GW7: Wildcard Active

Classic 4-4-2 Formation.

Abandon All Plans !

Very quick update. The plan to "follow the template" until Christmas has completely gone out of the window. I just haven't been following fpl well enough to even know what the template is. It's been very hard to get invested in fpl when I haven't been picking my own players and doing things my own way.

In hindsight it might have been a good time to trial another "Gamemonth Management" season, but I've missed that boat too.

So now, I'm just going to play it my way :)

I'm going to wildcard tonight, pick my own team, and hopefully start enjoying things and paying attention.

My current rank is 2,187,602. Nothing I haven't seen before at this stage of the season. Meaning I can just crack on and aim for a decent rank.

Hopefully my posts will be a bit more frequent from here on in.

GW2/3 - It's So Hard To Follow The Template

This following the template lark is hard. Firstly, I'm a little disappointed, as I think I've ruined the whole experiment by not nailing the template properly, and also by not keeping on top of things these first few weeks. The Template is one of those things you kind of just know - you know it when you see it. However, to know it you need to be plugged in to what's going on in FPL. As I wasn't paying attention to what was going on in the weeks preceding GW1 I just didn't have a clue. It was lazy of me.

I think Saka is definitely template. Now I've started paying attention I see him in pretty much every team. It's not surprising given his nice price relative to other options. Again, something I would've known instinctively had I been paying attention.

Since the start I've tried to follow the template with my transfers too. I've been too lacklustre and slow off the mark though, meaning I've missed quite a few price changes. (One of the benefits of 'following the template' is you get those bandwagon/herd mentality point ones. So this is another example of my laziness spoiling my little experiment.)

MOVES

Last week, when Solanke got injured, I had a decision to make in regard cheap forward options. The template move was to go with Muniz. My instinctive desire was to go with Southampton's Adam Armstrong - mainly to save £0.5m. I went with the template choice, of course - true to my plan. It was quite a good illustration of the type of difference in decision making I was expecting. It felt so wrong going against my instincts. I didn't like doing it, but even though I haven't quite nailed the template start I'm determined to stick with it.

This week I've made two transfers. I've actually took a (-4). Another thing I would normally never be doing this early in the season. I downgraded Nkunku to Rogers, and I upgraded Gordon to Saka.

So now I am looking very template. The only other clear template player I don't own is Fulham's Robinson.

GW2 Score

72 points (avg. 69)

As you can see, I benched Gordon's 10 pointer. This was another 'chasing the template' mistake. Had I been playing my normal game I'd have never benched Gordon in a million years. However, I was watching fpl content and so many people were sticking with Nkunku for another game. Likewise, there was the usual talk of Gordon being poor away from home. So I was thinking, "What would a template manager do?", and stuck Nkunku in. This was a mistake, and not because it cost me points, but because the logic was faulty. Just because I'm following the template doesn't mean I should make daft decisions in regard my own specific team. Gordon was always more likely to play than Nkunku. So that was an error in judgement in more than one way.

My current rank is now 3,773,406. So not a great start. Now I've taken a (-4) that'll be a further dent. It's still early days though, 

GW1: Template Let's Go

So, I had my first template week. This is the team I ended up going with. I saw it on a Let's Talk FPL video; where someone had put together the average affordable Twitter team.

59 points (avg. 57 - very template)

I think this is probably a good approximate of the template, as it was going into that first week. I've seen a few teams with Saka. So that's the one player I feel could be missing. Though that might be more my feeling that he should be in there, as I'd have no doubt had him in there if I was playing normally.

It was a weird first week. As I'd just copied (or tried to copy) the template I didn't feel any emotional investment in the team whatsoever. So it kind of passed me by. Now it's a question of how I continue to follow 'the template' over the next few months. Clearly, different people will now be making different moves, so unless there's an obvious bandwagon, it isn't entirely apparent what I should do.

At the moment my plan is just to roll the transfer. It might be easier to keep to the template with two frees next week.

I've also been thinking that I don't need to be entirely strict now that first week is out of the way. I just need to be mindful of broadly where the template is and not stray too far. So that means sticking with the template formation. Making sure I have the players that almost everyone in the "fpl community" has. Going with the template captain. If I have minor problems that need fixing, or there are marginal decisions about bench players, etc, I can still use that leeway to make my own choices.

