Fantasy Football players have been left stunned by the first two game weeks. Reliable, experienced players have proved to be anything but, with more unlikely players picking up the biggest point hauls. If you’ve managed to avoid the temptation of an early wildcard you’ve found restraint that many FPL managers simply couldn’t find. This restraint may just pay dividends too come the end of the season.
The likes of Dimitri Payet, Andre Ayew, Riyad Mahrez and any other quick starters are obvious choices to have in many teams, and their names will certainly crop up in most wildcard teams. To some extent this makes the differential, cheaper selections all the more important.
It’s hard to see for sure whether or not the wildcard itself is the way to go, but experienced heads seem to suggest patience is a virtue — surely the big names will start firing on all cylinders soon? If not, here’s three differential players to consider having in your team and help lessen the blow.
Fantasy Premier League Differentials
Ibrahim Afellay (£5.5m) (Ownership 1.7% at time of writing).
Next five fixtures: NOR (A), WBA (H), ARS (A), LEI (H), BOU (H).
Afellay is quite simply a fantastic singing for Stoke City. He has 50 caps for the Dutch National team, as well as playing career with the likes of PSV and Barcelona. With Shaqiri recently coming in too (valued at £7.0m), there suddenly seems to be some excellent fantasy players appearing at Stoke.
Afellay’s price of £5.5m in the FPL market is tempting. Perhaps the only downside is the four fantasy points he has scored in his first two games. Despite this, there are reasons to consider selecting him in your team. An obvious one is his next five games he faces aren’t too ominous. Arsenal stands out as a potentially problematic fixture, but his price being as low as it is means placing him on the bench for just one week is not unthinkable (don’t blame me if he scores a hat-trick).
Afellay, now 29, has something of a point to prove. His potential to be one of the best players in Europe and his early career recognition earned him a place on the international stage as far back as in 2007. His career since then has still see him be successful, but after a couple of loan spells away from Barcelona he may still have a point to prove with Stoke, his now permanent club. A risk, but at a relatively cheap price perhaps makes it one worth taking, especially when cheap midfield players are so hard to come by in the FPL market nowadays.
Jordan Amavi (£5.0m) (2.3% ownership at time of writing).
Next five fixtures: CRY (A) SUN (H) LEI (A) WBA (H) LIV (A)
Amavi had a great first week in FPL, scoring nine points and keeping a clean sheet against newly-promoted side Bournemouth. Man United proved a more tricky task with just the two points collected. However, with that game well out of the way his next five fixtures still look challenging, but used effectively, promising.
If you opt to play three defenders and choose to put more emphasis on strikers or midfielders, players like Amavi can certainly be interchanged effectively. For instance, Crystal Palace, Leicester and Liverpool away all look daunting prospects, whereas an out of form Sunderland and a fairly slow starting West Brom seem far superior options.
In the long run, Amavi could be an extremely useful asset and will often save the unnecessary temptation of transferring a new defender in and instead allowing the focus to shift to attacking or midfield transfers. Although he may not always be one of your starting 11 players, Amavi could very well be the type of player to score you a few unexpected points in game weeks where he plays more favourable opponents.
Shinji Okazaki (£6.0m) (1.0% ownership at time of writing)
Next five fixtures: TOT (H), BOU (A), AVL (H), STK (A), ARS (H)
It’s extremely difficult to pick a striking differential who will actually be effective. As soon as you dip much below 10% in teams selected by, you begin to encounter riskier and riskier options. I suppose this can be considered ‘jumping on the bandwagon’ because he scored last week. Of course, this helps improve his appeal, but again he seems like a player with bags of experience considering his 93 caps for Japan (and even more impressively 43 goals).
If you are going to go off extremely recent Premier League form, it seems sensible to consider players with experience are more likely to continue it over the course of an entire season. That’s why Okazaki seems a relatively safe pick. Having said this, you can’t expect a goal every game from him, if you want that see Sergio Agüero, a player who may very well be truly essential in FPL this year.
Okazaki is also part of a squad full of confidence. Tottenham, Leicester’s next game, will now be looked at in an entirely different light to past encounters. Although you’d never write Leicester off in the fixture, at this moment in time it almost seems like a point would be something of a disappointment. Of course, it’s only two games in and Leicester have a long way to go, but Okazaki’s fellow players have a great deal of confidence and this should only help increase the amount of chances and goals opportunities coming his way in the next few weeks.
