FPL - The numbers game

My first complete season of FPL has been freakish to say the least. I’ll elaborate with a very recent example. I stuck with Bolasie for weeks on end and he repaid my faith by scoring a hat-trick for Palace. Low ownership differential and I was “bubbling high”. Last weekend, I transferred Mane after having in my team for many weeks and he scored the fastest hat-trick in premier league history. It left me “absolutely low on spirits”.  One could look at stats all week long until the eyes gouge out and still end the game week looking like a fool! In other words, nothing is guaranteed.

From the very beginning, I didn’t want to let vagaries of fate decide my FPL destiny. I realised that form, class, good run, bad run, easy fixtures, tough fixtures, home records, away records, injuries, suspensions, player combinations are all interdependent variables that make or break your game week. Therefore, I authored two highly complex (supposedly ingenious!) spreadsheets over countless hours to help me with FPL. 

After the hard labour, all that I could manage after 37 weeks was the occasional dabble around the 800K mark before finally resting below 1.2 million peeved managers. When one considers that there are approximately 1.5 million “season long” active managers out of the total 3.5 million managers, one realises how poor the season has been. 

Last week, while reading this engaging interview with FPL Manager Abu Bakar Siddiq (he was World No. 2 at the time of the interview), something else caught my attention - the total points scored by the winner of FPL this season (Simon March) - he was on 2,427. 

I asked myself – why am I lagging so far behind? After all, I had fair knowledge of the game, teams and players. What can I do differently next season so that I am at least “in the race” rather than being an “also ran”? I decided on the following strategy: 

-          Zero hits (why lose those hard earned points?)

-          Limited substitutions (why sub and regret?)

-          Stick with best players (why not retain players who give the best returns over the football season?)

The third point seemed key to everything. Once you have the best players, you have fewer substitutions to make and therefore lesser hits. Virtues such as patience, wisdom and the ability to control the urge to change cannot be disregarded.

To test my theory, I checked the overall Dream Team (GW37) from the FPL website (see below). The team average is 181 points and if you consider that as the Captain’s (double) score, the overall team score comes to 2168 (1987 + 181).

Not a bad score, right? However, this team has 4 Chelsea players and therefore invalid. 

Dream team
Name	Team	Position	Points	Cost
Ivanovic	CHE	DEF	177	7.70
Terry	CHE	DEF	175	7.00
Jagielka	EVE	DEF	141	5.80
Hazard	CHE	MID	226	11.10
Sanchez	ARS	MID	202	11.50
Silva	MCI	MID	188	9.60
Fabregas	CHE	MID	165	9.20
Aguero	MCI	FWD	210	12.80
Kane	TOT	FWD	184	6.20
Austin	QPR	FWD	170	6.20
Mignolet	LIV	GLK	149	5.40
Total			1987	92.50
Captain			181
Final score			2168

I tried all the possible combinations (in the order of most points scored) and found two of them to be valid:

4-3-3 (Valid)

Name	Team	Position	Points	Cost
Ivanovic	CHE	DEF	177	7.70
Terry	CHE	DEF	175	7.00
Clyne	SOU	DEF	141	6.00
Jagielka	EVE	DEF	141	5.80
Hazard	CHE	MID	226	11.10
Sanchez	ARS	MID	202	11.50
Silva	MCI	MID	188	9.60
Aguero	MCI	FWD	210	12.80
Kane	TOT	FWD	184	6.20
Austin	QPR	FWD	170	6.20
Mignolet	LIV	GLK	149	5.40
Total			1963	89.30
Captain			178
Final score			2141

3-4-3 (Invalid)

Name	Team	Position	Points	Cost
Ivanovic	CHE	DEF	177	7.70
Terry	CHE	DEF	175	7.00
Clyne	SOU	DEF	141	6.00
Hazard	CHE	MID	226	11.10
Sanchez	ARS	MID	202	11.50
Silva	MCI	MID	188	9.60
Fabregas	CHE	MID	165	9.20
Aguero	MCI	FWD	210	12.80
Kane	TOT	FWD	184	6.20
Austin	QPR	FWD	170	6.20
Mignolet	LIV	GLK	149	5.40
Total			1987	92.70
Captain			181
Final score			2168