The most transferred player in so far this week is Mazraoui. I don't know if that's an fpl thing or more a Man Utd thing at the moment, but with Porro flagged I'll keep an eye on that going into tomorrow.

I am starting to feel it a bit more now as well - that enjoyment is coming back. So hopefully I continue to grow into the season.

FPL 24/25: Template 'til Xmas

It's been a while. In truth, I'm still not in the mood for Fantasy Premier League. We had the Euros, which gave me my fill of summer football. Plus, we've had riots and God knows what else pulling my attention. So I've been a bit distracted.

At the end of last season my plan was to "Copy the Template until Christmas" this season - a little experiment I've been wanting to do for a while. This is still my plan, though the rule changes that were announced almost shifted me away from that. A few seasons ago I played FPL monthly - which I enjoyed. One of the big downsides with playing that way was that it meant burning a lot of transfers. Now we can save up to five that problem has been alleviated. Almost perfectly so. So, my first thought was, "Oh, I can try another season playing monthly." Perhaps had I been more switched on to football this preseason I might have went down that route, but my lack of interest has forced me to stick with the plan.

I haven't followed any FPL content at all over the last month or so. Today was the first time I attempted to watch a few videos. (Again, I'm not in the mood for it. I'm just not really feeling it.) It should be easy. After all, at the moment I'm just going to copy the template. However, it isn't that easy to find out what the template is exactly. At least with any precision. As it's not simply the most owned players overall, it's the collective wisdom of the 'FPL community.' I need to filter out the casual noise and get a sense of what the movers and shakers are doing.

We know the template when we see it (at least I would if I'd been paying attention this year), but at the same time it's a bit fluid and amorphous. Anyway, at the moment this is what I've got:

I'm not sure this is right, but I think it's in the general ballpark - no pun intended. Also, it's been so hard putting my own instincts to one side. If it's a 50/50 call, where there's tinkering around the edges, how do I exclude my own bias? It's not so easy. I've seen many teams with Flekken as the £4.5m keeper, but I've stuck with Henderson as that's what I tended to see at first.

Also, I'm in work tomorrow and Friday. So I won't be able to observe the onset of the Friday evening deadline. Hopefully, I can catch some more content tomorrow evening and get a better handle on things. I'm sounding like a bit of a Sad Sack, but I think the season has just came a few weeks too early for me. In some ways it's quite fitting. I don't really need to be too invested if I'm just going to be a copycat for the first three months.

I do need to get the start correct though. If I don't go into GW1 with a very template team it defeats the entire purpose of the experiment. So I must get my act together.

I don't even have a team name at the moment 😬

End of Season: Final Rank

It's the end of the season, I almost forgot. Most people post their final rank online on the final day, I'm, as ever, a week late.

It was actually an eventful last couple of gameweeks.

In GW37 I got very lucky, or unlucky, depending on view. I captained Wilson, which was obviously something of a desperate gamble. He missed both games. Meaning Foden came in as my vice captain, with 11 points. I think it was definitely more good luck than bad.

I finished up with 117 points, which was fairly decent, though I still dropped around 20k. Owing to the fact that most others were bench boosting, and the fact that I went against Haaland, who outscored Foden with 15 points.

GW37: 117 points (avg. 83)

Then, however, in GW38, going Foden over Haaland paid off. This was a pretty big week for me - 98 points! The Chris Wood differential working out nicely, with my planned transfer Salah getting a small, but useful 6 points.

GW38: 98 points (avg. 52)

So I ended up with a final rank of 52,925 - which I was very happy with given that I finished GW37 at the 99k mark.

By GW27 I'd climbed up to 32k, so my season definitely tailed off towards the end, but still, overall, 53k is pretty decent (my second highest rank).

Next Season

Next season I'm definitely going to try out the "Template 'til Christmas" experiment, so that should be fun. I like to switch off over the summer though, so I'll come back when we're much closer to the start.

Wildcard Delirium - GW37

It's literally 6 o'clock in the morning. I'm never up this early, but the sudden onset of warm weather has made it difficult to sleep. So now I'm tired, but wide awake. I've did some final tinkering to my GW37 wildcard in this semi-delirium ..removing Haaland to bring in Son. 

