Update (Tuesday 22 September). The game has now formally closed Gameweek 5 and, as flagged below, the numbers moved up. The final average is 48 points, not 44, and the highest score in the game is 126. The point still stands — it remains the weakest gameweek of the season (50, 81, 51, 69 and now 48) — but every figure further down this article predates the close.
Our league was recalculated too and has grown to 71 teams: an average of 48.7 against 48 across FPL, with 38 teams above the global average. Pogoń Bydło strengthened at the top (64 points in the week, 414 overall), and the best score of the round now belongs to Yannick Aguero — 72 points.
Two fresh flags that matter ahead of Gameweek 6: Cole Palmer (muscular injury, 75 per cent chance) is owned by 26.3 per cent of managers, and Declan Rice (injury, 75 per cent) by 12 per cent. Bruno Fernandes has also dropped below £12.0m. With 18 days until the deadline these are not decisions for today — but keep both names in view, because international breaks tend to add more.
Gameweek 5 is done, and it leaves behind a number we have not seen yet this season: an average of 44 points. The four previous gameweeks returned 50, 81, 51 and 69. The most-captained player in the game returned 12 points with the armband, and the gameweek was won by a striker owned by one in sixteen managers — one we ourselves put on a list of traps six weeks ago.
This is the full review: Sunday’s matches, a reckoning of our own calls, our league table, and what changed in the ratings after the recalculation. We covered Saturday yesterday — this closes the round out.
Sunday: eight goals at the Etihad and a hat-trick in a defeat
Manchester City 5:3 Sunderland was the match of the round. Antoine Semenyo scored twice, added an assist and collected 17 points — the best return among midfielders. Rayan Cherki (8 points) and Enzo Fernández also scored, while Erling Haaland managed one goal out of his side’s five.
The hero, though, came from the losing team. Brian Brobbey scored a hat-trick for Sunderland, took all three bonus points and finished on 17 — officially the highest individual score of Gameweek 5. He costs £5.7m and is owned by 6.3 per cent of managers. Meunier, Enzo Le Fée and N. Angulo supplied the assists.
The other three Sunday fixtures were far leaner:
| Match | Score | Who returned |
|---|---|---|
| Bournemouth – Liverpool | 0:1 | Isak goal and 8 pts (3 bonus), assist Wirtz |
| Leeds – Crystal Palace | 0:0 | Trafford 10 pts, Justin 8, Mitchell 7 |
| Fulham – Man Utd | 1:1 | Cunha goal and 10 pts; Martinez own goal for Fulham |
Look at that goalless draw at Elland Road: the home goalkeeper returned 10 points, and three players from that match made the gameweek’s top ten. In a round where clean sheets were worth more than goals, that is no accident.
An average of 44 — the lowest of the season
Three of this season’s five gameweeks have now closed below 55 points. After a generous Gameweek 4 (69), this was a hard landing: six of the ten matches ended level or by a single goal, and the highest score in the game was 124, against 151 a week earlier.
One caveat we repeat every week: the game has not formally closed the gameweek yet, so 44 may still rise. It has happened twice — Gameweek 3 went from 36 to 51, Gameweek 4 from 67 to 69. For the record, the first two gameweeks also climbed after our reviews and now sit at 50 and 81 in the official data.
Captaincy: three in four backed Haaland
Haaland was both the most-owned (73.5 per cent) and the most-captained player in the game this week. He played 90 minutes, scored once and returned 6 points, so 12 with the armband — in a match his team won 5:3.
For comparison: the armband on Semenyo paid 34 points. On Isak, 16. That is roughly a third of an average gameweek score, riding on a single decision.
This is not a dig at Haaland — our own model still rates him highly (88, verdict “buy”). It is a good illustration of what captaining the favourite actually is: you rarely lose much, but you rarely win the week either.
Once again, the cheap and the unknown won the week
Third week running, the same pattern. The gameweek’s top ten included:
| Player | Club | Price | Ownership | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Semenyo | Man City | £8.4m | 15.1% | 17 |
| Brobbey | Sunderland | £5.7m | 6.3% | 17 |
| Jay Dasilva | Coventry | £4.0m | 0.7% | 15 |
| Tarkowski | Everton | £6.1m | 15.3% | 14 |
| Schuster | Brentford | £4.5m | 0.2% | 14 |
| Groß | Brighton | £5.8m | 26.3% | 14 |
| Manzambi | Aston Villa | £5.9m | 0.3% | 13 |
Dasilva, Schuster and Manzambi are owned by less than one and a half per cent between them. Groß — the only name on that list the crowd was actually buying — was the most transferred-in player in the game this week (530,000 moves) and paid off immediately.
Our calls: what landed and what did not
We publish our calls in advance so they can be checked afterwards. The Gameweek 5 balance is mixed, and we are showing it as such.
| Our call | Where | Result |
|---|---|---|
| João Pedro will not play, despite the game showing 75% | Friday, 5 h before deadline | ✔ 0 minutes |
| Careful with Konsa — Arsenal travel to Brighton | Wednesday | ✔ ARS 0:3, Konsa 1 pt |
| Elanga needs a decision today (injury, no return date) | Wednesday | ✔ 0 minutes |
| Barnes as a differential (rated 87, 3.2%) | Wednesday | ✔ 9 pts |
| Gibbs-White — Haaland’s profile at half the price | Wednesday | ✘ 2 pts |
| Tavernier as a differential | Wednesday | ✘ 2 pts |
| Szoboszlai still a “buy” despite the mass sell-off | Wednesday | ✘ 2 pts, the crowd was right |
Four out of seven. Gibbs-White stings the most — we described him as the best alternative to Haaland, then Forest lost at home to a promoted side and he finished with two points. The warnings were the strongest part: three times we said “this one will not play” or “there is risk here”, and three times that held.
