Frustration reigned once again in the world of FPL as gameweek 8 represented another low-scoring round for many, with an average score of just 36 points. The last gameweek before the second international break of the 2019-20 campaign was especially marked by the misfiring of so many premium and popular FPL assets, including the seven players that had been given the best odds for scoring a goal at any time in the build-up to gameweek 8. The likes of Salah, Sterling, Aguero, Aubameyang, Pukki, Son and Kane all blanked. This provided other less premium and sometimes simply non-premium assets to shine, with players like Villa’s Wesley (14 FPL points), Wolves lightning bolt Traoré (16 points) and Arsenal defender David Luiz (15 points) rewarding their managers in big ways. Expect many wildcards to have been activated during the international break, and watch out for those few surprising results and performances that always seem to materialise in FPL right after such a break.

Finally, don’t forget: the deadline for gameweek 9 is set at 11h30 (BST) on Saturday, October 19^th.

How did our picks for the previous gameweek fare?

Premium picks

Gameweek 8 was not much a success for premium FPL assets, as the likes of Mo Salah, Raheem Sterling and Harry Kane, just to name a few, failed to score. Considering the historical consistency of the official game’s biggest names though, we’re counting on (some of) them to deliver as usual this weekend. Our first pick is Harry Kane (£10.9m), star man of an terribly out-of-form Tottenham outfit. Spurs are definitely not in form, having lost four of the last five matches they played, including an embarrassing 2-7 home defeat against Bayern Munich in the Champions League and a painful 3-0 loss to Brighton in the week prior to the international break. Kane is sort of an exception to the problems at White Hart Lane, as he already has 5 goals and 1 assist to his name in the Premier League. He was lacklustre against Brighton in gameweek 7, but he posted attacking returns in each of the four gameweeks before that (3 goals, 1 assist, 27 FPL points). In gameweek 9, he is facing a hugely disappointing Watford, who are bottom of the league as we speak with just 3 points and a worrying 20 goals conceded in just eight games. A comfortable win in a home game against a team in crisis might just be what Spurs need to get back on track.

Seeing as Liverpool face United at Old Trafford and City play away against a very solid Crystal Palace, our second premium pick for gameweek 9 is Arsenal’s Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (£11.1m). The Gunners are a bit hard to predict at times and their away game against Sheffield United does not look like a walk-over under any circumstance, but it’s not too crazy to expect a return from PEA in this fixture. Bar gameweek 8, the Gabonese striker has scored or assisted at least once in every round (7 goals, 1 assist, 55 FPL points). Sheffield are currently in 13th place with a respectable 9 points from eight games, but only 3 of those points have come from home games (a 1-0 victory over Palace back in gameweek 2). Liverpool came away from Bramall Lane two gameweeks ago with a narrow 0-1 win, so Arsenal have their work cut out for them, but if there’s one man who can lead the line for the Gunners, both literally and figuratively, it’s Aubameyang.

Non-premium picks

Leicester’s playmaker James Maddison (£7.2m) was at the heart of a bit of controversy during the international break (see here for more details), but we don’t believe this will affect his chance of starting against Burnley this weekend or his desire to add to his current tallies (2 goals and 2 assists in the Premier League). The young Englishman came back from injury in gameweek 8 and promptly scored an equaliser at Anfield. At a price of just £7.2m, Maddison is assured of a central spot in Brendan Rodgers’ starting eleven and with a kind run of fixtures coming up, starting with Burnley at the King Power, he’s a bit of a bargain. The Clarets have yet to win an away game this season (3 draws and 1 loss from 4 games) and they have conceded 6 goals over that run. This should be three points in the bag for Leicester and Maddison could be the one to make it all happen.

If you would have said at the start of this campaign that Chelsea’s Tammy Abraham (£7.7m) by the beginning of gameweek 9, would not only be Chelsea’s starting striker, but the Premier League’s joint-top scorer (8 goals in 8 games) and the FPL asset with the second-highest increase in price (after teammate Mason Mount), some people would have probably thought you’d lost your mind. You wouldn’t have though, because that’s exactly what the situation for Chelsea’s academy graduate is at the moment. This coming Saturday, the Blues are hosting Newcastle, who have conceded 11 goals in just four away matches as well as 23 shots on target, which is the second-worst record in the league. Add to that Abraham’s 7 big chances in the last four rounds (joint-most with Aguero) and the fact that only that same little Argentinian had more shots in the box (16) than his 13 over that period, and the Chelsea man actually becomes a more than decent candidate for the captaincy.

