FPL Wrapped - Our Teams

Welcome back to another instalment of FPL Wrapped. Today, we will be revealing each of our latest drafts, discussing chip strategy, and helping you with your FPL team names. Make sure to join our mini-league too, £250 to the winner!

Table of Contents

• Join our mini-league! £250 to the winner 💰

  • Harry's Team

  • Ross's Team

  • Oscar's Team

  • Chip Strategy

  • Team Names

  • Final Thoughts

Here is my current 1st Draft! I have to admit being on honeymoon I haven’t tinkered as much as previous seasons but I’m pretty happy with the structure for early pre-season.

In goal, I’ve gone with Sanchez and a £4.0m. Sanchez looks set to be Chelsea’s main number 1 this season and there is not much upside in the defenders at Chelsea unless you pay for Cucurella so I like him as a set and forget option for those opening fixtures.

In defence I’ve gone with Gvardiol. I have only gone with one premium option so far and with Liverpool and Arsenal’s opening fixtures I’m not sure I want to start with them. Gvardiol even at CB will get some defensive contributions as well as having attacking threat.

Then 3x £4.5m defenders to rotate in De Cuyper, Konsa and Wan-Bissaka. A combination of attacking threat, good fixtures as well as some defensive contribution potential although these 3 do not rank that highly for the metric. I am wondering about Van De Ven, Udogie, Aina and N. Williams as well given their fixtures to start.

In midfield I have gone with the Salah - Palmer - Wirtz combination. I want as many pieces of the Chelsea puzzle as possible given their fixtures they have to start the season. I haven’t currently gone for anyone else like Neto or Joao Pedro as I’m not completely certain on their minutes and I know Palmer will be reliable. However, I have to admit at the end last season I felt pretty sure Palmer would not be in my GW1 team but here we are!

Salah feels self explanatory and I like Wirtz price, although I am also considering Marmoush and Odegaard in here for some Arsenal or Manchester City “cover”. The final midfielder is the popular Ndiaye who combines good fixtures, potential for clean sheet +1s at Everton, with good attacking numbers at the end of last season, scoring twice in their final home game as well as being on penalties. There are a number of options here I like in Kudus, Sarr and Enzo Fernandez and pre-season form and minutes may dictate this pick more.

Finally, upfront Watkins and Solanke are in for good reliability of minutes and both have a long term good run of fixtures. The final option is Welbeck. With no Joao Pedro he should lead the line at the start of the season although I would prefer Joao Pedro now of Chelsea in this position!

In terms of captaincy I plan on GW1 - Salah, GW2 - Palmer and GW3 - Palmer.

Oscar and Harry will make some excellent points about the players they have chosen, but I’d like to instead focus more of my limited words on the dreaded bench boost (chip strategy section later for more details on wildcard and free hit)…

I have experimented a lot with various drafts and structures over the past few days. One thing is for sure though, I am EXTREMELY tempted by Bench Boost in GW1 - and as of right now, I currently have the chip active (don’t worry, you can cancel it before the GW1 deadline).

The thought process behind that and why I am strongly considering it:

• You can build a strong enough bench without massively sacrificing the XI.

• You can make unlimited changes for free before the deadline (no need for transfers or hits).

• When I wildcard later in GW7 or GW13, I want to be able to have all of my money in the starting XI (I probably want Haaland and Salah).

It isn’t a perfect strategy, but it is certainly viable. Massive shoutout to Pras for his excellent video on The FPL Wire this week discussing the BB1, WC13 strategy. I recommend checking it out.

In terms of the players, a lot of them speak for themselves, but in particular the new additions that I am warming to are Rogers and Anderson in midfield. Another shoutout, this time to Baker343 from Above Average FPL. He wrote an article discussing Anderson, who might provide us with a set piece taking, defensive contributions (DC) monster at only £5.5m. Last season, he would have picked up DC points in 54.6% of his games, accruing an additional 36 points. With Elanga out of the picture, he is likely to gain more set piece duty too. A great, cheap pick!

And Rogers feels like a case of being ignored because he’s had a price rise and is not a shiny new toy (in comparison to a Kudus at Spurs, for example) - I am guilty of this too! But he managed 19 returns last season, and I can only guess that he will have a good chance of beating that this year. We also love an xMins monster, especially early doors when you naturally pick up lots of issues in your team.

I am sure this draft will change a lot over the coming days, so I will update you all in the next newsletter.

Here’s where I’m at with my latest team. In goal Sanchez, who looks to have cemented himself as Chelsea's #1. Including most recently at the Club World Cup he started all but one game, when Jorgensen started against Tunisian side Esperance, and 3 days before they played Benfica with Sanchez back in goal. 47.97 xGC ranked fifth best last season, they conceded the third fewest goals, fourth fewest shots conceded.

Double Arsenal defence who ranked best for xGC, who in theory could improve further with the likes of Zubimendi joining. I'm conscious of being flexible when it comes to defensive contribution points and who the best picks are now, the likes of Tarkowski, Milenkovic, Bednarek would have got the most last season because teams get at them more than the likes of Gabriel, Van Dijk, Gvardiol who also cost more.

