GW 5 Points	69
GW 2 Rank	21.59 lacs
Overall rank after GW 2	24.07 lacs – up from 29.46 lacs

I played my Wildcard in GW 5 and although Wildcard is a move for the long term, some instant gratification always helps to believe that one is on the right track, and GW 5 sort of provided that to me. 69 points and an increase of ~5 lacs in my overall rank is a good start with the Wildcard team. I feel that the team is well balanced in all aspects and could be a start towards recovering my overall FPL rank in the long run.

Review of last game week’s performance:

Positives

• Spurs Attackers – I had put faith in Spurs’ attacking potential by keeping both Son and Kane in my team, and they delivered in style. With Son as captain, they combined to score 42 points for my team in GW 5 and with favourable fixtures in upcoming GWs I will continue with them in my FPL squad for nea future.
• Merseysiders – 2 attacking players from Merseyside, Salah and Dominic Calvert Lewin scored in the derby. Although they did not get huge hauls, DCL has by far been the most consistent player this season and Salah 7 points were enough for me to keep faith in him over Mane for next few GWs.

Negatives

• Defence – 7 points from my 4 defensive players is a very poor return. Although I could have made better decisions in selecting my playing XI (more on that in near misses section), a return of less than 2 points per defensive player is extremely poor and that needs to be fixed, sooner the better.
• While there were other poor performances in my team, I wouldn’t call any of them out as yet, given this was first GW for this wildcarded team

Near-Misses

• Bench Selection – My bench scored 19 points, had I selected my team better I would have scored 14 points extra this GW, which could have led to a further increase of my overall rank. Foden looked good for Manchester City and defensive potential of Wolves and Aston Villa looks great.

Team for GW 6

I had selected my team for GW 5 keeping in mind next couple of fixtures and thankfully there were no injury scares for my team, thus allowing me to not make any changes to my team. So the biggest question in my head is who do I bench this week, specially given I had 19 points on my bench last GW:

Bamford: Bamford was a pat of my starting XI till Friday evening. However I decided to get Konsa in my team and leave Bamford on the bench for a couple of reasons: 1) Leeds had scored 2 goals in last 3 PL matches, I believe their attacking potential is diminishing 2) Aston Villa has kept 3 CS in their 4 PL matches.

Pulisic – I am of the opinion that Manchester United are going to be compact, having shipped 6 last time they played at Old Trafford, so I do not see a lot of opportunities for Pulisic to score high points. This also allows me to play Foden in my playing XI.

Chillwell – I really like Chillwell as a player, but I think after success against Newcastle and PSG, United will be pumped for the match against Chelsea and they are bound to score against Chelsea, limiting Chillwill’s chances of scoring high points in FPL this GW. Also this makes way for Saiss to play in the starting XI against Newcastle at home.

Captain Pick

Salah, Son and Kane offer good captaincy choice to me for GW 6. I am slightly wary of captaining Spurs players after Thursday night Europa League fixture, but that is not the decision maker for me. This fact combined with the point that Salah is playing against Sheffield United, who have been poor so far this season. Hence I am going to ahead with captaining Salah.

Hope you enjoyed reading, best of luck for Game week 6 !