FPL GW4 - Greenwood, Greenwood, Greenwood

I should start this with the caveat that I haven't really been following the latest team news today. With the wildcard still active I'll be doing a more thorough check later on. Normally I'm all sown up by this point barring major team news, but with the deadline being tomorrow I may as well take the time to tinker the wildcard as much as possible.

The one major point of consideration that has been occupying my thoughts is the possibility of removing Joelinton to bring in Patrick van Aanholt. Essentially meaning a return to five at the back. PVA is already top for points in defence and Palace have some nice looking games. Joelinton's home fixture against Watford looks too nice though. Plus it would be galling if I took him out now to see him score a couple of goals. So I'm sticking for the time being.

(..as things stand)

The real point of this article, hence the title, is Mason Greenwood though. There's a possibility he could start tomorrow and at the moment I even have him in my starting eleven (that may change though).

At the start of the season I was quite excited when I saw Mason Greenwood at 4.5m. Obviously he was bottom of the pecking order, but with Lukaku going and no one coming in it meant he would be guaranteed at least some game time. Especially with injuries being an inevitability at various points during the season. Now with Sanchez leaving that's even more so the case.

Therefore if he does start tomorrow it shouldn't really come as too much of a surprise to anyone.

Anyway, my initial enthusiasm for Greenwood was dampened as I listened to various other FPL commentators downplay his prospects of getting serious minutes. I should perhaps say at this point that though I tend to just keep to myself in FPL and do my own thing. Posting my little blog posts. A bit like someone alone at sea filling in their journal. I do watch a lot of FPL content, especially on YouTube. There's so much good stuff out there. Fantasy Football Scout and Let's Talk FPL are pretty much essential viewing. I'm really enjoying watching Planet FPL this season. FPL Wildcats, FPL Cougars. Capkin Gaming, FPL General. The list goes on. There's so much good stuff out there, and they all actually seem like quite decent people too. (I like to imagine that they all hate each other behind the scenes lol but that probably isn't the case.)

So I do benefit a lot from listening to other people when it comes to information. I think the one problem with watching so much content though is that it makes people overthink things, or dampen their own instincts. It seems to add a fear factor. No one wants to look like a casual player or like they don't know what they're doing. Taking a risk on an obscure player that no one's heard of is one thing, but just sticking a player in your team because he plays for Chelsea or Man United can look a little amateurish if it doesn't pay off.

I've had this problem myself with players like Kanté. He's not a bad option for his price (116 points last season isn't too bad at all), but putting him in your team looks like the sort of move a casual player would make, or that a child with only a limited knowledge of football would make. So you avoid doing it for fear of looking like that.

I think it could be similar with Greenwood.

This is potentially a Manchester United striker, getting serious game time, that costs just 4.5m.

It would be massive if he gets a run of games, but it's almost too obvious a risk for people to take. Everyone instead is looking for a 4.5m gem from Aston Villa or Norwich or somewhere like that. A clever choice. An original find.

If fact, it's quite fitting that I'm currently trying to decide whether to start Greenwood or Cantwell. Obviously it's quite possible that Greenwood won't start, so that's a big risk factor, but if he does start who would I rather have?

If you asked a ten year old whether they would rather have a Manchester United striker or a Norwich midfielder they would say a Manchester United striker without even hesitating.

Is that because it's so obviously the better choice that even a child can see it? Or is it just because kids are idiots?

If I go with my inner child perhaps Greenwood will start and get a couple of goals. Then again, he could sit on the bench for 85 minutes and Cantwell could get a very boring, but valuable assist ..and I'll be sitting there feeling and looking like a child. It's a bit pathetic to be bothered about such things really, but we're all social animals and we can't completely escape worries about how we're perceived by other people.

If Greenwood starts getting games though, then the Greenwood / Joelinton strike partnership is definitely on. Stuff Pukki, he'll be straight out, far too expensive for my tastes :)

FPL: My GW3 Points ..and My Wildcard Team (!)

Very happy with this week. Though I think that's mainly because Joelinton scored :D
57 points, 13 above the average. Very tidy.

