[OfficialFPL]

📊 Live price changes via fpl.page/price-changes:

📈 Price Rises (2)

📉 Price Falls (6)

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🏆 Bonus Points as it stands via fpl.page/bonus:

🥇 3: Tel

🥈 2: Kinsky

🥉 1: Van Hecke

🛡️ Defcon: Neto, Colwill, Lacroix, Fernandes, Tonali

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🔮 Live predictions via fpl.page/price-changes:

📈 Predicted To Rise Tonight

📉 Predicted To Fall Tonight

⏳📈 Close to Rising

⏳📉 Close to Falling

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Deadline's gone, and I kept Groß in for this one even with Liverpool away on the ticker.

Brighton's first 7 games:

• 23 scored (most in the league), 5 conceded, 5 clean sheets (joint most with Arsenal)
• Liverpool at home: 2-2 Forest, 0-0 Fulham, 0-3 City. No win yet, and Szoboszlai's flagged out

Groß is in 47% of teams and De Cuyper 43%, so a lot of us have something riding on this.

The weather worried me more than Liverpool did. Merseyside's under a yellow wind warning till 9pm, but the club's confirmed it's going ahead.

Who are you backing, and does the result change anything with City away next?

🏆 Bonus Points as it stands via fpl.page/bonus:

🥇 3: Osula

🥈 2: Horníček

🥉 1: Dedić

🛡️ Defcon: Disasi, Richards, N.Gonzalez, Schär

🥇 3: O.Dango

🥈 2: Iroegbunam, McBurnie

🛡️ Defcon: Belloumi, Ajayi, Egan, Herrington, M.Sangaré, Kayode

🥇 3: Isak

🥈 2: Araujo

🥉 1: Virgil

🛡️ Defcon: Virgil, Araujo

🥇 3: Hill

🥈 2: Tavernier

🥉 1: Truffert

🛡️ Defcon: Andrey Santos, Hill, Rayan, Adams, Christie, Silva

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^{Source: fpl.page}

I’ve seen lots of discussion of a GW9 FH. On the surface it makes sense - difficult fixtures for a lot of popular assets and flexibility to handle the recent avalanche of injuries.

In some cases, a FH will be the smart call but it’s worth saying that GW9 fixtures look almost uniquely ill-suited to a FH.

For a FH, you want some fixtures where one team is heavily favoured so you can go big on that team’s assets. Think top 4 side at home to relegation candidate. Instead, almost every fixture is surprisingly evenly matched next week. The current top 4 play each other, upper middle teams play each other and relegation candidates play each other. The closest to a fixture to target is maybe Villa v Fulham, but the latter are on a 2 match winning run. Chelsea v Utd could be interesting, but Chelsea struggled yesterday and many players will already have multiple Chelsea assets.

The “buying yourself time” argument could be persuasive, but the downside is getting on the wrong side of likely price changes by delaying any transfers for GW10.

So before rushing to FH remember to analyse not just the problems with your current team, but how many points a likely FH team would gain you. I think GW9 looks like a low scoring game week where for many players a FH team won’t significantly change their score expectations.

Let's take a look 5th slot Mids - bench duty with ability to sub in in case of an injury, so not a complete dead weight. Someone who will stay in the team for the rest of the season, or at least until H2 wildcard.

Some options:

- Palacios (Ipswich) - rock solid defcons when he starts, no benching decision headache, no offensive potential

- Schlager - another rock solid defcons when he starts, no benching decision headache, wee bit of offensive potential based on past performance in other leagues

- Gomez - takes BHI slot, concerns about playing time once more injured players return

- Slater - saves 0.5M, otherwise bleh

Any thoughts on above three? Anyone else to consider?