Welcome back for another article. 📖
Who are the best players to buy for GW29?
It's a super quick turnaround so we've got less time to think over what to do, with a Tuesday deadline next. What do we do with Haaland? So fresh off the back of all the games we're going to break it down easy by position, the best players to buy this week.
🧤 Goalkeepers
Goalkeepers first and the best fixtures defensively are Everton home to Burnley, Liverpool away to Wolves, Arsenal away to Brighton. Alisson and Pickford are joint top this week. In Pickford's case they follow that Burnley game up with some horrendous fixtures so he's a hard avoid, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool in their next 5. Alisson looks great if you need a long term keeper or just for the next 3 or 4 games until wildcarding. Wolves, Spurs, Brighton, Fulham, Everton, Palace is Liverpool's run.
Kelleher missed last gameweek due to becoming a dad, no injury there which is good news and he's expected to return in goal next match for Bournemouth away.
What I'll do in the next couple players to buy articles is also touch on which players are top specifically up until GW31, given the popular chip strategy is shaping up as GW32 wildcard before double gameweek 33. We don't know yet who will double in GW33, that will be dictated by the FA Cup fifth round, 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th March is when the Prem teams play, so not too long and we can step our planning up a gear!
The top goalkeeper for the next 3 is actually a threeway tie between Kelleher, Leno and Alisson!
🛡️ Defenders
Moving on to defenders.
So yes, it's Tarkowski top given the Burnley home game though as we were saying with Pickford, avoid him as you won't want to play him in any fixtures after Burnley. If you're in a position where you already have him then you're in a great spot. The main transfer target as far as defenders is Van Dijk who has 2 goals and an assist in his last 3, he's the second most bought player around the world currently, with Ekitike #1.
Screenshot is from the top transfers tool.
The only other defender on the most bought list is O'Reilly who could be injured, we don't have an update yet. Andersen is the one who looks really appealing. I do recognise that Fulham don't keep lots of clean sheets, but their next 3 opponents, West Ham, Forest, Burnley rank 14th, 16th and 20th for non-penalty xG this season. Or for actual goals scored 14th, 19th and 16th. He's hit defcon points in 62% of games, 10.41 per 90 ranks fourth best among all defenders.
Andersen was absent from Fulham's squad in the game vs Spurs, Marco Silva said it was due to illness. So that's better than an injury at least, they play again on Wednesday so hopefully he's back for West Ham home midweek.
Van Dijk is #1 for projected points in the next 3, Andersen is just behind in second assuming he's over the illness for Wednesday's game. Senesi in third place is worth a mention, with Brentford home and Burnley away, then Man Utd home. The GW31 fixture isn't as appealing but he's clearly a strong pick, as is his 4.1m counterpart Hill.
If it's bad news on O'Reilly then Ait-Nouri could be even more appealing, he's settling in now, an 11 pointer last game, 9 pointer a couple games ago. It depends on whether your team has scope to add a player blanking in GW31 though. Some other defenders that rank well for the next 3 gameweeks, Van den Berg, Gudmundsson, Konate.