FPL GW3

This week I will keep the preview short, and I’ll explain why below. The message is basically to avoid making transfers if (almost) at all possible.

This GW probably has the highest penalty of using a transfer. I don’t think we will have another gap between GWs where we will foresee so much information coming to us.

Transfer deadline is coming, and we are still unsure how everything will play out. Isak, JSL, Wissa are great examples - and they affect other assets such as Ekitike and Thiago. On top of that, there will certainly be other transfers that we are not yet aware of.

International break may also cause some chaos with injuries.

Remaining flexible to act on these opportunities is highly valuable and one of the reasons I was tempted to plan my WC for GW4 this season. As an example, I planned for being able to get Mbeumo in the case Toney left Brentford last season. We all know how that went, and I was able to pick up a lot of points before he became a bandwagon. Who that might be may wait for next GW.

Onto the big questions:

  1. Saka - sell unless you can find a creative plan to keep for GW7

  2. JSL - probably just hold, will be a good asset at WOL and likely won’t be a terrible asset if he leaves, so you can slowly work him out

  3. Palmer - requires more than just a comment, see below

We don’t know for sure if Palmer will play GW4, but it seems more likely than not with Maresca’s comments. While it can be tempting to sell, you should remember it’s the cost of 2 transfers. The likelihood of him costing more for you if he is not in your team GW9-12 than a GW3 benching is high.

Also, the direct replacements are honestly not amazing. The best single GW ones are Cunha/Mbeumo (assuming you own Bruno, if not you made a mistake earlier and should just get Bruno), and while fine this GW, the long term appeal is not good enough in my opinion.

If anything I like it better as a double move - get in Sarr/Semenyo and upgrade somewhere else. But that will mean dropping your entire transfer bank right before we get a lot of information, and I don’t think that’s worth it.

I’ve come to the conclusion to stick with Palmer and would recommend the same unless you can’t field 11 (somewhat reasonable) players. That is, if it requires Guiu in your XI, you should consider selling paths.

That should be the main issues covered - performance levels and form is still to early to conclude anything about.

My own team has had an amazing start even factoring in that I have used both bench boost and wildcard. I did play around with using FH this gameweek and just have Palmer back, and it is not terrible I must say. Although, my pre planned FH6 still comes out better especially when adding a long term perspective.

I will be rolling my single free transfer. Palmer in the XI, you know, just in case, but basically accepting I will have double Arsenal defence against Liverpool.

The season is long, and you can’t have 38 fantastic GWs. Just make sure the bad ones don’t ruin your season. That will be my mentality going into this weekend.

Good luck out there!