A differential pick or two

With City and Arsenal facing defensively solid opponents in Palace and Sheffield, and with Liverpool rolling up to Old Trafford, many of this season’s “template” premium FPL assets are involved in difficult fixtures. These kind of coinciding match-ups usually also represent a moment to shine for differential picks, like Bournemouth’s Josh King (£6.3m). While his teammate Callum Wilson has been passing somewhat under the radar despite his 5 goals and 3 assists so far, King has barely even appeared on the radar. Still, the Norway international already has 2 goals, 3 assists and 38 FPL points to his name, which translates to an average of just under 5 points per game. Not bad for a striker of £6.3m. He has recorded two hauls of 10 points or more this season (10 points in gameweek 5 at home to Everton and 12 points in gameweek 7 at home to West Ham), from which we could infer that one, he is a bit “streaky” and two, he shines in home games. This Saturday, Norwich visit the Vitality Stadium and no team in the Premier League has conceded more goals (21). On top of that, only West Ham have allowed for more big chances than the Canaries (26 vs 24). It could be goals galore for the Cherries and King could well be amongst them.

Our second differential pick of the week is Aston Villa’s Wesley (£6.1). The Brazilian striker had a bit of a slow start to the season, but his double strike and single assist in gameweek 8 away against Norwich brought his totals so far to 4 goals, 1 assist and 40 FPL points. His price rose by £0.1m over the international break, but his ownership still stands at a mere 2.8%, which makes him a pretty big differential overall. Villa are facing City and Liverpool in gameweeks 10 and 11, do keep that in mind, but it’s Wolves away and Newcastle at home after that, while this weekend the Villains are welcoming Brighton to Villa Park. The Seagulls have conceded 6 goals in 4 away games so far and it might just end up being quite an open game on Saturday, seeing as both teams have shown positive attacking intent this season. Wesley is definitely punt, but we wouldn’t be surprised to see it pay off.

The captaincy

Gameweek 9 is an interesting one in terms of the captaincy, because of the fixture set and the fact that the traditional “post-international break unpredictability” might be part of the results again. With Liverpool visiting Old Trafford and City going to Selhurst Park, while Spurs are hosting a Watford side that is having a horrid start to the season (3 points from 8 games), our pick for the armband is Harry Kane. Considering the match-up and Kane’s seeming immunity to both fixtures and the form of his own team, we feel his upper arm is probably the safest place for the armband this weekend. In case Tottenham’s current form makes you hesitant, which we can understand, you have two of this season’s revelations in Tammy Abraham and Mason Mount who are facing Newcastle at Stamford Bridge. As a matter of fact, we wouldn’t be surprised to see Abraham end up being gameweek 9’s most-captained player.

The Captain Poll for GW9 on the FISO Forum favours Sterling ahead of Abraham, Wilson, Aguero, Son, Kane, Salah & KDB.

Gameweek 7 turned out to be another difficult one as far as FPL captaincy choices go, with none of the ten most captained players returning a double-figure haul. Arsenal’s Aubameyang and our choice, City’s De Bruyne, were the stand-outs in this category, with 9 FPL points each. Most heartbreaking was the benching of City top scorer Sergio Aguero, though the Argentinian did come on in the 76th minute to grab an assist. We now have the second international break in our sights after gameweek 8, so do keep that in mind when considering injured players like De Bruyne or Martial. Another thing to pay attention to when making your transfers this week is, as usual, the mid-week European games. Man City, Liverpool, Spurs, Arsenal, Man United, Chelsea and Wolves all had Champions League and Europa League group stages to deal with, which will surely have some influence on the starting line-ups for the coming Premier League weekend.

Finally, don’t forget that the deadline for gameweek 8 is set at 11h30 (BST) on Saturday, October 5th.  ^.

How did our picks for the previous gameweek fare?

