FPL | Chips and drafts

The new season is upon us.

This is my favorite time of the year. Strategizing, planning, analyzing players and teams.

While a lot of analytics managers bury themselves in minutes and solver settings, my approach is a bit different. I try to zoom out and understand the bigger picture. Fixture schedules, European involvement, information cliffs, perceived team strengths an so forth.

Solvers and predictions will not handle everything for you, but they are great tools to enable you in creating the best possible FPL team for you.

We didn't see many changes this season, and the bonus changes have minimal impact. Don't get confused with certain players changing heavily in actual bonus points if you recalculate last season. The expected changes in bonus for any player was not very high, and the impact on predicted points will be minor.

Chip strategy

Chips are a big part of the game and we have all four available for the first half of the season. Here is a short breakdown of when I believe they are best utilized.

Triple captain

- GW16 is the highest predicted points (Haaland against Hull at home)

- GW3 and GW7 Haaland plays the two other promoted sides at home

- Bruno GW2 is an option as well as GW14

Any other strategy will come with greater risk, but there is not much to loose from the triple captain, so if you fancy something special, go ahead.

I'm not locked, but I'm open to using it GW3 if Haaland and City are flying in GW1 and GW2.

Otherwise I may just hold it for GW16 (or GW14 if Haaland is injured) with an extremely unlikely option that we get a double gameweek before Christmas.

Bench boost

GW1.

That is maybe a bit provocative, but in my opinion there is no reason to get creative here.

If you're on an early wildcard strategy, you want to use it to get optimal structure on the wildcard, which likely involves a 4.5 forward.

If you're looking for later wildcard strategies, there is a good overlap between good long term holds and good or decent GW1 fixtures.

Maximizing the bench boost in isolation may come at greater cost in the starting XI in the same or other weeks.

Free Hit

This one is hard as we usually let blanks or doubles dictate this chip, and we don't have that.

Some options:

- GW3 to avoid Arsenal/Chelsea

- GW4 to maximize Chelsea for only one week and avoid Manchester Derby

- GW12 to avoid Arsenal/City

- GW14 to allow non-Bruno teams to captain him in the middle of a poor fixture run

I like an open approach to this chip and potentially use it to pull a "Spaceman" (@FPL_Spaceman on X) who used his free hit to take out Haaland in a gameweek he was injured to then have Marmoush and captain him. This requires a lot of monitoring in general, so I would only advise this strategy for engaged managers.

Wildcard

This one is tough and dictates your GW1 draft a lot.

I'm seeing different approaches and have not completely settled myself.

- GW2 -> Do a BB on a "free hit", which I did last season

- GW3 -> Maximize bench boost and no Haaland in GW1/2, get City in GW3

- GW4 -> Avoid Chelsea initially and bring them in before Hull at home (captaincy is crucial this GW)

- GW5/7 -> Restructure a non-Haaland team (with FH3)

- Late -> Stay open and flexible in case of an unforeseen event (cancellations due to weather for example) or information about future fixture changes

One thing to remember is to not lock yourself out of chip usage. An example is a locked FH or WC in GW3 will not allow you to TC Haaland in GW3. This does not mean it's bad, just something to have in mind and settle mentally before FOMO may hit you in GW3.

Draft examples

Three drafts with three wildcard windows:

- GW2

- GW3

- Unplanned

They're all bench boost in GW1 and open regarding free hit and triple captain.

They're all examples as there are plenty of options for each of the different strategies. An example could be Szoboszlai, who could easily be in either of these three drafts if you fancy him.

Wildcard 2

Essentially the Free Hit Bench Boost synergy.

Disclaimer - your wildcard is gone and the transfer window is open. This requires picking very safe players on your wildcard. This may not be bad as it will also make your team more durable in the long run.

I like the triple stacks in defense with high offensive upside. Mosquera is probably safer than Calafiori.

Wildcard 3

Maximizing the early value of United fixtures and the value of cheaper Arsenal defenders. Wildcarding with the transfer window closed removes some uncertainty and it's a good window to get Haaland into the team.

We are still very unsure of the actual strength of teams as our sample is small.

Wildcard Unplanned

This team should get you to GW5 without using transfers and then assess from there without sacrificing too much value of the bench boost.

You're not maximizing the Arsenal defenders or the United players apart from Bruno, but you're not paying the price of your wildcard either.

If you're confident of a start for Walle Egeli in GW1, you can start with optimal structure and still bench boost for a small sacrifice of projected points early on but a lot of tools to win that back in the future.