The World Cup is not that far away, in case you hadn’t heard. We will be bringing you plenty of content for that, but – for the time being – how about checking out our piece on when World Cup Fantasy will begin?
In the meantime, we still have a few weeks to go in Fantasy Premier League. Read on to get a quick moan about my wildcard (again), my top talking points from the weekend, and a review of all of Gameweek 14’s matches. Finally, I’ll talk about what I’m thinking about for my moves.
More Wildcard Regrets
Fresh off the back of an awful first week for my wildcard team (detailed here), the lads delivered again and got me my worst gameweek rank of the season. Brilliant.
It’s a tough year, and I think prices have a lot to do with it. Normally we max out our budget – that’s sort-of the point – but you could go significantly less than your budget and get the highest-scoring team at the moment. That’s a psychological block for me and others, that I just need to get over.
Top Gameweek 14 Talking Points
Here are the most impactful events from FPL Gameweek 14.
Fo-done
I’m done with him.
He’s gonna stay in my team until the World Cup, but I fell into the same trap I do every year. Foden turns up, delivers some points, and makes me think he is worth it over De Bruyne for the price-saving. But, he’s not. Because he can just get benched for no reason. Like he does every year.
Sigh.
Kane You Believe It?
He blanked. After me banging on about how consistent he, he decided to mock me personally and blank.
I’ve seen a lot of people dissatisfied on Twitter about him, but I don’t think there is any need to worry here. Spurs look crap in general, but Kane is performing well regardless. It’s only a couple of weeks until the World Cup, so I can’t see any reason why you wouldn’t hold him. I can’t imagine he’s the biggest problem in your team anyway, so focus on whatever that is instead.
Tripp-le up on Newcastle?
Trippier is obviously in everyone’s team, and if you don’t have him by now, just get him.
Almiron is the soupe de jour, so getting him is also fine. It’s confusing because he’s too cheap and he’s never been this good, but just getting him in based on his current form – and not worrying about the rest – feels great.
Elsewhere, Wilson seems to be the most logical replacement for Toney this week. Maybe we should just have three Newcastle in all our teams.
FPL Gameweek 14 – Every Match Reviewed
| Brighton – 4 | 1 – Chelsea |
| Trossard looks amazing. So full of confidence, and back to playing out of position as a striker. 1.49 xGI for the weekend is the second-best of all FPL players.
| Defensively they struggled against the press, were bad at getting the second ball, and gave away far too many chances. Kepa went off injured at half time. Annoyingly, for wildcarders such as myself. Auba still not starting.
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| Liverpool – 1 | 2 – Leeds |
| Shocking back pass by Gomez gives away the first goal. He’s not looked good since coming back, apart from one performance against City. Pool defence is a hard avoid with the 6th highest xGC in the week. Salah returned, scoring after he was left open in the box on a second cross. He looked lively at times, but still far from his old FPL self. Nunez definitely could have had a goal, but is still failing to impress.
| Rodrigo an intriguing choice, but it’s the opportunity cost of who you miss out on. |
| Spurs – 3 | 2 – Bournemouth |
| No Perisic in the starting XI. Despite his return, I still don’t like him as an option because of the minutes. | Despite two goals this weekend, Moore is not worth considering. His xG was 0.45 and that was probably his best performance of the season. |
| Newcastle – 4 | 0 – Aston Villa |
| Wilson was brilliant. 1.89xG for the game. Seems to me that he is the Toney replacement you want. Almiron once again overperformed his stats, but had quite a few shots and obviously delivered a goal plus a fantasy assist by winning the pen. Trippier had another good defensive performance. Actually, he had the best defensive performance of the weekend in FPL. | Martinez off on 35 minutes after an apparent concussion. Currently unclear that he will be back for the next game, but it’s possible. Defensively poor, which I guess this might be a part of as all four goals were scored after Emi went off. Basically offered nothing going forward. That said, there’s plenty of intrige around Unai Emery’s appointment, which we wrote about here. |
| Leicester City – 0 | 1 – Man City |
| Not much on offer in attack, but pretty good in defence considering the opposition. | Haaland’s fever was gone but his foot was still hurting, so he missed the game. One to watch this week. Incredible free kick goal from De Bruyne. Shows the value of set pieces and owning the best player in the team regardless of price. Foden came off the bench for an annoying one pointer (see above).