Premium picks

In the FPL world, the term “Pep roulette” has become a somewhat universal way to indicate the high risk of rotation that sticks to Man City players since the arrival of Pep Guardiola. Point in case: the last time we recommended Raheem Sterling (£12.1m) as a premium pick and captain, back in gameweek 6, Pep benched him out of nowhere. We’re confident this won’t happen this time, though, because he tends to start for City (he played for at least 85 minutes in all other games) and he’s now had his rest. The young Englishman was also partly rested during the mid-week game against Dinamo Zagreb in which he came on in the 56th minute, and promptly decided it with a goal and an assist. In the Premier League, Sterling recorded his first return in four weeks last weekend by scoring a goal and bringing his owners 7 FPL points. He is now on 6 goals, no assists and 4 bonus points from six games. This weekend, Man City are hosting Wolves at the Etihad, and with them having scored 14 goals in their three home games so far this season, while Wolves conceded 7 goals in their four away matches this campaign, it’s hard to not see City put a few past the visitors. When they do, expect Sterling to be involved.

Our second premium pick of the week is Arsenal’s Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (£11.0) or ‘PEA’. The Gabonese striker has been phenomenal for the Gunners this season, scoring 7 goals, providing 1 assist and recording 53 FPL points in the process. As a matter of fact, he has booked attacking returns in each of the seven games played in the current campaign: 6, 6, 5, 9, 13, 5 and 9 points. That’s incredible consistency and with Arsenal’s favourable run of fixtures coming up, we could see PEA extending this run for some time to come. First up are Eddie Howe’s Bournemouth, who have shipped 12 goals in seven games so far. Aubameyang scored in both the home and the away game against the Cherries last season, and he has also scored in six of his seven last home games overall. This fixture has seen plenty of goals in the recent past, with Arsenal putting eleven goals past the Cherries on the last three occasions (5-1, 3-0 and 3-1), and we don’t see why this would not be possible coming Sunday.

Non-premium picks

We already recommended Sterling as a stand-out premium asset and we will be highlighting a teammate of his a bit later on, so picking a third City player feels quite risky considering the chances of rotation, but Kevin de Bruyne made us do it. The Belgian seems to have been ruled out of action this weekend with a groin injury that needs rest, which makes it likely for David Silva (£7.6m) to take over main playmaking duties. The living City legend has started five out of seven games so far, completing the 90 minutes on three occasions. In those 408 minutes of Premier League football, he scored 1 goal and provided 5 assists, resulting in 37 FPL points. As it currently stands, ‘Dilva’ is actually the third-most valuable City player when looking at points per million. He’s worth 4.8 points per million, a ratio that’s beaten only by De Bruyne (5.5 points) and Bernardo Silva (4.8 points). The hope is, one, that David Silva starts against Wolves on Sunday, and two, that he is pushed up the field as a result of De Bruyne’s absence to increase his potential for a big haul. With an ownership of just 9.9%, a punt on the Spaniard could mean a world of difference for your rankings.

Speaking of points per million, Norwich midfielder Todd Cantwell (£5.0) currently represents a ratio of 6.2 points per million of his price. He is the fourth-highest scoring midfielder in the category of midfielders with a maximum value of 7.5m, with only Chelsea’s Mount (39 points), Villa’s McGinn (38) and West Ham’s Yarmolenko (33) recording a higher total. After his teammate Buendia, Cantwell is the player who has created the most chances (10 vs 17) for the Canaries this season, while these two also share second place for shots on goal (9) and shots on target (4). Cantwell is already owned by 27.3% of FPL managers, but with a pretty favourable run of fixtures coming up, which includes home games against Villa and Watford and away games versus Bournemouth and Brighton over the next five, his ownership could very well increase in the coming month or so. He looks like a bargain gem at the moment, and bringing him in frees up funds, while assuring you of a very interesting option for the spot of fifth (or even fourth) midfielder in your squad.

