The week in Fantasy Premier League: Paying the penalty - How to recover from a disastrous Gameweek 8
From five Aguero goals to Southampton's 8-0 thrashing of Sunderland, GW 8 has become something of a turning point recent seasons. That mini-tradition of big scores came crashing down in spectacular style this season, courtesy of some high-profile penalty misses.
Well, the good news is that even if you’ve had a terrible gameweek, most of your rivals had too!
I have Benteke, Aguero(C), Son, Dawson and Snodgrass. Total points 0. #FPL
— fplbro (@fplbro) October 15, 2016
So where do you do from here? Is it time to dump those former favourites who let you down last week, and before that? Let’s take a look...
Sergio Aguero
VIDEO: Steckelenburg coming off his line before Aguero takes his penalty. By rule, a yellow & a retake #MCFC: pic.twitter.com/DIjduiroaf
— American Cityzens (@AmericaCityzens) October 15, 2016
After being given the armband by 24% of unfortunate managers, the Man City marksman was public enemy number 1 this week.
9,605 of you triple-captained Sergio Aguero this weekend...
— Fantasy Premier League (@OfficialFPL) October 15, 2016
That's a total score of -3 points 😬 pic.twitter.com/QQqnzLTV5e
Pep Guardiola can deny it all he wants, but you don’t bench your go-to goalscorer in a Champions League tie without good reason.
All is not right with the Argentine, and it looks like he’s playing through a minor calf injury. A 90% fit Aguero is still better than most, but suddenly he doesn’t seem his usual all-conquering self.
It would take a brave manager to sell him at this early stage, but I would keep the captain’s armband off him until we know more.
That feeling when you're part of the 44% of #FPL managers who captained Ibrahimovic (1pt) or Aguero (-1pt) in Gameweek 8 pic.twitter.com/m1O15yJJMT
— Fantasy Premier League (@OfficialFPL) October 17, 2016
Zlatan Ibrahimovic
Zlatan, Zlatan - where did it all gone wrong?
Fantasy managers are shipping the Swede out in their droves and after just five points in the last three gameweeks, and who could blame them?
This is one case where the underlying stats (goal attempts especially) can be misleading - you can see his trademark swagger is on the wane.
Get rid. He may yet recapture his ‘essential’ status, but it doesn’t look like happening any time soon. And that £11.4m could almost buy you two Charlie Austins!
Michail Antonio
After urging fantasy managers to keep the faith last week, I must admit that three blanks in a row means time is running out for the West Ham striker/winger/wing-back/defender.
With Bilic shunting him around the pitch on every tactical whim, is it any wonder the England prospect is struggling to find his rhythm?
He’s still returning decent stats, even hitting the post against Palace, but that £7.1m pricetag isn’t looking as appealing as it once did.
If you can cash him in for Theo Walcott (ARS 7.9m) - do it. Otherwise, see how he gets on against a woeful Sunderland side this week.
Raheem Sterling
Blanks against Spurs and Everton have seen over 150,000 fantasy managers give the pacy winger his marching orders, no doubt to make room for the cheaper, in-form
That’s understandable, but I can see a lot of needless scrambling to get him back as soon as his next double-digit points return comes around, which you’d presume will happen by GW11 at the latest when Man City host welcome lowly Middlesbrough to the Etihad.
Save yourself a transfer and keep him in your team.
Heung-Min Son
A massive 43-point in four matches saw an army of fantasy managers snap up the South Korean last week, only for him to repay that faith with a blank.
He could yet reward the 545,569 who brought him in for GW8, but there was always an element of “chasing points” with this move.
With pencilled in for a GW11 return, there’s some uncertainty around the Spurs line-up. Chalk this one up to experience and move on.
Christian Benteke
That ugly -1 return doesn’t look pretty, but the big Belgian remains the singular focus of Crystal Palace’s cross-happy attacking strategy and is joint-top with for shots inside the box in the last four gameweeks (14).
His awkward £7.7m pricetag means he has no natural replacement - any change will mean a fairly radical shake-up of your team.
If he’s your third striker, it’s hard to argue against switching to Austin and banking the cash. If he’s your second striker, you could upgrade to or if you have the funds, but you probably have bigger fish to fry. Hold for a while.
The Differentials
It’s still too early in the season to get too jittery, but if you’re the nervous type, there are some good differential prospects emerging - if you’re brave enough to gamble on them.
: It’s been a stop-start season for the Spurs attacker so far, but he’s back on the scoresheet and that’s a tempting pricetag for a player of his potential.
: Stoke are on the comeback trail and have great fixtures to boot. With five shots inside the box since GW5, he offers decent attacking threat, too.
: Currently just 9.4% owned, if you want to hop off Sanchez or Aguero, look no further than the man (penalty miss and all).
: Not exactly a secret anymore, but still only owned by just 3.2% and his prodigious attacking stats will only see that figure rise.
Is Joe Allen the new Etienne Capoue?
After blanking in the last three gameweeks, has finally started looking like the 4.5m enabler he began the season as. Is now leading us down a similar garden path?
The true FPL stattos out there were warning for some time that Capoue’s points returns were unsustainable, and they were right. Joe Allen’s numbers and average pitch position offer more encouragement.
Capoue OUT, Allen IN is a popular transfer for GW9
— Fantasy Football Fix (@FantasyFootyFix) October 18, 2016
Here we look at attacking stats from the last 4 GW’shttps://t.co/b56MrVw0fW pic.twitter.com/IQSZq6Sn0x
But can either really be considered as long-term options for your all-important fourth midfielder spot? Probably not. So what should you do?
Well, you could replace Capoue with Allen and probably pick up a few more points over the season, if you really have nothing better to do with that free transfer.
You could cash in, bank that Capoue profit and revert to a traditional, ever-present, boring-as-hell cheap enabler like or .
Or you could just hold on to the Watford man, who you hopefully bought for around £4.5m anyway. He’s still a decent attacking threat and will be an able deputy when the dreaded Christmas squad rotation kicks in.
BUY
is the obvious must-buy this week, he’s a £9m+ player that actually only costs £7.9m, if you look at it that way.
Less obvious, perhaps, is the urgent need for Liverpool coverage. There’s not many certainties in FPL, but falling behind if you don’t have a good Liverpool attacking midfielder in your team over the next few weeks is as close as you’ll get to one.
Planning ahead?
— Fantasy Football Fix (@FantasyFootyFix) October 20, 2016
Liverpool are projected to have best Attack & Defence potential in the next 10 GW’shttps://t.co/J2p8XbbaRq pic.twitter.com/g5pgS4XpCM
TRY
Usually operating as either a number 10 or a ‘false 9’, the Icelander can be a reliable source of points when he gets going, and the new-manager factor seems to be spurring him on.
GOODBYE
Zlatan, Mata, Rashford, Rooney … take your pick. None of them look like doing much at the moment if they can get on the pitch in the first place.
QUICK TIP
This says it better than I can, really.
If your player is currently on a 4th YC, picks up his 5th YC in #GW9 and has league cup action next week, he won't miss out on #GW10!#FPL pic.twitter.com/yOKNpBI9Hq
— Chief @FPLHints (@FPLHints) October 20, 2016
Top of the League
A respectable GW 8 score of 49 keeps ’s ‘Elegantly wasted’ side top of - just! An unlikely 71-point haul from has him just three points behind.
If you’re not in contention yet, don’t despair. It’s a marathon, not a sprint (at least that’s what I keep telling myself!).