Gameweek Points: 57

Gameweek Rank: 1,082,664

Overall Rank: 538,448

(click to enlarge)

Not gonna lie it felt great when Joelinton scored. It's been hard watching everyone else get forward returns while I've had a single 6m priced lone striker. So to get something in a game where I wasn't expecting anything was a huge bonus. Took my whole gameweek from average to decent.

I would say more about how the other players did this week, but I've hit the wildcard button. So that's now front and centre in my thoughts. I mainly did it to get Teemu Pukki in. It seemed like the sensible thing to do after watching the Norwich v Chelsea game. He was actually quite quiet for most the game, but when a player keeps scoring the way he has you have to take it on board.

I could've made excuses why not to get him, but getting him now makes sense whichever way you split it. Either he goes on to be this year's Jiménez - in which case I definitely need him, especially given how I'm setting up this season. Or he fizzles out as many strikers do after a bright start, in which case I've at least got in on the price rises (heading to 7m tonight by the looks of it).

My wildcard as it stands at the moment;

(..yes, Joelinton stays)

I've also used the wildcard to get in on some of the other price rises. Cantwell, who has already risen once this week, and Douglas Luiz and Lundstram who both look set to rise over the next few days or so.

I watched Douglas Luiz against Everton on Friday night and I thought he looked really good. I had no idea what his price was at the time, I was much more concerned with watching Digne fail to return. So when I saw his price after I hit the wildcard it was a nice surprise.

I'm keeping Joelinton for the time being - how can I drop him after yesterday. The home tie against Watford now looks like a very nice fixture for him.

At some point I plan to revert back to just one up top. I think I'll wait it out to see which cheap striker looks to be the best value, then go back to five defenders. I was a little apprehensive about getting rid of Wan-Bissake. I still think he's potentially great value, but United really are an odd outfit at the moment. It's like they have the footballing equivalent of bipolar disorder.

With Sheffield United at home Azpilicueta stays. Especially after his assist. I thought he had a really good game against Norwich, so hopefully the rest of the Chelsea defence will be passable enough going forward that I can keep him long term.

With four or five days still to go til the weekend (plus League Cup fixtures midweek) it's possible there may be injuries or other team news that forces me to change things. Other than that though I think I'm fairly settled with the wildcard as it stands. Hopefully it does okay for me over the coming weeks and months.

Overall Points: 181

Overall Rank: 538,448

GW3 Preview.

FPL Gameweek 3 is here. I like it when we have a Friday night fixture. It feels like much less waiting around. Straight into it. It does mean I have to whack a blog post out a little quicker though.

Fortunately it's nice and easy this week as I haven't made any changes or transfers.

(click to enlarge)

Joelinton stays in spite of a 0.1m price drop. That change is going to make it difficult going forward when I want to take him out. If I want to take him out. I'm keeping the faith!

I'm still fairly happy with the team overall, I just need my few differentials to start delivering. I can't be highly hopeful about Joelinton against Spurs of course, but with my two Chelsea players there's some potential over the next few games. So I'm optimistic for the time being.

Also it's probably worth mentioning I'm a bit more active on Twitter this season. Just silliness for the most part - it's amazing how much more cocky you feel when you're hiding behind a Dogtanian avatar lol.

( ..link in the sidebar)

I'll try to keep it separate from this. I'll keep this a little more straight laced. At least now I can just pretend my bad decisions or opinions were done in jest though :)

FPL: GW2 Review

An underwhelming week and what can only be described as a very mild green arrow.

Gameweek Points: 44

Gameweek Rank: 2,313,654

Overall Rank: 997,234

(click to enlarge)

Oddly, given the way the week went, I'm actually feeling quite positive about my team. I'm sticking with five at the back. It hasn't worked too well so far, but I'm happy with all the players. Wan-Bissaka looks decent value to me. I'm certainly in no rush to drop my two Liverpool defenders, and Digne has done the business so far. It's only really Azpilicueta that I now have doubts about, but even there the next two games for Chelsea look pretty nice - Norwich (A), Sheff Utd (H).

Digne currently has a yellow flag. I think he's due to have a scan this week to assess the injury. If he's just a doubt, or it's only for a single week I may just keep him, but I could just go Digne to Coleman if he's definitely out. So I'll wait and see with that one.

