FPL Fortress

It’s a (relatively) peaceful week in the FPL landscape this week. We still do our classic Gameweek Review and Captaincy segments this episode, but instead of the Dilemma Deliberations, we embark on a brief philosophical interlude regarding, among other things, Paul Tillich’s ontology of courage and Henri Bergson’s views on the connection between time and free will. We promise, it all connects back to FPL! Our favorite Jean-Paul Sartre makes a reappearance as well. Oh, and before all that, we tackle the Problem of God that has gripped Manchester United since the departure of Sir Alex Ferguson.

It’s a (relatively) peaceful week in the FPL landscape this week. We still do our classic Gameweek Review and Captaincy segments this episode, but instead of the Dilemma Deliberations, we embark on a brief philosophical interlude regarding, among other things, Paul Tillich’s ontology of courage and Henri Bergson’s views on the connection between time and free will. We promise, it all connects back to FPL! Our favorite Jean-Paul Sartre makes a reappearance as well. Oh, and before all that, we tackle the Problem of God that has gripped Manchester United since the departure of Sir Alex Ferguson.

Considering the dramatic episode title, it may come as a surprise that the nature of the following 70 minutes is actually rather light-hearted. (Don’t worry—Jiayang does go off on a mini-tangent about the subtlety behind how French Existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre might view FPL managers’ decision to keep Haaland or not!) The bulk of this episode revolves around the nitty-gritty of Jiayang’s Wildcard draft: we go through the “non-negotiables” and compare a couple of combinations. Finally, we dedicate a significant amount to our Captaincy segment for the first time in recent memory. Is the power of real choice a blessing or a curse? Sartre, I surmise, would advocate for the former.

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Today, we all witnessed the divinity of Daniel Johnson Burn, the lanky lad who just scored against PSG in the Champions League. To quote Newcastle’s Twitter admin: “Hang it in the Louvre.”

Jacob has just activated his wildcard, and we spend this episode breaking down his current draft. Jiayang explains why Darwin is a personification of entropy, Jacob questions whether FPL managers should consider the aura surrounding a club, and we laugh at all the bad records that Erik ten Hag is breaking.

Note: Keep an eye out for a couple of biblical allusions.

We’re back on the grind here at the Fortress—as college students now!—and, as always, there’s a ton to talk about this week in FPL. Our Gameweek 6 Review encompasses the high-quality North London Derby, the clash between mid-table mediocrity and a team that’s contending for Europe (Chelsea and Aston Villa—in that order), and the massacre that happened in Sheffield. In our Dilemma Deliberations, we answer key questions about Chelsea assets (or shall we call them liabilities?), how we should treat Salah (essential or not?), and initial preparations for a potential GW 9/10 Wildcard. Following that, we introduce a brand new segment: Differential Equations! And finally, a brief conversation about the captaincy “debate” rounds off the episode.

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This is our fourth season, and yet, for some reason or another, we still have yet to produce a Gameweek 1 episode. If we had, it’s obviously safe to say that anyone who listened to it would be ranked in the Top 1K right now, because our advice is just simply that good. In all seriousness though, it’s wonderful to be back for the 2023-24 season. Reviewing Gameweek 1, we debrief City's comfortable victory, Liverpool's imbalanced and dysfunctional midfield, and United's unpromising performance. In our Dilemma Deliberations, Jacob draws upon his philosophical side to answer the question of whether or not a manager should try to save a transfer going into Gameweek 2; we also look at the list of most transferred in players and attempt to identify whether or not they're fool's gold. Finally, Jiayang posits that Salah might be a better captaincy option this week than Haaland. Also tune in for some comments about James Milner and the inherent irrationality of FPL managers.

The final episode of the 2022/23 season on FPL Fortress is here! It’s been another wild ride—it always is, whenever FPL is involved, at least—and we want to find some sense of closure with it all. We’ve all faced so many stressful last-minute decisions right before the deadline, experienced so many memorable moments, both good and bad, and (hopefully) taken away so many valuable lessons for the future. In this episode, we hand out our superlative awards of the season, go through our Breakout XI and Flop XI, trauma-dump our horror stories, reminisce about our favorite moments, and share our takeaways for next season. It’s been a true pleasure and honor to be with you all this season, and—well, there isn’t any green arrow to wish everyone, so Jacob and I will simply wish you all a lovely summer. Until August!

Time Stamps:

00:00 - Superlatives

32:38 - Breakout XI

47:15 - Flop XI

63:21 - Horror Stories

70:30 - Memorable Moments

78:37 - Lessons Learned

This episode is all about narratives. After all, it's the last gameweek of the season—what better time to indulge ourselves? We deliberated over the best one-week punts, ranging from a Colombian troll to an English cult hero. The captaincy should probably go to Erling, but Jiayang is tempted by more alluring options (he is rather bullish about another 9-0 as a nice send-off for Southampton into the Championship). Finally, we round off the episode with a brief discussion on rank and the value of risk-taking with one week left—the highs can be so high, but the lows can be low beyond the limits of our fathomability.

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Sir Callum Eddie Graham Wilson MBE the Great (has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?) has officially crowned himself the King of Tyneside. Just how Howe has been such a roaring success at Newcastle? We also talk about the "real Brighton" and the "fake Brighton" that we saw, as well as Liverpool's fine form of late and Arsenal's alleged "bottling" of the league. Then, we take a deep dive into the best options from Man United and Man City for their upcoming double gameweek, with a particular focus on City assets. We round this penultimate episode off with a brief discussion about captaincy—though it may not be much of a decision, as per the usual this season.

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There was a coronation in England recently, but it's not the one you're thinking of, as Erling Haaland set the new single season goalscoring record in the Premier League. He may be the king of the Prem, but he isn't the FPL king yet, unless he eclipses Mo Salah's high-water mark of 303 points in a single season. After breaking down Big Sam's return to the Premier League, Haaland's curious decision to give Ilkay Gundogan his penalty kick, and some EFL-level defending from many of the teams in the relegation battle, we discuss the Isak/Wilson conundrum, ask whether the opportunity to get Trent Alexander-Arnold into our teams has come and gone, and solve many a manager's benching dilemmas. We also discuss the merits of captaining a double gameweek player over some of the best single gameweek options.

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