When you have an extremely underwhelming FPL season, the break before the next campaign always goes too quickly and this was definitely the case for me. It was the first time since the 2016/17 season that I had not amassed over 2,00 classic points, and back then I made a plethora of transfers not really caring about how well I did, which shows you how badly I performed in 2022/23. I overthought to begin with and thought that Pep Guardiola may start the campaign off with Erling Haaland on the bench for the first few matches. Therefore, I never owned him and he bagged a brace on his debut away at West Ham and from there I was playing catchup and as you guessed...I never caught up as it took me a couple of gameweeks to create the budget to get him in.
Last season was slightly surreal, Haaland broke the Premier League record for goals in his debut campaign and the likes of Newcastle and Brighton overachieved. When you add the fact Arsenal (who I do not pick players from) had a brilliant run up until April that is, and many FPL managers had similar teams by the time the World Cup came around in November. With another team that I refuse to select from Manchester United stacking clean sheets and coming 3rd it was an epic FPL struggle. I faced teams that had triple Arsenal midfielders as well as the likes of Marcus Rashford (who had a very good season) and then the likes of Brighton's Kaoru Mitoma or Newcastle's Miguel Almiron. However, with Haaland now being a whooping £14m after his outrageous start to Premier League life, it would be much more complex for fantasy managers to have a similar midfield. Mitoma has gone up from £5m to £6.5 and Rashford's purple patch after the World Cup means that he has risen to £9m after scoring 205 points in 2022/23 when he started off at a mere £6.5m. Arsenal's main picked trio of Martin Odegaard (£8.5m), Gabriel Martinelli (£8m) and Bukayo Saka (£8.5m) have all gone up, by £2m, £2 and £0.5m respectively. Saka not being £9m was a bit of a surprise despite him not ending the campaign as well as he would have liked. Therefore, a trio of Arsenal midfielders with Rashford and Mitoma would cost £40.5m. then if you were to add Haaland, who is already owned by over 85% then you would have already used an astonishing £54.5m of your budget! The rest of your team would be littered with enablers, so good luck getting another premium player in your team.
I will reveal my first squad draft from a few weeks ago below, but I already have a few changes in mind before Friday's 18.30 deadline. Being a Liverpool fan, I obviously have Mo Salah, his ownership is under 25% so some people are choosing to look elsewhere with Haaland's crazy high price it seems. I am starting out with Trent Alexander-Arnold at the back but if he does not start as I wish I will have no issues saving money to transitioning to his teammate Andy Robertson as I have done in previous seasons. In midfield I am torn between having James Maddison or Eberechi Eze, as it stands, I am leaning towards the latter only as he is cheaper. Maddison, I believe will accumulate a lot of points however if he stays fit and especially if Harry Kane does not end up going to Bayern Munich. Should England's captain leave then the only real premium striker will be Haaland and I firmly believe his ownership will then go well over 90% at a stage making him become the highest owned player of all-time. So not having the Norwegian as boring and maybe even tedious as it may seem to some may just be signing your death certificate especially if you are in a head-to-head league.
Now you may have wondered what 'end of an era' meant in the title. Do not worry, despite almost losing the plot last season I would not be doing a brief season preview if I was quitting...though the thought did cross my mind. Despite of my subpar outcome, fuelled by the poor start, in the 'Justice League' I somehow had the highest weekly score five times which was the most of anyone. In gameweeks 11, 16, ,21 and 23 I led in scoring, as well as finished joint-first in gameweek 26 with Dwayne. Dwayne was incidentally next up with four highest scoring weeks. This shows the relentless consistency of the champion Khurram (K), who only needed to have the highest weekly score twice en route to the title. My bad weeks were detrimental otherwise I would have done what I do usually despite all the naysayers about the fact I do not pick from certain teams. Those high scoring weeks are really the only thing giving me a glimmer of hope, and why I did not suffer the hypothetical relegation in the league I damn well created. I mean come on, that would be like Ted DiBiase losing the Million Dollar belt, right?
So, the reason why it is the end of an era is that I have been informed by the administrators at the Fantasy Premier League that my beloved team name has been flagged, yes, you heard correctly, '#SheSaidBenMeeOver' will be no more. I have no idea why now this has only just happened, and I am quite upset about it to be honest, not quite melancholic but not far off. When I first began to play, I had the team name 'Verte Bremen' as it aligned with where I was working at the time. I then had a brief stint with 'Cesc on the Beach' but I grew to not liking it as I saw too many similar names in other classic leagues. For well over five years I have had the team name and now they want to ban it, you could face expulsion if you have a failed appeal, so I am not going to bother. If it was so 'offensive' then why was I allowed to use it in the first place! For the time-being I am going with 'Cash Mee Outside', a line made famous by Danielle Bregoli (Bhad Bhabie) when she came on Dr Phil with her Mum as an unruly child. The spelling incorporates Ben Mee still obviously as well as Aston Villa's Matty Cash.
So let the games begin, I will not let this hold me back, I must bounce back for peace of mind at the sheer minimum. No two seasons are the same but going from 5th to 13th is a reality check and a humbling to say the least, I was rock bottom at a stage so only a nice winning run towards the back end got me up the table to spare my blushes. The prices of some players are quite questionable but let us see how this plays out, with Chelsea being so poor last campaign their players are nicely priced, and they will be the biggest threat of the teams I choose to not select from. Although I have given adequate time, as usual less than 48 hours before the deadline I am scrambling around making sure everyone is in the Justice League so I can lock it at 20 people for the head-to-head to program, I tell you, some things never change. One season just one season everything will be sorted well in advance.
@DubulDee
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