A differential pick or two

Our first differential pick for gameweek 8 has it all: the form, the (home) fixture and the relatively high chance of starting in Pep’s roulette. Algerian winger Riyad Mahrez (£8.6m) is currently kind of hard to ignore, thanks to his 2 goals, 2 assists and 25 FPL points over the past two gameweeks. These hauls (15 points vs Watford and 10 against Everton) were already his second and third haul of 10 points or more, after his hat-trick of assists and 14 points against West Ham in the opening week of the 2019-20 campaign. In four starts so far, Mahrez has scored 2 goals, provided 5 assists and gotten 45 FPL points, which is more than decent for a winger who is classified as a midfielder in the official game, who has a price tag of £8.6m and who is currently owned by just 5.2% of FPL managers. Of course, the question with City players is always whether they will start or not, so a differential from their roster could be risky, but a punt on Mahrez could pay off big this weekend when current number thirteen in the league Wolves roll up to the Etihad.

Our second pick is Bournemouth’s left-back Diego Rico (£4.1m), who represents a differential from a different category: his form is pretty good, with 2 assists over the last three games, and his upcoming fixture calendar is reasonable, though this weekend the Cherries are visiting the Emirates, a game in which they will not be expecting a clean sheet. After that, it’s Norwich at home, Watford away, Newcastle away and Wolves at home over the next five games, which could mean clean sheets and the occasional assist for the man who has stepped up as Charlie Daniel’s replacement after the latter got seriously injured in gameweek 3. The main reason why we are including the Spaniard in our list this week though, is that he represents a starting option in a decent team with some potential for assists at a bargain price of just £4.1m. In gameweek 7, there was actually no player who created more than his six chances across the board. In a season in which the FPL budget feels more strained than ever and at a moment in which many managers seem to be considering moves away from the early-season template (and towards a new template, perhaps?), a budget asset like Diego Rico can come in very handy. Therefore, he is more of a medium to long-term, budget-enabling pick for us, and not one from which you should expect immediate impact. An alternative is Chelsea’s Tomori (£4.6m) who has just been called up by England in their hunt for a great Central Defender. Other options are discussed on this fiso forum FPL transfers for GW8 topic.

The captaincy

With Man City, Liverpool and Arsenal playing at home, gameweek 8 immediately offers some interesting options for the captaincy. Out of the three, Liverpool are facing the toughest opponent in Leicester, but Salah at home is rarely a bad shout (4 goals, 1 assist, 36 FPL points in 3 home games this season). For Man City at home to a pack of underwhelming Wolves, the likes of Sterling, Aguero and even Mahrez tickle the fancies, if any of them play, of course. Our choice for the armband this week is Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang though, who has started the current campaign in the same fashion as he ended the previous: by scoring goals. Not only has the Gabon forward scored 7 goals in 7 games, he has also yet to play a Premier League game this season in which he does not return points for his owners. This game will inevitably come, but we don’t believe it’s at home to Bournemouth this Sunday.

The FISO Forum Captain Poll for Gameweek 8 consensus though is for Sterling or Aguero ahead of PEA, Salah and Pukki.

To those FPL managers who captained Sterling for gameweek 6 to subsequently see Pep bench him for 90 minutes while his team mates absolutely thrash Watford: we feel for you, really. It might be of some comfort to know that he was actually the most-captained player, or it might not. With an average score of 52, it was nevertheless quite a high-scoring weekend, with the likes of Bernardo Silva (19 points), Kevin de Bruyne (17 points) and Aaron Cresswell (14 points) recording big hauls. There was no mid-week European football this week, but all of the Premier League clubs did have League Cup obligations, so do keep that in mind when making your decision for gameweek 7.

Finally, don’t forget: the deadline for gameweek 7 is set at 11h30 (BST) on Saturday, September 28^th.

How did our picks for the previous gameweek fare?

Premium picks

Tottenham have had a bit of a rocky start to the season, to say the least, but despite that, talisman Harry Kane (£11.0m) has already got 4 goals and an assist from just six games to his name. The Spurs striker has returned in each of his last three games (a goal against Arsenal away, an assist against Palace at home and a goal versus Leicester away) and brought his owners (current ownership: 20.5%) a satisfying 36 FPL points, which boils down to an average of 6 points per game. Next up for Spurs are Southampton, who lost at home to Bournemouth last weekend and against whom Kane boasts an excellent record. The English forward has faced the Saints nine times in the Premier League, a run in which he scored 8 goals and provided 2 assists. What’s more, he scored at least one goal in each of the last five encounters between the two clubs. With the odds for him to score this weekend stand at 58%, he’ll be aiming to extend that run to six games.

