Having reviewed some forward options yesterday and been unsatisfied with the outcome, today I'm going to analyse Midfield options with the view to shifting to a 3-5-2 formation for my team.
Fixtures Analysis
I begin by looking at my analysis of Expected Goals Against (xGA), Relative Fixture Difficulty and whether that fixture's home or away. I then apply a weighting (which is slowly learning) to correlate these values with the likelihood of that team's players appearing in the top players for that Gameweek. Budget will be a concern and I'll need enough money left over for a viable option as my 3rd forward. I may even consider a cheaper option who rotates well with Ivan Toney (or Emmanuel Dennis or Josh King who I didn't mention yesterday) and alternate between 3-5-2 and 3-4-3 (also giving me good cover for the inevitable squad rotation).
Options
So looking at all of the players who have had some involvement in the past 5 matches (i.e. Form > 0) and looking at players from Liverpool, Man City, Chelsea, Burnley and Arsenal, we can prioritise them as follows. I include data for minutes played, xG, xA which I then extrapolate an FPL score from and assign each player an indication of their Value (FPL score / Price). I also include per 90 stats.
It's no great surprise that Liverpool's front 3 are top of the list - if you don't already own Salah, delete your team.
I made the move on Jota a couple of weeks ago so I won't include him in my analysis and since I also have Trent Alexander-Arnold, Liverpool players are an option at all so I've got to exclude Mane. I should probably have done this before spending my time getting their stats but hopefully somebody reads this and finds their inclusion useful.
So we're looking at Gundogan (possible injury), Hudson-Odoi (rotation risk), Havertz (will lose his place in attack to Lukaku soon), Ziyech, Jorginho and Bernardo Silva.
This is almost as inspiring as the forward options assessed yesterday.
Rotation Options
I mentioned the possible option of rotating somebody with Ivan Toney or a Watford striker so let's see what teams my spreadsheet suggests...
Rotation with Toney
Liverpool, Man City, Chelsea and Burnley have already been looked at so I could perhaps consider Spurs and West Ham. Hudson-Odoi could be an option given his rotation risk - he seems to either start or not play which is good from an FPL point of view.
Rotation with Watford
This could perhaps provide a better route (more money to spend in Midfield too) and adds Man Utd and Leicester to the teams already mentioned.
If I'm looking at rotation with Toney, I've got a budget of £5.3m so it's Hudson-Odoi again. If I go as low as Emmanuel Dennis, then I've got £6.6m but West Ham's rotation doesn't fit with Watford so again, it's Hudson-Odoi.
So I don't know how helpful those additional options were.
Consistency
With the selection still far from decided (maybe 4-4-2 is the answer!!), let's see if any of the original options will consistently tick over for me, looking down to Bernardo Silva.
I feel like I'm getting nowhere fast.
My Thoughts
I hoped that by moving my attention to Midfielders, the answer would gift itself to me but the amount of rotation at the bigger clubs is proving to be a total nightmare. I do like Gundogan as an option and will perhaps wait for an injury update before making my decision.
Gudmundsson being a statistically better option than the much talked about Cornet at Burnley is also an interesting consideration.
This is too much for my fragile little mind to process. I'd love to hear your thoughts.
Please Share Your Thoughts
Please let me know what you think. Because I quite clearly don't have a clue!
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