FPL Updates XI – FPL Gameweek 34 – Fantasy Premier League Tips

Call in the Wildcard and register our lowest GW score of the season. Obviously!

Ok, so to be fair it was called in for GW34 onwards and the GW average was only 32, but still it’s quite frustrating. We dropped down to 35k overall which I’m actually quite please with. Any week you score 28pts you expect a far bigger drop than 6k places.

With our first big DGW upcoming let’s review last week’s piss poor effort first.

Nick Pope got the start over new signing David De Gea. Correct by a whole point. Joy. Annoyingly it was another 2nd half goal conceded by Burnley. In fact they have only conceded 2 in the first half of their last 9 games. Yet they only have 1 clean sheet across those games. So basically it means if you’re checking your score in-play never assume those 6pts for Pope are going to stick.

In front of him our decision to shop at Lidl certainly didn’t pay off as Jack Stephens saw red and dished us a really handy -2pts. Cheers fella. It wasn’t a lot better alongside him as Lewis Dunk and Ben Chilwell combined for 3pts. In all fairness after the GW started with a goalless Merseyside Derby not another one of the 18 teams kept a clean sheet.

Our midfield were firing blanks for fun as Heung Min Son, Willian, Riyad Mahrez and Kenedy totalled 9pts for the Updates XI. 1pt less than Jack Cork scored on his own. FPL is weird.

Up top you got the captaincy decision right again! I’ve lost count of the amount of times the poll vote has come out spot on and it’s a big reason for why we didn’t drop too heavily overall. Pierre Emerick Aubameyang was named and he was the only player to register a return with a goal against southampton. 12pts was a massive help, especially as most other big name strikers failed to score. Including Harry Kane. Well, sort of. Lastly, Ashley Barnes came in and did f*ck all. As expected. If he scores a single goal whilst we own him I’ll be astounded.

GW33 over and attentions turn quickly to one of the biggest weeks of the year. 8 teams feature in GW34 and it’s time for big decisions to be made. Bench Boost or Triple captain?

All week I have been deliberating which one gets used this week and which in GW37. I’ve changed my mind more times than I can tell you but what ended up sealing it for me was actually the Spurs appeal for Kane’s goal. If a player and team are so intent on going to those lengths for a player to win the Golden Boot then there’s no way his DGW in 37 can be ignored for the Triple Captaincy. Therefore the Bench Boost chip wins this week.

With this decision locked in I felt an 8pt hit was justifiable to compliment the line up.

Aubameyang (OUT) – Lukaku (IN)
Salah (OUT) – Pogba (IN)
Stephens (OUT) – Vertonghen (IN)

Jack Stephens’ ban and Mo Salah’s uncertainty around playing 90 mins were the key factors here, so we decided to double up on United’s attack whilst adding a Spurs defender to the mix given that they have the 2 DGW’s.

So with no one ‘benched’ this week let’s have a run through our entire 15 man starting line up.

FPL’s highest scoring keeper David De Gea makes his FPL Updates XI debut. A favorable double for the worlds best shot stopper should hopefully bring a decent points haul. I’m not convinced that applies to our 2nd keeper Nick Pope. Aside from a lack of clean sheets I think that Tom Heaton features in at least one of the games. We shall just have to see.

At the back all 5 are on a double. Jan Vertonghen is in because he has 2 DGW’s. He faces Manchester City and Brighton in this one. Maybe not the easiest of doubles but we can hope. Lewis Dunk, Ben Chilwell, Andreas Christensen and Matt Lowton all join him. I fear that a few of these will rotate a tad but if they get minutes there’s points there.

Our midfield includes our only non-DGWer as Kenedy is involved. 25pts in his last 3 games and facing an Arsenal team heavily focused on the Europa I think he could deliver here. Newcastle have become a real force at home since the turn of the year and I think they win this. Paul Pogba is back in our line up for the first time since GW4. We very nearly brought him in last week so it’s a little painful we didn’t, but with such a great looking double he looks cracking value at sub-£8m. The other 3 are players we are definitely pinning hopes upon. Willian, Riyad Mahrez and Heung Min Son have some nice games this week and will look to improve on their already impressive FPL seasons so far.

Hopes are also sitting heavily on 2 of our front 3. Romelu Lukaku currently sits 4th overall in FPL points and with WBA and Bournemouth up this week that could change. He scored against both of these teams in the reverse fixture and that would be greatly received if he could do it again. Harry Kane is the other big hitter with our hopes on him. Tougher games than Rom but Manchester City are missing Fernandinho and Brighton are getting close to safety so maybe this could be a good week to face them. Last up is Ashley Barnes. Cheap and in decent form he made his way into our team. Although he has 2 games they are against Leicester and Chelsea so far from easy. At this point I’d be over the moon if he managed a goal this week.

So there we have it. Bench Boost actioned, 14 players on a double and a couple decent captaincy options. With us sitting 35k overall we are well within our preseason of the top 100k target but we now want a top 10k finish. With our lineup this week, Free Hit next week and Harry Kane Triple Captain in GW37 I certainly think that’s achievable.

What will go a massive way to helping our push will be the choice for the armband this week. We have 2 or 3 stand out options now so if you have the chance to vote on who we should name this week then feel free to do so below. All votes appreciated and the best of luck to you all.

[polldaddy poll=9981467]

For any last minute help feel free to tweet either myself or the bid dogs at @FPLUpdates and we will try and give you a nudge in a positive direction.

Thanks again for reading!

Written by FPL Guru (@FPL_Guru)

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