Our recommended squad returned 55 points
That is the number worth setting against the average. The recommended squad for Gameweek 5 — a starting eleven built by the model, with Haaland as captain — collected 55 points against an average of 44.
It managed that despite three misses (Gibbs-White 2, Saka 2, Tavernier 2). Semenyo and the cheap defence carried it: Mitchell 7, Guéhi 4. That is a fair picture of how this model works — it does not get everything right, but it spreads the risk across enough picks that one big score is enough.
The model changed its mind about Brobbey — and rightly so
In August, in our piece on traps, we listed Brobbey as a “cheap striker, a popularity trap”: he was rated 71 at 19.6 per cent ownership. Today, after the hat-trick, he is rated 84 with a “buy” verdict, and ownership has fallen to 6.3 per cent — because most people had already sold him.
This was not a manual correction. The model recalculates after every gameweek and raised his rating itself once the minutes and goals arrived. The same story applies to Isak: in August we wrote about him as a “premium trap” rated 60; he is on 78 now and has returned in three consecutive gameweeks.
We write this plainly because it is the only honest way to describe a data-driven rating: it is a record of what a player has already done, not a prophecy. When the data changes, the rating changes — including when that means admitting the earlier one was too low.
Our league: 70 teams and a new leader
Our league now has 70 teams. The Gameweek 5 average was 45.6 points against 44 across FPL — the narrowest edge of the season (it was 74.3 to 67 a week ago). 38 of the 70 teams beat the global average.
| # | Team | Manager | GW | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pogoń Bydło | Szymon Żaba | 50 | 400 |
| 2 | AVERAGEJOE | Jóhann Örn Kjartansson | 28 | 393 |
| 3 | PTC Mistrzem Anglii | William Lewis | 61 | 384 |
| 4 | HaHaHaHaaland | Daniel Filipowicz | 62 | 379 |
| 5 | Dc OldBoy | Grzegorz Podgrodzki | 49 | 376 |
New leader: Pogoń Bydło overtook AVERAGEJOE, who posted the weakest score in the top five (28 points). The best score in the league was 69 points (Szase), and the biggest climb belonged to Katalonia 73 — 64 points and a jump from 16th to 9th.
The picks are where it gets interesting. 48 of 70 teams (68.6 per cent) captained Haaland — almost exactly the global figure. Two teams went with Semenyo and banked 34 points. Two went with João Pedro and banked zero.
What the table alone does not show was costly too: 29 teams (41 per cent) started João Pedro, and 30 started Konsa. Between them the two returned a single point.
Chips: five wildcards and five free hits, no bench boosts and no triple captains. After four triple captains a week ago, the league is clearly saving them for later in the season — sensible with a three-week break ahead. If you are weighing that up, we have a separate guide to chips.
Ratings after the recalculation: two “strong buys”
The model has now processed all five gameweeks. The rankings currently carry two “strong buy” verdicts:
- Bukayo Saka (Arsenal, £9.5m, rated 90) — despite two points in a week Arsenal lost 0:3.
- Marcus Tavernier (Bournemouth, £6.1m, rated 90) — at just 6.7 per cent ownership.
Behind them: Semenyo (89), Le Fée (89), Rogers (88), Scott (88), Guéhi (88), Haaland (88), Bruno Fernandes (88), Barnes (88) and Gibbs-White (88). Captain picks for Gameweek 6 currently lead with Saka, with Haaland eighth — but that deadline is three weeks away and these numbers will move once the international break is over.
What next: a three-week break and an October 10 deadline
The international break is here. The Gameweek 6 deadline falls on Saturday 10 October at 11:00 UK time (12:00 CET) — earlier than usual, because the first match kicks off at 12:30. Write it down: a three-week gap is the easiest way to miss a deadline.
What is worth knowing before we are back:
- João Pedro still carries a “75% chance” flag and a knee problem, but the break works in his favour — if the reports of a three-and-a-half week lay-off were right, he returns exactly for Gameweek 6, when Chelsea host Bournemouth.
- Prices are moving properly now: 293 changes since the season started, 257 of them drops. The steepest rises are De Cuyper (+0.4) and Calafiori (+0.3); Gyökeres is down 0.4.
- Transfer of the week: Groß — 530,000 buys. Most sold: João Pedro (241,000).
- The fixture of Gameweek 6: Liverpool – Manchester City on Sunday 11 October. The only match rated 4 in difficulty for both sides.
The full schedule with fixture difficulty is in the fixture ticker, and current flags are in the Injury Centre. We will be back with deadline coverage in early October.
The ratings and picks in this article come from our own AI model built on data from the official Fantasy Premier League API. Figures read on 21 September. We are not affiliated with the Premier League or Fantasy Premier League.