Moving on to midfield. Again I'm feeling confident. Sterling and De Bruyne I'm very happy about owning. Salah hasn't quite been on fire, but him or Mané seem essential. Then finally with Jorginho it's the same as with Azpilicueta. Chelsea assets look very questionable, but the next two games give me no reason to be moving them out.

Upfront I do have a problem. Joelinton blanked again. (Pukki quite obviously stole the show in that game). He also has a yellow flag, though the news seems to be that he'll be fine for Tottenham. I plan on just leaving him in for the time being. There isn't an obvious 6m replacement at the moment who's guaranteed to play, and I'm not going to rearrange the rest of my team just yet. It's hard to see Newcastle doing anything against Spurs, but you never know. It is still very early in the season.

Overall Points: 124

Overall Rank: 997,234

Fantasy Premier League: Tactics Central

On this page I'm linking to all the posts I've done regarding my overall strategy - i.e. posts that have long term value (hopefully). Compared to the weekly posts that are usually out of date after the gameweek in question.

So this is essentially the holding bay for posts detailing my evolving strategy. That I'll be referring back to.

My FPL Rules and Strategies - March, 2019.

Mathemategy - May, 2019.

FPL: GW2 Preview

So I've swallowed my pride and brought in Digne. A week later than I should've had him, but at least he's in there now. I watched the highlights from last week and he looked very attacking. Obviously we all know that from last season, but my bias against teams like Everton made me look elsewhere.

My thinking in that regard is pretty much this. With a top six side you can be fairly certain they'll be in the top six come the end of the season. They may be higher up in that top six pecking order, they may be a bit lower down, but they'll probably be in there.

For example, if Spurs finish seventh or eighth this season you'd be very surprised. Whereas a team like Everton. Though you might expect a seventh to tenth place finish (or perhaps even higher as a few people have predicted) you wouldn't be the least bit surprised if they finish much further down. If Everton finish 14th this season no one's jaw will be dropping. Likewise if they find themselves being dragged into a relegation battle after the first seven or eight games it wouldn't be that unusual.

So that's why I was thinking a Spurs defender would be safer.

However, with the fixtures Everton have, and the clear attacking prowess of Digne, that was a big error. I missed out on a clean sheet last gameweek, but it could've been way worse. So I don't have that worry now going forward.

Anyway, my GW2 team.

(GW2 lineup_)

My big worry comes following that 120 minute super long, Super Cup. I had five players involved 😦 four of whom played the full whack. So that could damage me.

One bonus though is that it seems Jorginho is quite likely to be on penalties going forward. Which adds hugely to his potential. I just hope he actually starts the game.

I'm also hoping Salah gets as much game time as possible as I'm sticking with him as captain.

Finally, the Norwich v Newcastle match is weirdly the most interesting game for me this gameweek. I want to see how well both Joelinton and Pukki do against must weaker defences. Obviously I'm hoping Joelinton does well given that I own him. If he has a poor game against Norwich it'll be a worry. This was the game I was looking at when I put him in, so another blank will be disappointing. Very nice differential though.

Hopefully I can have a half decent week.

FPL: GW1 Review

I'm getting in there early. Very eager. The scores haven't even updated yet, but my brain's already ticking over with ideas about what I want to do in the next few weeks. I should be on 78 points if I've worked it out correct - 80 if Wan-Bissaka gets his bonus. So quite happy. (I'll post my score and rank below when the game's updated properly).

Gameweek Points: 80

Gameweek Rank 1,031,442

(click to enlarge)

All the big names seemed to turn up this week. Kane, Salah, Sterling, Aubameyang. Even Agüero came off the bench to grab a goal. So I'm expecting the average to be fairly high. Kane and Aubameyang would normally give me food for thought. However, with my plan being to go cheap up front it means I can just ignore them, which makes decisions much easier for me. A bit like how I stuck with my plan to avoid both Salah and Kane all last season (that time because of their respective prices). Obviously this could come back to haunt me. Kane in particular looked very sharp with his finishes. ..but the plan's the plan.

Looking at my team I'm broadly happy with it, though the players that did well for me are all the sort of players that will have done well for everyone else. So it's probably best to just ignore my six City and Liverpool players, who all did well (with the exception of Robertson), and focus on the rest.

