Midfielders are the gold mines for points in FPL (Fantasy Premier League). Out of the top 5 scorers, every year in the past at least 3 of them were midfielders. Most of your “Premium” slots should be occupied in midfield for a good rank.
How Points Scoring works for midfielders
In the image below I have illustrated how a midfielder can score points both positively and negatively.
How mids score points
Premium Bracket
I consider every midfielder priced 10m or above as a Premium option. This year in the Premium bracket we have Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane from Liverpool, Kevin De Bruyne and Raheem Sterling from Man City, Bruno Fernandes from Man United, and Heung-Min Son from Spurs.
The optimal midfield consists of two Premiums according to me and with 6 premiums to chose from I have given my preference of them below and listed the top 3 for the first 5 fixtures.
Mohamed Salah (Liverpool) 12.5m
All English Premier League
The first 6 outings for the Liverpool talisman are really good with only Chelsea being a tough encounter. You can make a case of captaining him every week except GW3 of the first 6 weeks, plus he has the surety of penalties.
Bruno Fernandes (Manchester United) 12.0m
The top scorer in Fantasy ball last season, Bruno Fernandes starts off this EPL campaign with a very kind run of fixtures in the opening 6 weeks. A case can be made for him just like Salah to be captain-able in all of them. Manchester United have also added the creativity of Jadon Sancho to their ranks, which will boost Bruno’s goal threat too.
Heung-Min Son (Tottenham) 10.0m
Despite the GW1 fixture against Man City being an extremely difficult one, the 3 matchups after are really kind for Spurs in which they will face Wolves, Crystal Palace and Watford. Kane is rumored to be leaving Spurs and if he leaves, Son becomes the talisman for the North London outfit, which will help him massively FPL wise, as he will also take on dead-ball duty.
Bargain Basement
Often to afford all these Premiums in our teams we need to find the best bargain gems that can help us fund the expensive assets.
The bargain-basement assets are generally assets that are priced below 7m. The best bargains according to me at the start of the season are below.
Emiliano Buendía (Aston Villa) 6.5m
The fixtures for Aston Villa at the start of the season are really great facing two of the newly promoted sides in Watford and Brentford, as well as Newcastle United, who are also leaky at the back. Buendia is the new arrival at Villa Park and with Grealish heavily rumored to Join Man City, I expect Buendia to replace him as the main creative output.
2020/21: 15 goals, 17 assists
— 90min (@90min_Football) July 31, 2021
2019/20: 1 goal, 8 assists
What would class as a successful 2021/22 season for Emiliano Buendia, Aston Villa fans? 🤔 pic.twitter.com/Iel4rPrsGo
Raphinha (Leeds United) 6.5m
Raphinha has the best underlying data for a below 7m midfielder with an xGi of 0.54 (Expected Goal Involvement). Leeds have a mixed start to the season but as we saw last year, Leeds can score against anyone! Also now that Raphinha has settled into the league I expect him to be the main creator in Marcelo Bielsa’s side.
Harvey Barnes (Leicester City) 7.0m
Last season before he suffered a major injury, Barnes was the FPL community favorite pick. He had an xGi of 0.35 last year, which is really good considering most of it was from an xG of 0.29 (Expected Goals).
Barnes has started almost all of Leicester City’s preseason friendlies and looks to have put his injury worries behind him and I think he is the best bargain option Right now available in the game.