Saka and Palmer my midfield premium duo, Saka looks the best captain in GW2 for LEE (H). What impact will Gyokeres’s arrival have on him? Does he keep pen duties?

Palmer has been playing down the right a bit more including at the Club World Cup, where he got 3G 3A in total, is he back? Let's discuss Enzo then, I've not seen him in many drafts and he's quite a data driven pick. I love a home fixture for GW1 which he's got, and comparing the 6.5m midfielders last season Mitoma and Sarr were the only two with a higher expected goal involvement. Often plays as Chelsea's #10, with Caicedo and James or Lavia sitting deep, perhaps plays a 10 more consistently if Palmer shifts to the right side. The fixtures are quite reasonable as well.

7m feels a bit steep for Rogers especially when only last season we got to enjoy his 5m price tag, though what I love about him is Emery always starts him and basically always gives him 90 minutes. He's an absolute beast when it comes to fitness and physicality, and I'm expecting him to make the 2026 world cup squad. 37 out of 38 starts last season, 19 returns so just over every other game on average, plus a nice long term fixture run. He feels like a slot in the team that can be left and won't have to worry about him.

Up front there's been a big shuffle, Salah’s out and Haaland’s in. On the one hand no one from Liverpool is a big scare, but on the other I've managed to squeeze in three premiums instead of two with Saka, Palmer and Haaland.

You can delude yourself with questions like how will Salah get on with all these changes to the team, Trent was pivotal behind him, a new striker Ekitike, Wirtz joining and so on. Let’s be honest, I'm fully expecting Salah to have an incredible season regardless, he doesn't look like slowing down just yet so it's scary to go without someone over 50% owned who will be heavily captained in GW1. Can the Palmer - Saka - Haaland trio make up for whatever he does though? Saka is arguably the best captain in the game in GW2 when Arsenal are home to Leeds so that's a factor the Salah + Palmer drafts don't provide.

Leeds have just signed new GK Perri which could be the end of Darlow as the only 4m GK option, hopefully one emerges over pre-season. If we find one we’ll be sure to let you know. 🤝

My favourite 4m defenders are Esteve and Bijol, the latter very slept on because he’s suspended for GW1 and therefore red flagged. You wouldn’t want to play a 4m defender like these in any gameweek if you can help it anyway so GW1 is no issue!

Need an FPL team name? Here's a hundred.

• 360 No Pope

• Alisson Wonderland

• AutoGlasner Replace

• Ayew Kidding Mee?

• Back of the Neto

• Barco-loan-a

• Bednawreck

• Beef Cherki

• Ben is not Mee

• Bowen Arrow

• Can't Get Any Wirtz

• Charli xGx

• Chicken Tikka Mo Salah

• Cleverley named

• Could Be Wirtz

• Count Doku

• Ctrl+Alt+DeLigt

• Dango Unchained

• DeLap Dance

• Don't look back in Elanga

• Drop It Like It's Slot

• Elanga Management

• Endo the Line

• Eze Come, Eze Go

• Eze Game Eze Life

• Fee Fi Foden

• GIROUD SANDSTORM

• Gyok Tuah

• Hall Cunha Mateta

• Hawk Tuanzebe

• I Baleba Can Fly

• I'm Eric the Port

• Ings Can Only Get Better

• Isak Newton

• It's A Disasister

• It's Football Not Saka

• Kai Another Day

• Kai Me A River

• KanteGetAnyWorse

• Kinder Mbeumo

• Krafting Table

• Krul Sommer

• Lavia and Leave Ya

• Live Fast Ndiaye Young

• Livin' Lavia Loca

• Lord of the Ings

• Minteh Fresh

• My Own Wirtz Nightmare

• Never in Doughty

• Nice to Michu

• Ninja Skrtels

• No More Mr Rice Kai

• On Porro'd Time

• Ødeparfum

• Pain in Dias

• Palmer Chameleon

• Palmer Violets

• Paqueta Crisps

• Parker the Bus

• Peaky Reijnders

• Petr Cech Yourself

• Pienaar Pants

• Pinky and De Bruyne

• Pjanic at the Isco

• Raya Sunshine

• Rutter Woke Nonsense

• Saka Potatoes

• Salah-vating

• ShutTheFACup

• Snoop Udogie Dog

• SonKane Ship

• Squidwirtz

• Stone Cole Steve Palmer

• Swedish Scouse Mafia

• The Floor is Lavia

• The Wirtz Is Yet To Come

• Thomas the Frank Engine

• Ugarte Be Kidding Me

• VictorDelap

• Wirtz Case Scenario

• Wirtz Team Ever

• Witness Mee!

• xGesus

• You Hwang?

• You Konate Do That

• You're a Wissa Harry

• Yoro Raya Sunshine

• Yoro Wizard Lenny

• Zirkzee and I Know It!

• Zubimental FC