Yes, I'm gambling. So I better post my team now, otherwise I won't be in the mood to do it once it all comes crashing down. That Fulham vs Manchester City game kicks off in about six hours. Meaning my season could effectively be over before the 3 o'clock kick offs even begin.

Before we look at my team though, let's re-cap, and find out how we got into this desperate state.

Lately..

My last post was just before Double Gameweek 34. I went into that one feeling confident, but with no Crystal Palace players. It was very much a week of two halves. After the first round of games I'd dropped from 60k to 110k. However, I then clawed all that back, plus a bit more, thanks to a Foden brace, a Semenyo goal and Branthwaite coming off my bench with 20 points. So amazingly I ended the week at 52k.

It was very much the Undertaker meme.

However, in weeks 35 and 36 it's been steady decline. Not quite buried in the coffin, but definitely getting there. It certainly feels more "I Know It's Over" by the Smiths than Wrestlemania at the moment.

GW35 was the mini double, and I went into that just with Palmer. So though I didn't do too badly overall (59 points), I was always going to lose ground on people with multiple doublers. Then GW36 was equally "decent, but not enough" (94 points). I didn't have Jackson (that was a pretty big dividend for people that brought him in solely with the double in mind), and I captained Saka over Haaland 😖 - which cost me 11 points.

So now I'm sitting at 82k with two weeks left. In a situation where about 85% of people in the top 100k will be bench boosting. Plus, I'm about 50 points behind the guy who's top in my mini league.

So..

How My Team Is Looking Without Haaland

My thinking is differential. De Bruyne and Callum Wilson in - Wilson captain ! ..and no Haaland.

The plan is also to do Gordon to Salah next week as one final dice roll, if I somehow survive this week. Before my early morning deliberations I did have Haaland in, and Son was absent. However, I really want Son, especially for that last game against Sheffield United, so I thought, "Okay, you're not going to captain Haaland, let's just go all in against him."

Of course, I've still got to sit around waiting for early team news, which is frustrating. I'd like to just hit 'save your team' and stop thinking about it. It's always a little annoying to write one of these blog posts only to change your mind again before deadline.

I sound a little miserable, but I'm actually enjoying the season. I do love getting the opportunity to go against the herd. It's more just the anticipation. I'm one of these people that just switches off if I have a bad gameweek, so I know the weekend (and season) could be over pretty quickly for me.

Template 'til Christmas

I've actually already started thinking about next season. My plan is to do my "Template 'til Christmas" experiment. As I've mentioned on this blog before, usually I start the season badly then come on strong in the second half, so I really like the idea of seeing how my season would go if I just followed the template like other people tend to do. Only to jettison it once things begin to naturally diverge over the Christmas period. Though saying this, this season hasn't really followed that pattern. I had a decent start this year, but have been treading water these last two or three months. Although you could say it was my unorthodox use of the bench boost in the first half of the season that's left me bench-boost-less now, and out of kilter with the chips.

Also, it's worth adding that the variance with the chips has been incredible this season. Free Hitting in the big blank saw every single player blank, whereas Free Hitting in the double was off the charts. Mateta getting 29 points alone was crazy. Hopefully the bad memories of this season will put people off using it in the blank next season.

Also, if I do my "Template 'til Christmas" plan, I'll have to figure out how to decide what the template actually is each week, and how I track the changes. That might require some thought. It may not be as obvious as it at first appears. There's definitely a psychological aspect, so I'll have to try to stop my own biases slipping in.

Another issue is the AI. I wonder if the various AIs are actually making the template worse. Before it was the "wisdom of the crowd," but now that collective opinion is skewed somewhat by appeals to algorithm. I suspect the AIs aren't quite good enough yet to be better than people en masse. After all, they're only as good as their inputs, and they're not literally watching the games and reading between the lines of press conference statements.

I'd really like to see some deep dives on the AI. How do they work? What are they picking up and not picking up? How successful have they been? I think people are a little too in awe to be truly sceptical though. It's one thing thinking you know better than an fpl content maker, it's another having the arrogance to think you can outsmart a calculator.

It'll be interesting to see if AI completely conquers the game, or if just remains as a tool that can be used with caveats.

Anyway, let's get on with GW37. At least with Haaland completely out my side I won't be sat watching him play with mixed feelings. The Callum Wilson captaincy feels pretty reckless, but it definitely feels fun too. ..Easy to say that now though.