If you take a quick look at the current Premier League table, one of the things you’ll probably notice is Sheffield United’s impressive sixth place. Therefore, our second premium pick of the week isn’t so much based on this weekend’s opposition, but on his current form and his club’s unbeaten run. Liverpool’s Mo Salah (£12.5m) is currently the fourth-highest scoring player in the official game (50 FPL points) and he has only failed to return once in the first six games of the 2019-20 campaign (3 points in gameweek 2). In a broader perspective, Liverpool has won their last 15 Premier League in a row, scoring 42 goals in the process, which comes down to an average of almost 3 goals per game. Of those 42 goals, 9 came from their Egyptian wizard. Saturday’s opponents Sheffield have been remarkably solid in the back so far, conceding just 3 goals in six games, but it seems unlikely they will shut out the Reds. As far as Salah goes, he already has 4 goals and 3 assists to his name this season, and it’s fair to expect him to build on those tallies against the Blades.

Non-premium picks

In this still young season, Chelsea’s Tammy Abraham (£7.5m) is one of the revelations so far. It took Frank Lampard a few weeks to settle on his starting number nine, but he has gone with Abraham and we don’t think the Chelsea legend is regretting it. Since securing the spot in gameweek 3, the young English striker has scored a rather unbelievable 7 goals, bringing his owners 42 FPL points in the process: 2 goals and 13 points against Norwich away, 2 goals and 13 points against Sheffield at home and 3 goals and 14 points versus Wolves at Molineux. Last weekend, he blanked against Liverpool, but that can happen to the best of them, so we wouldn’t worry too much about it. This Saturday, the Blues are hosting Brighton, who have conceded 8 goals in six games so far. It might turn out to be a goal-filled encounter at Stamford Bridge, which should sound like music to the ears of the 33.7% of FPL managers who currently own Tammy Abraham.

One of the few players with an ownership higher than Abraham’s is Man City’s puppet master Kevin de Bruyne (£9.9m). Seeing as the Belgian’s price tag is still just low enough to not label him a premium asset, he is our second non-premium pick of the week. His performances so far are very premium, though. As a matter of fact, De Bruyne is currently the second-highest scoring player in the game (54 FPL points vs Pukki’s 55), courtesy of 2 goals and an incredible 7 assists in just six games. This coming Saturday, Pep Guardiola’s men are visiting Goodison Park to face an out-of-form Everton who just last weekend lost 0-2 to Sheffield on their own ground. City have an outrageous expected goals ratio per game of 3.50 and the crazy thing is that their actual average number of goals per game currently stands at 4. Last weekend’s 8-0 demolition of Watford contributed to that in a big way. In other words, City are in red-hot goal-scoring form and it would be odd to see Kevin de Bruyne no return against Everton this weekend.

A differential pick or two

Last week, our first differential pick was Burnley’s Ashley Barnes and even though he did not return against Norwich at home, the Clarets did put on a good display with a 2-0 victory as a result. As the current number nine in the league, they seem to be back to their gritty, hard-to-beat selves, and one Claret who should be raring to go at Villa Park coming weekend is striker Chris Wood (£6.2m). The New Zealander scored both of Burnley’s goals last week and recorded a 13-point haul as a result. In all honesty, these were his first two returns of the season, but he is nailed on to start under Sean Dyche and it wouldn’t be surprising to see him return again on Saturday as he faces a not-so-solid Aston Villa defence. The Villains have conceded 9 goals in six games so far, while Burnley have scored 8. At a price of £6.2m and with an ownership of just 0.8%, Wood could be a major differential in gameweek 7.

