Another quick turn-around between gameweeks and another set of interesting fixtures on the agenda. From a purely fixture point of view, the Merseyside Derby at Goodison Park to kick off the gameweek stands out, as do Spurs hosting Fulham, Manchester City’s visit to struggling Aston Villa, and, of course, the clash between Manchester United and Arsenal at Old Trafford on Sunday evening. Be ready for plenty of rotation, especially as the European season is nearing its official start next week. The following teams will be involved in intense mid-week action for the foreseeable future.
- Champions League: Manchester City, Liverpool, Chelsea and Spurs.
- Europa League: Arsenal, Manchester United
- Conference League: West Ham
As a result, we might see some shifts in the strong template team that has developed over the first five gameweeks of this season, especially considering the huge number of players who have now joined the Fantasy Premier League (over 10 million). Having said that, some of the highest-owned players in the official game did deliver in GW5, notably Erling Haaland with a second consecutive hattrick, (17 FPL points), his teammate Joao Cancelo (12 points) and Gabriel Martinelli (10 points), while Mo Salah’s 10-pointer wasn’t enough to be included in the FPL Game of the Week. You can find other popular games for mobile roulette apps to play.
Don’t forget, the deadline for gameweek 6 is set at 11h00 (UK time) on Saturday, September 3rd.
Most transferred in/transferred out players (as per September 2nd, 2022)
| TRANSFERS OUT | TRANSFERS IN | POSSIBLE REASONS | |
| GK | Mendy (CHE), Ramsdale (ARS), Alisson (LIV) | Henderson (NOT), Sanchez (BRI), Pope (NEW) | |
| DEF | James (CHE), Zinchenko (ARS), Trippier (NEW) | Saliba (ARS), Perisic (TOT), Cancelo (MCI) | James illness doubt, Zinchenko injury |
| MID | Rodrigo (LEE), Odegaard (ARS), De Bruyne (MCI) | Gross (BRI), Zaha (CRY), Martinelli (ARS) | Rodrigo injury, Odegaard injury doubt, Zaha and Martinelli form |
| FOR | Toney (BRE), Kane (TOT), Greenwood (LEE) | Haaland (MCI), Mitrovic (FUL), Isak (NEW) | Haaland and Mitrovic form, Isak hype, Toney lack of returns |
Premium pick
Could Pep Guardiola leave out Erling Haaland (£11.9m) after scoring back-to-back hat-tricks? He could, he definitely could, with the away game against Sevilla in the Champions League coming up on Tuesday followed by the home game versus Spurs the next Saturday, but the reality is that we just don’t know. Man City are on a roll right now, scoring goals for fun, and the Norwegian phenomenon is at the centre of the party. He has returned in every game of the young league season so far, and his hat-tricks against Palace in GW4 and Forest in GW5 earned the 74.2% of managers who owned him back-to-back 17-pointers. Add to that the fact that City have an away game at Villa Park up next, against a Villa side that has already shipped 9 goals in five games, and there you have your premium fantasy pick for gameweek 6. It might end in heartbreak if Haaland gets rested, but in his current form, even a 20-minute cameo could do some serious damage. Just make sure you back him up with a strong vice-captain and a decent one or two players on your bench.
Non-premium pick
There were some worries about Kieran Trippier (£5.1m) not starting in gameweek 5 against Liverpool as a result of injury, but those worries proved unfounded as the former England international completed 90 minutes at Anfield. Of course, he got zero points out of the encounter, but few sensible managers would’ve expected him to get anything out of one of the season’s most difficult fixtures. Instead, we like to look ahead now that we know that he’s fit and ready to go, because the Magpies have an interesting run of fixtures coming up. On Saturday, it’s Crystal Palace at home, followed by West Ham away, Bournemouth at home, Fulham away and Brentford at home. Trip has not yet missed a single minute of Premier League action so far, Newcastle are a fast-improving and defensively solid side, and of course the cherry on top, he has set-piece pedigree. The right-back is on most corners and takes plenty of free kicks as well, including direct ones. He showed just what damage he can do back in gameweek 3, when he fired in a banger against Man City’s Ederson from about 22 yards out. We wouldn’t be surprised to see Trippier’s current ownership of 27.5% rise even further over the coming weeks.
The budget enabler
Our budget fantasy pick for gameweek 6 is an attack-minded player who has not had returns yet since the start of the 2022-23 Premier League campaign, so there’s that. Still, if you’ve seen at least some highlights from Nottingham Forest’s games this season, Morgan Gibbs-White (£5.5m) will have surely caught your eye. The former Wolves attacking midfielder was brought in for a fee that could total up to £42.5 million including add-ons this summer and seems to have cemented his place in Forest’s starting lineup. He has an advanced role in manager Steve Cooper’s 3-5-2 formation and takes care of plenty of set-pieces as well. As we mentioned before, MGW has not returned yet so far this season, but Forest have also had a difficult start to the campaign in terms of fixtures, including a home game against Spurs in GW4 and a visit to Man City in GW5. With upcoming games against Bournemouth (home), Leeds (away) and Fulham (home) up next, we might very well see an uptick in underlying numbers and hopefully, attacking returns.
The differential
Considering Rodrigo Moreno’s ownership still sitting at over 20% at the moment of writing, we can only imagine how many fantasy managers were affected by the Leeds man’s unfortunate shoulder injury after about half an hour of play against Everton on Tuesday. The interesting thing about this occurrence, from a fantasy manager’s point of view at least, is that the Spaniard’s injury has also opened up a spot in the Whites’ attack that might be filled by our differential fantasy pick for gameweek 6. After his £21 million transfer from Dutch giants Feyenoord in the summer, Colombia international Luis Sinisterra (£6.5m) got his first start under manager Jesse Marsh against the Toffees and he did not disappoint. Luisito had already scored once in the second round of the League Cup against Barnsley last week and followed that up on Tuesday with the equaliser against Everton. His direct style and dribbling also helped him collect all three bonus points from that game to return a lovely 10 FPL points on his first Premier League start for Leeds. Next up are Brentford at the Gtech Community Stadium, who have conceded 6 goals in five games so far, and after that it’s Nottingham Forest at home, two decent opportunities for 0.4%-owned Sinisterra to deliver some serious differential value.
The (vice-)captaincy
As you probably guessed already from our opening premium fantasy pick category, Erling Haaland is the stand-out captaincy option for gameweek 6. He’s delivered 34 FPL points in just two gameweeks and he’s facing Aston Villa next. Even a substitute appearance could very well result in a double-digit return at this rate, which is why we feel that, despite the very real rotation risk, he’s going to be this gameweek’s number-one pick for the armband in the official game.
Fortunately, if you’re understandably not comfortable with the possibility of rotation, there are some good alternatives as well. In any case, even if you do captain Haaland, we want to stress the importance of picking a good vice-captain as well. There is always the inevitable Mo Salah, who still returned 10 FPL points on Wednesday, as Liverpool visit Everton for the Merseyside Derby. There is also Harry Kane at home to a surprisingly well-performing Fulham side, while Trent-Alexander Arnold might also be a good shout, despite Liverpool’s recent inability to hold on to clean sheets. More punty picks for the armband are Ivan Toney at home against Leeds and Pascal Gross at home versus Leicester City.
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