapest ways into the Wolves defence, that’s assuming he doesn’t get sold soon as per the rumour mill. Young Tyrick Mitchell makes up the numbers at the back for us. He’s another potential timebomb but at £4.0mln we shall ride his wave until such a time as Van Aanholt returns and then he can go take his rightful spot at the back of our bench.
Midfielders
Having already decided on no Mo, or indeed Mane, our premium slots went to Aubameyang and Bruno. And to an extent Havertz. By way of explanation: we had an initial plan which seemingly involved lots of transfers to bring in the likes of Bruno and KDB. Including the former in our squad from the get go, and benching him, cut those down a bit. Havertz snuck in at the last minute at the expense of Alli. Essentially he ate up our aforementioned £0.5m buffer but with Bruno already in and KDB likely to come in for Auba in a few weeks, freeing up another £0.5mln, we felt comfortable with the switch, certainly more comfortable than we did with no Chelsea coverage.
Now that Allan Saint-Maximum has an actual forward to aim his crosses at rather than simply a deckchair, we felt he was worthy of a spot, especially as he was one of the more outstanding players during the ‘restart’ period.
Tomas Soucek managed to make his way in and out of our team at least 6 times during the final meeting. He clung on in there, although we expect he may be on our bench more often than not after this week given the above quartet. Truth is that had Bruno been playing this week we would have probably dropped him to a £4.5-er.
Forwards
We had Timo Werner in every draft until yesterday evening. It was then suggested that Leicester had better opening fixtures than Chelsea and with Vardy a ‘tried and trusted’ Premier League scorer we saw an opportunity to grab some ground on the 48% of managers who currently own Werner. We may well look to get Werner in GW3 or thereabouts once Chelsea have got their visit of Liverpool out of the way. It’s a gamble not going with Werner from the start but one we expect (hope) may just give us a slight edge early doors.
Joining Vardy are Callum Wilson and Aleksandar Mitrović. Wilson has decent top flight pedigree having recorded 14 goals and 12 assists in 2018/19 and though he struggled in a faltering and disjointed Bournemouth side last season, we feel his move to Newcastle could well rejuvenate his career, especially as he is joined at the Toon by his old mucker Fraser and will also have ASM and Almirón teeing him up. Newcastle play West Ham, Brighton and Burnley in their first four matches which should give Wilson the chance to reward our faith. If not, there are others at similar price points gagging for the chance to please us.
Mitrović also had a decent 2018/19 as he scored 11 goals and four assists for a relegated Fulham side, while last season he scored 26 goals to win the Championship Golden Boot. The Cottagers have a mixed start and are expected to struggle but if Fulham score, the Serbian is generally involved. Home fixtures vs Villa, Palace and West Brom coupled with an early trip to Leeds certainly give Mitro the chance to extend his reputation as a goal scorer.
Captain – Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang
A clean sweep of the votes here, again it probably needs little explanation. Vardy is vice.
Our GW1 team in full…
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Would love some feedback on my team please .
Robertson to Dier + Lallana to Havertz?
I like it bar Lallana and Batman, is probably downgrade Lallana to a 6.0 and below, use the 0.5 to upgrade Douglas. Mitro or Adams over Batman :good:
Did you mean to captain Trent? It could be a masterstroke, but I would say Salah, Auba and Werner are more obvious captain candidates this week.
Personally, I’m not a fan of rotating GKs, as I tend to get it wrong more than right. Consider downgrading one and upgrade one of your £4m defenders for better bench coverage.
Other than that, it looks pretty solid :good:
PS – meant to say, I quite like the Bats and Lally differentials in there
No need for differentials in GW1!!
all players are differentials in GW1.
Since when?! Some have over 50% ownership :laugh2:
Nice side. I’d keep TAA and Robbo, not compromise there. Maybe Justin as the main 4.5 to start.
Otherwise go for it – one could argue maybe to start Soucek over Lallana but Seagulls fans I know are chuffed to the bollocks that he’s playing there.
I salute your choosing him and Batshuayi.