A bit further up the table, Leicester City have rather quietly settled inside the top four. The Foxes have not been particularly spectacular yet this season, but they have been racking up the points under Brendan Rogers, with Spurs representing their latest scalp (2-1 victory at the King Power last weekend). Despite the sale of Harry Maguire, Leicester have been, maybe surprisingly, solid in the back and with a kind run of fixtures coming up, we figured it could be interesting to recommend Ricardo Pereira (£6.0m), especially after his goal against Spurs in gameweek 6. It’s true that his price tag belongs to the premium category for defenders, but he could be worth it. Last weekend, the marauding right-back not only scored a goal, but also two shots on target and a very advanced position on average, with 9 FPL points as a more than decent result. This coming Saturday, Newcastle are rolling up to the King Power and the Magpies have scored just 4 goals in six games so far. A clean sheet and possibly another attacking return could be on the cards for Pereira (currently owned by just 6.2% of FPL managers)

The captaincy

Gameweek 7 is offering us another set of juicy fixtures that brings up several good options for the captaincy. For us, the final selection was between Tottenham’s very own Harry Kane and Man City’s Kevin de Bruyne (KDB), in great part due to their consistency as far as attacking returns go over the past gameweeks. In that light, Liverpool’s Mo Salah was in the running for a long time as well. We have eventually chosen to place the armband on De Bruyne‘s arm as were confident that he will be involved in the goal-scoring activities at Goodison Park this weekend.

The FISO Forum Captain Poll for Gameweek 7 has 5 players with at least 10% of the votes (none of those five are KDB) so it’s a wide open selection this weekend and a chance to make up ground on those ahead.

So, we more than insisted on Raheem Sterling as the stand-out premium pick and captaincy candidate last week, with all the subsequent consequences. Our only comfort was the confirmation of what all FPL managers already knew: the Premier League is an unpredictable, at times heart-breaking beast and the official fantasy game just emphasises that. Besides the big shock of the gameweek (and perhaps of the season so far), Liverpool once again failed to keep a clean sheet, struggling Watford benefited from a second-half Gunners collapse, and Bournemouth put three past a usually pretty sold Everton. In other words, gameweek 5 was FPL chaos and a continuation of the craziness that is the 2019/20 campaign. An example of this is the number of goals that has already been scored by the top-five most prolific scorers over the past five gameweeks. There are currently five players with five goals or more who, together, have already scored 30 goals. For comparison, in previous seasons, this total after five games stood at 21 (last season), 21 (in 2017/18), 22 (2016/17), and 18 (2015/16). Players like Kane, Rashford, and Vardy are not among those first five, but each of them still scored 3 goals in five games, which is a decent return. In other words, this season got off to a crazy start, so don’t worry too much yet if you feel like your FPL team has been disappointing so far. Don’t spend too much time on how our picks for last week performed, it’s not very impressive, and let’s move on to our picks for gameweek 6.

Finally, don’t forget: the deadline for gameweek 6 is set at 20h00 (BST), on  Friday, September 20^th.  ^.

How did our picks for the previous gameweek fare?

Premium picks

We’ll be honest with you, even after two consecutive blanks, we would still like to recommend Sterling as a premium pick for gameweek 6. We decided to put our love for the England winger aside though, and go instead for his team mate in attack Sergio Aguero (£12.1m). The Argentinian striker should fear a bit more rotation now that Gabriel Jesus is back from injury, but he is still one of just three players this season to record a return in every game so far (5, 6, 13, 16, and 6 for a total of 46 FPL points). Jesus too the strain during midweek playing in the Champions League with Arguero rested on the bench so will be rested this Saturday. Watford are currently bottom in the league, in big part due to the 10 goals they have conceded in just five games, and Aguero’s personal record against the Hornets looks promising (for City, that is, not for Watford): 7 goals and 2 assists in 6 encounters, including a hat-trick two seasons ago. We wouldn’t be surprised to see him add to those total on Saturday.

Our second premium pick for gameweek 6 could be considered a little unexpected, but we believe that Everton’s Lucas Digne (£6.2m) could deliver big this weekend. We don’t base this belief on Everton’s last outing against Bournemouth though, where the Toffees put up a disappointing display, but on the team’s undeniable quality, the coming opponent’s relative struggles in front of goal, and Digne’s potential to deliver at both ends of the pitch on Saturday. The Frenchman has so far brought his owners a decent 23 FPL points, an average of 4.6 points per game, courtesy of 2 clean sheets and 2 assists in five games. Rolling up to Goodison Park this weekend are newly-promoted Sheffield United, who have been pretty decent so far (5 points from five games), but who have not exactly been prolific in front of goal (5 goals in five games). A second double-digit haul of the season might well be on the cards for Digne.