4-5-1 (Invalid)

Name	Team	Position	Points	Cost
Ivanovic	CHE	DEF	177	7.70
Terry	CHE	DEF	175	7.00
Clyne	SOU	DEF	141	6.00
Jagielka	EVE	DEF	141	5.80
Hazard	CHE	MID	226	11.10
Sanchez	ARS	MID	202	11.50
Silva	MCI	MID	188	9.60
Fabregas	CHE	MID	165	9.20
Henderson	LIV	MID	160	6.60
Aguero	MCI	FWD	210	12.80
Mignolet	LIV	GLK	149	5.40
Total			1934	92.70
Captain			176
Final score			2110

5-4-1 (Invalid)

Name	Team	Position	Points	Cost
Ivanovic	CHE	DEF	177	7.70
Terry	CHE	DEF	175	7.00
Clyne	SOU	DEF	141	6.00
Jagielka	EVE	DEF	141	5.80
Baines	EVE	DEF	139	7.10
Hazard	CHE	MID	226	11.10
Sanchez	ARS	MID	202	11.50
Silva	MCI	MID	188	9.60
Fabregas	CHE	MID	165	9.20
Aguero	MCI	FWD	210	12.80
Mignolet	LIV	GLK	149	5.40
Total			1913	93.20
Captain			174
Final score			2087

3-5-2 (Invalid)

Name	Team	Position	Points	Cost
Ivanovic	CHE	DEF	177	7.70
Terry	CHE	DEF	175	7.00
Clyne	SOU	DEF	141	6.00
Hazard	CHE	MID	226	11.10
Sanchez	ARS	MID	202	11.50
Silva	MCI	MID	188	9.60
Fabregas	CHE	MID	165	9.20
Henderson	LIV	MID	160	6.60
Aguero	MCI	FWD	210	12.80
Kane	TOT	FWD	184	6.20
Mignolet	LIV	GLK	149	5.40
Total			1977	93.10
Captain			180
Final score			2157

5-3-2 (Valid)

Name	Team	Position	Points	Cost
Ivanovic	CHE	DEF	177	7.70
Terry	CHE	DEF	175	7.00
Clyne	SOU	DEF	141	6.00
Jagielka	EVE	DEF	141	5.80
Baines	EVE	DEF	139	7.10
Hazard	CHE	MID	226	11.10
Sanchez	ARS	MID	202	11.50
Silva	MCI	MID	188	9.60
Aguero	MCI	FWD	210	12.80
Kane	TOT	FWD	184	6.20
Mignolet	LIV	GLK	149	5.40
Total			1932	90.20
Captain			176
Final score			2108

4-4-2 (Invalid)

Name	Team	Position	Points	Cost
Ivanovic	CHE	DEF	177	7.70
Terry	CHE	DEF	175	7.00
Clyne	SOU	DEF	141	6.00
Jagielka	EVE	DEF	141	5.80
Hazard	CHE	MID	226	11.10
Sanchez	ARS	MID	202	11.50
Silva	MCI	MID	188	9.60
Fabregas	CHE	MID	165	9.20
Aguero	MCI	FWD	210	12.80
Kane	TOT	FWD	184	6.20
Mignolet	LIV	GLK	149	5.40
Total			1958	92.30
Captain			178
Final score			2136

The two valid teams cost 89-90 million.  Substitutes should not cost more than 4 million each. All that is required is one player change from the team and then we should be able to accommodate all 15 players. 

That being said, there is no guarantee that the same set of players will shine next season but you get the point. That’s my two cents for this week – and if doesn’t work out for you next season – please forgive me (Bryan Adams, huh?).


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