Thanks for the feedback guys much appreciated and yes chipster I mrnt to captain TAA not many players out scored him last season the only player I’m not sure about is batman
Old school of thought would say don’t play an attacker against your GK. We got over that a while ago but I still hate to see it
G2g guys ??
I don Saka-> Prowse, Davis-> Vinegre
1.5m left for Bruno
I’d get a 4.5 mid and a 6 million striker over JWP and Davis
:good:
In your case, I agree with Smash.
16 pages of comments to read through in a day! Cheers for the article!! The articles this week have been class and very helpful.
I’m guessing going for Werner in many ways is a bit daft with United and City coming in game week 2 and his ridiculously high ownership…unless you plan on probably taking him out.
If he doesn’t score, for whatever reason, his price will drop as he is culled??? It can only go down??
Yes that is a risk of owning Werner. Could go the other way, of course. But as he plays relatively late in the GW there may have been huge volatility before then, e.g. Mane scores 3 tomorrow, etc etc.
I had a minor dither earlier and considered Vardy instead. Part of me thinks start with Vardy and see how Chelsea and Werner get on. The other part of me sees he’s an excellent player in a side that may be out to make a point and which has a (relatively) easy fixture to start.
Yep, think I’m inclined to agree, Kralin. Sticking with the high ownership is usually more prudent than foolish early doors.
I keep an eye on ownership but try (at this early stage) not to get too hung up about it.
There will be huge chopping and changing before GW2 – and I daresay a few wildcards played – so (to answer your other point) I don’t think owning the likes of Lallana is overly risky at this stage.
“Mane scores 3 tomorrow”
Ahhh, cheers Kralin, that’s Beethoven to my ears !
You read it here first, ZL.
A few more exclusives before the evening is through.
Have got Terje Rypdal’s splendid new disc filling my ears at the moment.
Yeah, just what I needed to hear. Been floating between Kane, Vardy and Werner all day. They will only be in there for a couple of weeks at the most, when Martial gets in.
Actually just switched to Vardy. Thought i would wait and see
I don’t think that’s an overly risky move. And easy enough to switch as/when if need be. Vardy has pretty good fixtures.
Yep, that’s where I’m at at the moment. I love the look of Werner tho, and on principal I want him in my team.
Hi team, what do we think? Unsure whether to hold onto the 2.5 mil or invest
Not a mile off from others teams, but thanks in advance
Only thing I can see jumping out IF the money is being spent now is ASM to Alli.
I would consider running with a 433 in GW1, bring Fernandes on for GW2 and hold your cash for the first ‘big’ thing.
Kind of like that move now actually! Cheers GP!
Not keen on Dier but like the rest. I’d personally prefer to start with Salah and drop down to Fernandes GW 2 if you’re going to keep the funds back anyway
Think its the way ive always played….one premium defender, one 5.5/5.0 and 3 rotating cheapies.
Thought about that move, but as a big chelsea fan i have a bias for werner so hoping he pops off!
Any Spurs fans here that can confirm Doherty is going to start?
As he’s Spurs’ much-publicised new signing, I’d imagine he would start
.
If you had 7mil what forward would you pick out of
Batman
Mitrovic
Lewin
Mitro
Of those three, I would be prepared to support DCL with the business Everton have done in mind.
Mitrovic close second.
DCL, Everton have invested well and you’d expect DCL to have bucketfuls of chances.
He needs them
Mitro and watching DCL
I think I’d go for Bats, and reinvest the extra.
Calvert-Lewin.
Adams worth a ponder too.
Lewin.In fact i have !
Mitro
Init, any vivid dreams at late 😉
Yep. But none I can put on an open family friendly forum :laugh2:
Aaah, this dirty Mitro :rofl:
Fortunately he wasn’t involved!
This is the most RMT’s I’ve done in 6 months so I dare say I’ll wake up thinking about FPL players so I’ll let you know tomorrow if he crept in in the night. Almost Kop & Cookie like.
Well, a couple of years ago you almost had it right with the hatrick dream, when he only managed a brace. Just a goal will do me nicely besides captain Kane with his brace
Mitro
I can’t stand DCL but it’s prob him