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

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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.