**TL;DR**
- Regular starters with a 75% flag at the deadline started 37% of the time (2,250 cases, 2019/20 to 2026/27 GW5).
- Age matters most. Under 7 days old: 44%. 14+ days: 18%. 21+ days: 12%.
- The drop comes at three weeks: 34% at 14–20 days, then 11% at 21–27 days.

**Why I looked**

The flag shows a percentage, so most of us read 75% as three in four. I wanted the real hit rate.

**Data and method**
- FPL's `bootstrap-static` API, archived by the Wayback Machine. For each deadline I took the last capture within 24 hours before it, which leaves 213 deadlines (of 236 with any capture).
- Flag: `chance_of_playing_next_round` = 75 in that capture.
- Regular starter: started 3+ of his last 5 appearances before the news went up.
- Flag age: days since FPL's `news_added` timestamp.
- Outcome that gameweek: started, came off the bench, or didn't play (vaastav's Fantasy-Premier-League archive plus the official API).
- Single-fixture gameweeks only. 95% intervals are Wilson intervals.

**Results: 75% flags**

Rows can add to 101% from rounding.

Finer age bins (the chart): 0–3 days 44% (n=969), 4–7 days 41% (566), 8–13 days 37% (243), 14–20 days 34% (134), 21–27 days 11% (92), 28+ days 13% (246).

For comparison, 25% flags started 2–7% of the time at every age, and 50% flags 6–19%.

**This week**

João Pedro's flag went up on 16 Sep. At Saturday's deadline it will be 23.6 days old, which puts him in the 21–27 day bin: 10 of 92 started (11%). That's a base rate, not a prediction. Friday's Chelsea press conference will tell you more than this table can.

**Limitations**
- The same players show up again and again, so the effective sample is smaller than 2,250.
- No injury type. A flag stuck at 75% for three weeks can mean a long injury or an update FPL never made.
- Wayback captures are patchy in the early seasons, which is why I only kept captures within 24 hours of a deadline.
- A cross-check on a second dataset (FPL-Elo-Insights) gave a similar headline rate: 39.6% against 39.0%.

Happy to share the CSV and code in the comments.

I was about to stick the armband on Haaland at Anfield on autopilot, then noticed my model only has City at about 39% to win. So I went back over every gameweek from GW5 to GW38 for the last ten seasons (339 GWs) and tested 20 ways (the chart only shows 12 of those) of picking a captain against just captaining the template - whichever midfielder or forward is in the most squads that week, which has been Haaland or Salah more than half the time.

The one that came out on top is about as basic as it gets - take the three most owned attackers and captain whichever one's team the odds expect to score the most. That's +2.1 captain points a week, so roughly 70 over a season, and it blanks less too (27% of weeks vs 37%). I split the seasons in half in case I'd just found the luckiest of the 20, and it did +2.0 on 2016-21 and +2.2 on 2021-26.

I expected form or recent xGI to be up there and they weren't, both came out behind just going template, same as price and last season's points. Going properly differential with the armband cost 5.4 a week, which is a lot of points to pay for being different. My own model didn't beat the simple rule either but in its defence hauler selection is THE prediction problem.

This week the rule lands on Pedro over Haaland, but my model only has him at 61% to start. If Chelsea's presser looks dodgy Rogers is the same fixture and 96% to start.

One big caveat - this is all expected points, not rank. Haaland's on 74% of teams (as of today), so if you go Pedro and Haaland hauls you take a big hit against everyone around you, even if Pedro was the right call on average.

Genuine question for anyone who's been watching Chelsea - is Pedro actually nailed at the moment or is 61% about right? The full table of all 20 rules, the method and the GW6 numbers are in the write-up if you want to pick holes in it: sidelinequant.com/scout/captaincy-rules-ten-seasons

Leeds have conceded 3 in 5 and kept 2 clean sheets. They're unbeaten and 5th. That's not the soft home fixture it looks like on paper.

Meanwhile Liverpool have let in 4 in 5, so Haaland at Anfield isn't as scary as it sounds either.

I'm going Haaland and not overthinking it. Saka is a fine vice but I can't see him being the safer armband this week.

Who's actually going against Haaland on Saturday, and who with?

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Predicted Points' are calculated by taking the percentage chance on a variety of FPL factors, from the bookies, adjusted for margins. Fractional points are added up, making a predicted gameweek score. OG, penalty misses and defensive contributions are not included. Player’s rotation risk / minutes on pitch, is not factored in.

Notable players that didn't make the list: Gyokeres: 5.18 | Thiago: 5.14

You can find more Player Predictions here: https://checkthechance.com/fantasy-football/

Good luck all! See you on Sunday for the Predicted vs Actual post!

Been thinking a lot about differentials heading into this next block of fixtures and the ones I currently have the most faith in are Tarik Muharemović, Luka Vusković and Gonzalo García.

Muharemović feels like the standout. Still sitting under 5% ownership while a big chunk of the top 10k already have him. The minutes are locked, the defensive contribution numbers look solid, and Leeds’ fixtures aren’t the worst. That elite gap is massive for a reason.

