GW1: Team Reveal

First, I'll further flesh out why I'm going without Haaland.

[Note: This may be cope. Helping me to justify a terrible decision post-hoc.]

I mentioned the price in the last post. £15.5m is a huge price. I'm surprised he's an automatic default in so many teams given the price. It makes me wonder what price it would take to get his ownership below 50%. £16m? £17m? £18m?

Then there are the wider questions around Man City.

Pep gone. Rodri gone. (An underappreciated) Bernardo Silva gone.

How will Maresca do? I'm sure he's a decent manager, but at the same time I don't think Chelsea fans are devasted that he's gone.

I like Elliot Anderson - I actually had him in my first draft. Aside from FPL there's a big question mark over him in purely footballing terms though. A really good player, yes. A title-winning world class player? That remains to be seen.

What isn't in doubt is that Kovacic is a bit average. Again, a good Premier League midfielder. Certainly not a bad player. But not world class.

So, for me, that midfield, if that's the midfield two, has question marks. I think with Bernardo Silva gone a lot now relies on Foden. I think he has to start as the number ten. He's the one player who threads the midfield lines. So that's interesting to me.

Now I'm not saying City will become a bad team if the midfield is a touch subpar. I'm sure they'll still be impressive. However, there's a difference between being good and being really good. Between beating teams 2-1 and beating teams 4 or 5 nil.

What type of City will we see?

Perhaps they'll get a new manager bounce? Perhaps they'll be worse? Perhaps there'll be little difference to last season? It's hard to say. If I had to put my money somewhere I'd say slightly worse though.

Liverpool

With Liverpool there are similar questions. Though, in my opinion, it's hard to see Liverpool being worse than they were last season. So going Isak over Haaland is exciting for me. It's obviously a gamble, but one that pays off handsomely if it does work out.

I also have van Dijk. Which is another nice bonus made possible by not having Haaland.

Who I don't have is Szoboszlai. As with Haaland, this is a decision that could hurt me given how well-owned he is. He's easy to bring in though, given my midfield, so as long as I'm not too stubborn that shouldn't be a problem.

My Team

So, let's have a look at my team.

I'm well hedged on City with Semenyo and Foden in there. Can they cover Haaland? Probably not when taking captaincy into account. Almost certainly if captaincy is taken out of the equation.

It's interesting that their combined cost matches Haaland's single price.

I've also had O'Reilly in drafts at times. However, I don't like the uncertainty over his starts. On top of this, I think the easiest way to get Haaland in GW3 is to downgrade Fernandes to a cheap mid to upgrade Isak. So it's probably worth keeping that third spot free.

I have three Arsenal, which pleases me. Tzolis feels like one of those picks where a new player arrives in the Premier League and everyone gets excited. Then they fail to live up to the hype. I really liked the look of him in the Community Shield game though, and his goal involvement track record is pretty spectacular - albeit in foreign leagues (we've seen similar things before - Timo Werner springs to mind).  So my expectations are low and I see it as a fun little punt.

My Bench

My bench is very cheap - in classic FPL mode. With so many people bench boosting early it feels like a little luxury having a super cheap bench.

As I've noted before, I plan on saving the chips and using them on the fly as things unfold.

There's a high possibility that I could be wildcarding in GW3 if the Haaland decision proves to be a disaster. Which could in turn trigger a bench boost. Though that doesn't appeal to me. I'd rather use it later.

It's even less likely I'll be using the free hit early, as I don't like using it in the first five or six weeks. Mainly because I think it loses you a tempo. I'm using tempo in the chess sense - not that I'm a particularly good chess player. That is, it costs you a move early in the game when getting your pieces positioned on the board is important. If you use the free hit you don't get a free transfer for that particular week. So after four or five weeks you've had one less free transfer than everyone else. At a time when transfers are really important as you adapt to the new information those early weeks provide. (This is assuming you haven't wildcarded early, making it irrelevant anyway. Hence if I need a chip in GW3 it'll be the wildcard for this very reason.)

So that's where I am. Now it's just a case of (hopefully) enjoying the weekend.

As I finish up the one change I'm considering is a Gabriel captaincy. Hull do look like they'll be the whipping boys, but will they get thrashed at home on the opening day of the season? Surely they'll be a bit fired up for it. Likewise, will Coventry score away from home at Arsenal?

Plus, I'm off work today, but in over the weekend. So I'll get to watch this Arsenal game tonight. Why not truly roll the dice and go differential?

..Okay, let's do it.