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| Crystal Palace – 1 | 0 – Southampton |
| Doucoure injured. Once again, not a fan of Zaha out wide. An assist to the assister this weekend, but I still can’t wait to get rid of him. Edouard has 8 of his 9 goals at home. | The most boring FPL team of all time? Defensively they’re alright, but better defences out there. Not much going forward. Adams had the sixth highest xGI for the weekend, but poor finishing prevented him from scoring.
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| Brentford – 1 | 1 – Wolves |
| Toney got booked so is now on five yellows and suspended for next week. He could have had a goal and was 15th highest for xG in outfield players. Mee showed his skills as a target on set pieces. | Maybe the second-most boring FPL team, now their defence isn’t even that solid. Classic Neves goal. Great hit from outside the box. Costa suspended after showing his hilarious lack of composure again.
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| Everton – 0 | Fulham – 0 |
| DCL should have scored – possibly a bit rusty still. | Mitrovic was the biggest threat as always. Bit lucky to get a clean. |
| Arsenal – 5 | 0 – Forest |
| An expected dominant performance from Arsenal. From that early goal, we knew it was going to be a demolition job. Saka got the first assist but went off injured after 26 minutes. He tried to play on after taking a hit, but looked in pain. Possibly won’t be risked now, with the World Cup so close. One to watch. Reiss Nelson took Saka’s place for his first PL appearance of the season, and grabbed all the FPL points. Don’t think he is worth considering outside of a deep draft league, and even then only for a couple of weeks. Martinelli got the first goal and looked generally dangerous. He’s still must-own. 3rd highest xGI for the weekend for Jesus, but some pretty awful finishing. Can definitely see myself going back to him after the World Cup. Partey’s goal was amazing but not very repeatable, and he’s not much of an FPL asset. Second lowest xGC for the weekend. What we have come to expect, but this wasn’t exactly difficult opposition.
| Williams missed out again. Lodi looks like the first-choice left-back. Nothing really worth talking about from this lot but actually only the third worst defensive performance according to xGC (2.30). Congrats to them!
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| Manchester United – 1 | 0 – West Ham United |
| Ronaldo back in the starting XI, annoyingly for Rashford owners. Rashford still looked like the main man though, and got a goal. Far from an excellent attacking performance, but they did get the job done. Pretty solid at the back too (even with Maguire), but don’t forget that Dalot has 4 yellow cards.
| Fabianksi appeared to get injured, and went off at half time. Bowen once again the main threat for points |
My Moves
As you can see, I have four flagged players, which is exactly what you want to see just after you wildcard…
I knew Toney was at risk of getting his fifth yellow card, and decided to keep him anyway because of his form.
I also knew Haaland might not start, but it’s concerning that he didn’t even make the squad. Fingers crossed he comes back soon, otherwise I could have made a very rogue but ultimately great move to go without him until the World Cup. Now though, I can’t see me wasting the value that’s trapped in him (I could sell him for 11.8, but would have to pay 12.2 to get him back) unless we hear that he is certainly out.
Saka injury – I’m waiting for news before considering a move there. Kepa can stay put and just go on the bench. and I’ll play Guaita for now, which I probably would have done anyway given Chelsea play Arsenal.
Basically, it’s a lot of wait and see for me. Toney is almost certainly gone for Wilson, but I have two free transfers and won’t decide exactly what to do with the other transfer until Friday evening/Saturday morning. Follow us on Twitter and I’ll likely update there.