Non-premium picks

Ashley Barnes (£6.7m) and his Burnley team mates are facing the League’s leakiest defence this coming Saturday, and that could be the perfect opportunity for the English-Austrian forward to get back on the score sheet after blanking against Liverpool at home in gameweek 4 and Brighton away last weekend. Barnes started off the season in spectacular fashion, scoring 4 goals in the first three games of the season, bringing his owners a very nice 25 FPL points in the process. Saturday’s opponents Norwich are having a pretty positive return to the English footballing elite, with last weekend’s shock victory over reigning champions Manchester City the absolute highlight, but at the same time, the Canaries have conceded the most goals of all teams in the league (12 goals in five games). An additional plus of bringing in Barnes is that he has a kind run of fixtures coming up, with just one side from the big six (Chelsea at home in gameweek 10) coming up between now and gameweek 14.

Our second non-premium pick for gameweek 6 is Liverpool’s Roberto Firmino (£9.5m), who surprisingly started on the bench in gameweek 5 against Newcastle. The Brazilian all-round forward came on in the 37^th minute though, after Divock Origi couldn’t continue, and he decided it was time to show why he should never be benched: 53 game minutes, 2 assists and 1 bonus point for a total of 8 FPL points. Over the first five games of the campaign, Firmino has scored 2 goals and provided 4 assists, while also recording 6 bonus points, making him the fifth-highest scoring forward in the game (35 points). Bobby did play 90 minutes in the disappointing 2-0 mid-week loss in Naples, but considering the short rest he got in gameweek 5, we expect him to start up front for Liverpool against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, who have conceded 11 goals in five games.

A differential pick or two

We mentioned Norwich before, but the Canaries aren’t the only ones with a leaky defence. True, Bournemouth have not let in as many (9 goals in five games, to be exact), but the Cherries still haven’t exactly been solid in the back this season. They are visiting Saint Mary’s in gameweek 6, which will have Southampton forward Danny Ings (£6.0m) hoping for a chance to add to his current tallies of 1 goal and 1 assist. The Saints have shown good form in home games so far, with one point from two games against Liverpool (1-2 in gameweek 2) and Man United (1-1 in gameweek 4), and they will be looking forward to their first three points of the season in front of their own fans. Ings looks certain of a spot in the starting eleven with Charlie Austin, Moussa Djenepo and Nathan Redmond all injured or doubtful for this weekend’s game, and with a current ownership of just 2.0%, he could be a great punt and will add to the interest in watching Friday Night Football.

Our second differential pick of the week is Tottenham’s Heung-Min Son (£9.6m) now that he can still be considered a differential (his ownership currently stands at 5.7%). The Spurs are visiting Leicester this weekend, who are no pushovers under any circumstance, and they will be looking to bounce back from their disappointing Champions League 2-2 draw against Olympiakos in mid-week. Last weekend, Spurs booked only their second victory of the season by thumping Palace 4-0, a game in which Son scored twice and recorded a juicy 16 FPL points. The Foxes have been a bit up-and-down so far this season, but the quality in their roster is abundant, so Spurs have their work cut out for them. We expect Son to lead the line together with Kane and if his performances in the past games is anything to go by, he could well be the differential factor at the King Power on Saturday.

The captaincy

When we recommended Raheem Sterling for his away game against Norwich last weekend, we were pretty convinced he was going to haul big. That, as we now know, didn’t happen. We haven’t lost faith in Guardiola’s goal-scoring machine though (don’t forget the Cityzens still scored twice against Norwich), so our pick for the captaincy in gameweek 6 is Sergio Aguero. The Argentinian has so far not failed to record returns in any of this season’s Premier League games and we doubt that a home game against struggling Watford is going to change that impressive run.

According to the FISO Forum FPL Captain Poll for GW5 the votes are about 50% for Sterling, 25% for Aguero and 25% split among the other candidates.