Where's the edge in FPL? 5 skills you can always improve a little further

Today’s topic

This time, everything related to the upcoming Double Gameweek 37 will be part of my traditional Friday preview on 𝕏/Twitter.

Instead of delving into a pressing matter, I’ve chosen to switch things up and offer a fresh perspective this time.

With the number of engaged FPL managers increasing yearly, I understand that some of you may find the game’s challenges much more daunting than in previous seasons.

An FPL evolution involves the mass adoption of data, solvers, or other tools, which can give you the impression that there’s only a little edge left.

And that we’re just trying to beat the variance now.

Even though luck plays a massive part in FPL and football in general, I guarantee you that there’s still a lot of skill involved.

These are the five abilities you can always develop a little further:

💭 Thinking long-term

Both in terms of planning and managing your assets. Everyone can plan quite nicely these days, right? Well, you’d be surprised. A mistake I often see, even with seasoned FPL managers, is preparing for too low a horizon of gameweeks.

Sure, there can be a few spots on your team where you can hold your player for 3-4 games when you see the proper upside. However, you must also build your squad on solid long-term foundations to execute your move well. For most positions, it might very well be an eight-week window.

Not giving your players enough time to perform is closely related to this. This is the absolute FPL classic. How often do you see someone moan about a particular player starting to perform once they sell him? They were often impatient, and the signs were always there. 

Even Erling Haaland can blank in two games in a row, so why would you get rid of a player with great underlying stats after 3 games and try to chase points with bandwagons? I’m not saying you need to hold poorly performing players over an extensive period, but more often than not, you’re making a sideways move at best.

📈 Using data properly

I could write a book about this. Even the largest content creators often use data poorly: cherry-picking stats, incorrect interpreting of some metrics, poor handling of the sample size, not enough context, and I could go on.

This combination creates many false narratives, which hurt your game if you follow them blindly. 

Using underlying data for FPL analysis is an excellent example of that even if everyone does it, it doesn’t mean they do it right. It’s a complex topic, but the warning sign might be someone drawing strong conclusions from a low sample size and no context whatsoever.

That’s usually a good indicator that they don’t know what they’re doing.

📅 Evaluating fixtures

The basic advice is that deciding based on the Fantasy Premier League’s own Fixture Difficulty Rating (FDR) is not the best approach. You also need to evaluate teams’ defensive and offensive abilities separately.

But you can go much deeper than this by tracking how key players’ injuries impact the squads, identifying positional weaknesses, or examining tactical nuances.

There’s a huge room to grow if you love the game and want to improve.

🧠 Being sensible with transfers

It’s related to the first point. A free transfer is the most precious thing in FPL, and you must treat it accordingly. Constantly remind yourself to use it to solve the problem you’re facing and/or to increase your team’s long-term expected value (EV).

Try to roll the transfer as much as possible, then attack the fixture swings/good opportunities when they present themselves. You can’t afford to take EV negative or sideways transfers because it can have immeasurable consequences (hit-taking) later. 

Yet another "everyday FPL" example is someone lamenting about the sheer volume of injured players this season and the necessity of taking hits. Yes, the amount of injuries is annoying this season, but often, that person could have avoided hits if they had been more reasonable with the transfers they did.

It’s not always just bad luck but also mistakes you’ve made along the way.

🚀 Constantly looking for opportunities

This is another very complex topic that can be divided into a list of sub-categories. And the more you master the 4 skills above, the better you can execute this. 

Opportunity-searching mainly consists of observing trends in data/tactics and monitoring the injuries of vital players, so you know when to pull the trigger. Hopping on high-performing players with whom you can attack the fixtures before everyone else is one of the most essential skills in FPL.

There's nothing quite like the satisfaction of identifying the right player before everyone else and reaping the hauls they missed out on.