So, the rest.

Azpilicueta - zero points.

I'm still pretty confident keeping him though. It's Azpilicueta.

Vertonghen - didn't play.

It was a bit of a mistake putting him in really. If Pochettino is rotating centre halves now as well then he definitely has to go. I only had him in as he seemed like a top six defender guaranteed to play. I should've went with Digne in hindsight, but it goes against my rule of not spending big on teams that aren't in the top six. 6m for an Everton defender seems a bit mad to me, but he came in with a clean sheet and looked very attacking, as ever. So I probably should've followed the pack.

Wan-Bissaka - 8 points (he did get the two bonus :D).

Great game. Definitely keeping him. The new Azpilicueta.

Jorginho - 1 point, yellow carded.

A bit worried about this one. At times he looked good, at other times he looked poor. He did seem to be more attacking though, getting a shot away from the edge of the box in the first half. He was taken off, so I'm now wondering if he's even certain to start next week. Kanté will definitely come in, so it's possible Kovacic could be the one who keeps his place. Really hard to tell after that performance.

Joelinton - 2 points.

Didn't actually see this game, so I'm still in the dark a little. He played the full 90 though, and if he continues to do that I'm quite happy to keep him. If a more nailed on 6m striker comes along I'll switch, but for now I'm not hugely concerned. Can hardly be expecting a 6m striker to be returning every week.

So my plans for this week.

Vertonghen is the obvious one to remove, but it's who to bring in. The whole point of going five at the back was to have five players I was confident would do well over a long period of time. Digne is the obvious one, but again 6m for an Everton player just feels wrong to me. David Luiz was my original pick and it might be logical to move back that way, but Arsenal's fixtures aren't ideal. Plus Luiz would potentially be a good replacement for Azpilicueta should Chelsea be truly bad at the back. Zouma and Christensen certainly didn't look great today (!)

Also, Philip Billing played and seemed to have a pretty good game. He had a very decent effort from outside the box which was saved, and he was involved in the goal. So if he continues to play I may go in for him. I could make a straight switch for Jorginho with them both being the same price.

Finally, my bench all got game time as well, which puts me in good stead. So it does mean if players do miss out it won't be a disaster.

GW1 ..Let's Go !

Okay, think I'm finally set. I've taken out David Luiz and brought in Vertonghen. It's a bit of a boring switch, but he's a safe pick and Spurs play at home to Aston Villa. So it's nice to have a Spurs player in there. I may then bring Luiz back either for GW2, or on my first wildcard (I'll no doubt wildcard fairly early again).

(click to enlarge)

Apparently Luiz is down to start this week, so I could've just left him in there really, but I'll stick with dull. One thing I do like about Luiz starting on Sunday is that he's not the most reliable of defenders, and with him being thrown in with completely new players. Especially an already suspect Arsenal defence, then that may be potential good news for Joelinton. Though perhaps I'm being a little optimistic here :)

Lukaku leaving Manchester United is also great news, as it should mean much more opportunity for Greenwood. So I feel more confident having him on my bench now.

I've been scratching around a little to try to see if it's worth maybe spending the extra 0.5m the Vertonghen move left me, but I think I'll just leave it. I was looking to perhaps upgrade Dendoncker so I could have a stronger benched 5th mid, but really the options at 5m are almost as bad as those at 4.5m.

Going forward I'll be very interested to see if Philip Billing gets much game time for Bournemouth. He's only 5m and they have quite a few injuries at the moment. He always looked like Huddersfield's best player last season whenever I watched them. He looks very capable. Obviously it was difficult getting attacking returns in that Huddersfield team last season, but with the way Bournemouth play that could be very different. Not many people are mentioning him, but Bournemouth must have seen something in him if they've paid £15m. The question is have they bought him as a potential first team player, or just to flesh out the squad.

Anyway, not long to go now. The first game of the season kicks off in just two and a half hours :D

Banner Art ..and Luiz moving

I was just about to post stating I'd changed nothing since the last post, however I just checked Twitter five minutes ago to find David Luiz trending. If he does go to Arsenal (totally was not expecting that!) then I'll probably have to shake things up a bit. Unless I just leave him in there, which seems a bit risky now - it's hard to imagine they'd just throw him straight in there.

