A week later and 8 changes to my team, a change in chip strategy as well, bench boost active for GW1. So let's discuss it all and I'll explain why the change of thinking.

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Let me get in to the team and goal Verbruggen.

🧤 Goalkeeper

• In goal Verbruggen comes in due to the pivot to the GW1 bench boost. Aston Villa home which isn't the best, but it's just about the best clean sheet odds available for 4.5m. We're near enough GW1 to have bookies odds available now to benefit from.

• Arsenal lead the clean sheet odds with a crazy 61% chance given, then Man Utd 44%, Man City 32%, Everton 31%, Forest 29%, Chelsea, Sunderland and Ipswich on 25%. Verbruggen just behind there on 23%. So granted, the clean sheet odds aren't great and that is one argument for delaying the bench boost. You're talking a 1 in 4 chance of a clean sheet from Ipswich or Brighton defenders, but of course defenders can get defcons or maybe goal involvements.

• Market odds from fpl.page/team-odds 🎯

🛡️ Defenders

• In defence a couple changes, it's Williams, Maguire and Mosquera.

• I've been going back and forth on Gvardiol and Shaw vs Williams and Maguire. Man City are a top defence, though I'm not expecting a huge number of defcons from Gvardiol playing LCB. Man City did come out with that pillars of the team remark, Gvardiol, Foden, Haaland the pillars of the team. I like him for 5.5m but starting to come around to the 2x 5m combo.

• There's so many potentially great 5m defenders like Vuskovic, Muharemovic, Colwill, Canvot so there's room to pivot there later easily. Man Utd are in the market for a new left back however Shaw does look safe for the start of the season. De Ligt probably not back until after the international break so Maguire should be safe for a while.

• Maguire has played the most minutes of any Man Utd defender in pre-season. He'll be the main threat off set pieces following Casemiro's departure.

⚽ Midfielders

• So in the midfield it's Szoboszlai, Mbeumo, Bruno and Ndiaye.

• Last draft had Semenyo who I mentioned that I really want to keep. It would take quite something to drop him but Mbeumo has been having a pretty good pre-season, he's even been playing up top and scored the only goal against PSG last match, with 3 goals in total in 4 games. Given he faces two of the three promoted teams in his opening games I'm finding him impossible to ignore now, but really think Semenyo is a top pick. I wonder if he'll be more of a creator in Maresca's system, we've seen signs in pre-season but he should chip in with a fair share of goals too. Maresca's set up looks tailor made for Haaland however.

• The rumours have died down on Ndiaye, Gana Gueye commenting on Everton's Instagram that he's here to stay, assuming that's the case I do think he's value for 6m. Missed 5 games at AFCON, and he averaged exactly 4 points per game, so if we do 5x4 = 20 plus the 128 points he got then 148 pts places him behind only Garner among all mids 6m and under. Garner's currently red flagged as well so he'd be #1 as far as available picks. And this is all in a fairly underwhelming season for him in terms of goal involvements.

• Bruno and Szobo are two players I've owned all along and are pretty unlikely to change I feel. I like Wirtz as a Szobo alternative, it's a shame he's 0.5m more though or I'd probably have been there. I'm not concerned by Szobo playing a deeper role, to use last season as an example who remembers all the chatter about Bruno's deep role, and yet he was still a top pick. Szobo can be a similar mould, corners, free kicks, maybe pens. Occasional defcon.

🎯 Forwards

• Two other players that have been staples are Haaland and Joao Pedro. Igor Jesus comes in to the team with Leeds home in GW1.

• He's absolutely flying in pre-season with 4 goals. Glasner has a knack for getting the best out of attackers, Mateta over the years, Eze, Olise and I think he and Gibbs-White could potentially thrive under this new management. Even Liverpool in GW2 I don't mind, Iraola said the other day his players are only capable of running for 30 minutes, it took him some time to get the best out of Bournemouth and I wouldn't be surprised if Liverpool games are often open and high scoring for both sides. Calvert-Lewin and Brobbey are valid 6m options as well.

• Looking at the projected goal odds, Arsenal are top for GW1 with 2.7, then Man City 2.5, Liverpool 1.9, Chelsea 1.8, Brighton 1.7 and Everton 1.6.

🪑 Bench Boost

• So let's look at the bench and talk about the bench boost.

• The reason I've opted for GW1 is because of the emergence of 2 super budget players. The bench is Kinsky, Gomez, Hume and O'Shea.

• Mitoma is still working his way back so it looked like Gomez was going to be fairly safe with Minteh LW and Gomez RW. Then Minteh went off injured last friendly in tears, they're waiting on the results of the scan. They've got Yohanna and Cozier-Duberry but I don't think either are quite PL ready to be starting games, so Gomez for 5m seems like a great option for GW1 suddenly.

• Hume has played more minutes in pre-season than any player for Sunderland, 4.5m and playing newly promoted Ipswich in GW1. But on top of that he's playing out of position in RW, with a goal and an assist. 1 goal 1 assist in pre-season.

• Sunderland are in the market for a RW I have to emphasize that, but every passing day means he's looking more and more secure for the initial gameweeks.

• So those 2 have nudged me this way. I'm also looking at swapping Ndiaye and Gomez to Gross and Sangare. So a 6m and a 5m for two 5.5's.

• The other reason I've swayed towards BB1 currently is that Wright wasn't in Coventry's squad last friendly, I'm unsure why. They've only got 1 more friendly and he's played 15 minutes in pre-season. He joined up late due to the world cup and I was expecting to follow those 15 mins up with a start but as I say not in the squad. Can I trust him enough to start GW2? Maybe. Would feel better about it if he starts in their final pre-season game. Amenda started over Thomas in CB that last game as well, who is their new CB signing. There's just a couple of slight question marks there that have made me feel a bit less comfortable about setting up for a GW2 BB.

• The other benefit to the GW1 bench boost is you're going straight in to it, whereas there's always a small chance someone gets injured GW1 and you've allocated all this money to your bench and the strategy has weakened, you either abandon it or spend a transfer as early as GW2. I'll be doing everything I can not to make a transfer in GW2, will have Gomez for depth 1st on the bench in GW2.

• It's also valid to save your bench boost until later, we'll have a firmer idea of the best budget players in the game after 5 gameweeks so you might get more out of it by waiting. However if no 4m goalkeepers emerges by then it means you will have to spend money on your backup keeper, whereas my intention is to have a 4m second keeper when I wildcard, whether they play at all or not. Set and forget one first choice keeper. It could be that Raya is the best keeper as well so imagine having to spend 6m and 4.5m on two keepers.

Please note my team and plans aren’t locked in and can change!