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 20th. .
How did our picks for the previous gameweek fare?
| PICK | PLAYER | OPPONENT | POINTS |
| Premium | Raheem Sterling | Norwich (away) | 2 |
| Premium | Mo Salah | Newcastle (home) | 9 |
| Non-premium | Ashley Barnes | Brighton (away) | 2 |
| Non-premium | Anthony Martial | Leicester (home) | Injured |
| Differential | Seb Haller | Aston Villa (away) | 2 |
| Differential | Danny Rose | Crystal Palace (home) | 5 |
| Captain | Raheem Sterling | Norwich (away) | 4 |
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 37th 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.