So I'll probably be looking for another high priced centre half. Could be for the best really. Two Chelsea at the back was always going to be a risk. Plus it frees up another spot for a Chelsea player should I want to bring in one of their cut price attacking midfielders or forwards. Think I'll definitely wait until tomorrow though to start playing around with things.

Having had a quick look I'm not hugely keen on Arsenal's fixtures so I'll most certainly be moving him out. Might just go super dull and throw in Vertonghen as a place holder. They play Villa and Newcastle in their first two home games so it wouldn't be too bad short term. He offers very little other than clean sheet potential though.

Anyway, I was just going to upload some of the art I'd been doing today. Thought I better change my Twitter banner pic for the start of the season. I'm not sure which is the best one, so I'll just upload them all here so I can easily find them again should I decide to change things. Plus it's always good to have a little colourful art about the blog.

(click to enlarge)

I didn't really plan on having Pep front and centre, it just kind of happened that way. It gives the impression that I'm a huge Man City fan, which sadly isn't the case. Though with Woodgate now in charge at Middlesbrough we are starting to play some attacking football finally, so it's not all bad.

Maybe I should put all the images together as one long poster type thing. Hmm..

Though saying that I should probably focus a bit more on my FPL team and less on making silly images :)

There we go, much better.

Fantasy Premier League. It Begins :D

Think I'm just about set for Gameweek 1 now.

(I'm ready for GW1

..94% battery and everything)

I'm still worried about my bench, but apart from that I'm fairly happy overall.

I'm going with Newcastle's Joelinton in the lone forward position. I'm most definitely sticking with my policy of spending as little as possible up front. So I'm hopeful that Joelinton will be my route into doing that without it causing me too much damage. Given how much Newcastle have spent on him and their general lack of centre forwards he pretty much has to play every game - hopefully most minutes of every game too. This is my main requirement really given how little I'm spending, so if he can get a few goals as well over the next few weeks that would be a huge, huge bonus.

I also now have Jorginho instead of Kanté. This is mainly because Kanté picked up an injury. He should be back I think, but I've switched to Jorginho anyway. He seems pretty much nailed on by the sounds of it. From what I've heard it seems Chelsea will be going something like a 4-2-3-1 formation. With Kanté plus Jorginho as the two. Hopefully this will be the case as at 5m I think Jorginho is great value.

A lot of people are a bit down on Chelsea, but this is a team that finished 3rd in the Premier League last year and won the Europa League. Sure Hazard is gone and there's been a managerial switch, but still they have some top players. Jorginho is someone who didn't have a great deal of goal or assist threat last year, but I'm very happy to have him (or Kanté) at 5m if he's starting every week.

Of course, I really need my first eleven starting each game with the weakness of my bench. I've brought in Jordan Ayew in the hope that he at least picks up some minutes most weeks. Crystal Palace, like Newcastle, look like another team that don't have a great deal of options up top. So if he's used, even if it's just off the bench, he might provide the odd point or two should it be needed.

As we've mentioned before. Greenwood is pretty much a free hit, so it would be silly to expect points from him. If he does play a part though, which isn't entirely unlikely given the circumstances at present, then 4.5m is superb value.

It does mean though that I'm starting the season with two very cheap strikers on my bench. Both of whom could play no part at all. So that third bench position is very important. I'm currently copying everyone else with Leander Dendoncker in there. The general consensus seems to be that he'll be a first choice player for Wolves again this season, but I genuinely have no idea and I'm just going with the crowd.

The other options in that 4.5m midfield price bracket are a bit, err.. bad. Hayden for Newcastle would be decent, but I think there's still uncertainty about his future. You'd think Dale Stephens would be a starter for Brighton, but with a new manager there I have no real certainty in that. Plus he tends to offer little more than one or two points a game when he plays.

Of course, if I was a really good FPL manager I'd have some unknown 4.5m gem up my sleeve, but sadly my knowledge, especially about the newly promoted teams, is just abysmal. Perhaps I can do some digging over these next few days and find the perfect pick.

For now though I'll just follow the herd and hope for the best.