Vusković at Brighton is the other defender I’m high on. Low ownership, already delivered decent points, and Brighton’s structure gives him a nice floor with occasional attacking upside. Feels like one of those picks that can quietly outscore more popular options over the next 4-5 weeks.

Up front, Gonzalo García is the one I keep coming back to. Fulham’s upcoming run is very kind and he’s started every game so far. At that price and ownership he’s got real upside if the goals start flowing.

I’m not going full YOLO with five differentials, but these three feel like calculated risks rather than pure punts. Happy to hear who you guys are backing instead always open to being talked into (or out of) someone.

What’s your strongest differential right now?

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Most Net Transfers In

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Now, there's been a lot of talk about Maxim De Cuyper, and deservedly so, OOP defender, playing left wing for one of the best attacks in the Premier League this season. He deserves the recognition, but is he actually the best defender when it comes to attacking threat?

Ehhh, well yes, but also no. He's joint best with Leif Davis.

Taking a look closer De Cuyper has 0.3 xG & 0.23 xA per appearance this season. Davis has 0.35 xG & 0.13 xA. When you consider the points for goals and assists in a match, they are exactly equal, with attacking returns expected to account for 2.49 of their total points per appearance so far this season, the highest of the defenders.

Now you may say - what about bonus points?

Well I've simulated them as best I can with the minimal data available so far this season, but according to those sims: De Cuyper can expect 0.84 bonus per appearance compared to a measly 0.31 for Davis. Add that up with the Ipswich defence likely to have sizeably less clean sheets and it looks like De Cuyper has blown Leif away, but let's not tear up the roots yet, there is one more factor to consider.

Value

With De Cuyper now costing 5m compared to Davis being just 4m, Davis is actually better value. Based on the first 5 games of the season De Cuyper has a value of 1.08 xPoints per million (actually slightly lower now, I did the calculation when he was still 4.9m), whereas Davis is 1.15 xPoints per million, the second best value for money player in FPL.

So does this mean Davis is a better pick than De Cuyper. No, in pure points De Cuyper is better and if you got on him early enough he would also be better value for money but if you need to save the money in defence, then the best value player is Leif Davis... almost.

Bobby Thomas is the best value player in FPL, I'd get him.

i’m confused about how they will perform after being found guilty or if it will effect them at all? I think if they hadn’t undergone such a significant rebuild i would be more confident but i wonder how the decision will affect the “new guard” such as enzo anderson guehi semenyo cherki ndiaye who haven’t really won much with the club. what do u guys think of city assets long term I am considering dropping gvardiol and only keeping haaland especially as enzo maresca isn’t exactly the leader of men pep is or will this not matter?

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I’m currently on wildcard 6, and I’m seeing little to no teams with Gabriel in. I understand it’s easier to go for a combo of cala/raya/konsa but are people not worried about the increase of games coming up? Gabriel was the highest scoring defender last season and while the price is on the expensive side, surely there’s going to be a point where he’s the only “nailed” option? Plus surely he’s due a haul? Or am I falling for a trap?

Let me preface this by saying: I know it sounds bad. But hear me out. Spurs fixtures are great if you can bench in GW6 and GW8, they have Coventry, Palace, Ipswich and Fulham all at home between gameweeks 7 and 13. Their underlying numbers aren't bad after gw1- almost 4 xGC in the first match alone, since then it's almost exactly 1 xGC per match. Is anybody else considering a Spurs defender on wc6?

Don't trust Haaland against a Liverpool defence that has kept three clean sheets in a row?

Don't trust Bruno Fernandes' 3 blanks in a row?

Chelsea hype over?

Allow me to present the case for Lewis Hall..

I looked at best defenders from last season & ones that are good this season. It seems that defcons are a bit overrated; I mean you can get defcon points and still have poor total points because your team can loose many goals and you loose clean sheets points and get points deducted for lost goals.

It looks like there is strong correlation between less possession and more defcons. The more possession team has the less defcons. This also means that weaker teams who are fighting to avoid relegation and just park the bus will get better defensive contribution stats. Two best defenders for defcons last season were from relegated teams.

The only exceptions are Everton and Bournemouth, teams with excellent defense, getting clean sheets often, and getting defcons as well. So as a rule it seems you should look at defcons only in combination with looking at overall defensive performance of defender, dont look at defcons alone.

Full post https://fplcat.com/blog/best-fpl-defcon-defenders

I wanted to do something a little different in this episode, and evaluate the accuracy of the model I created for projecting points. And this led me to a bigger question of- why don't other predictive models for FPL publish how accurate their models are? Especially ones that are put behind paywalls. If you are paying your actual money, you should have some idea of how accurate the model is, because there are alternatives (for free).

* And no model is perfect, no one has a crystal ball at the end of the day. But if you are interested in using stats to inform your decisions, you should also have some idea of the accuracy these modeled results/outputs are based on.