With Erling Haaland being a doubt this gameweek, this week’s captaincy choice is a little wide open. There are a lot of really good Haaland alternatives and that’s what we’d be focusing on in this article.
It’s also very important to keep an eye on Pep’s press conference on Friday, because then we’d be able to know whether or not Erling Haaland would be fit to start the game against Leicester.
How did our GW13 captain picks perform
Before we get into our GW14 captain picks, we’d like to you to know how our GW13 captain picks performed:
1. Erling Haaland
In first place last week, we had Erling Haaland, and boy did he perform. The Man City forward scored two goals, picked up all three bonus points and returned 13 points in total.
2. Mo Salah
We had Mo Salah in second place last gameweek, and he was a bit disappointing. The Liverpool winger only returned two points against Nott’m Forest.
3. Harry Kane
In third place we had Harry Kane and he also was quite impressive. The Spurs man got himself a goal, two bonus points and a total of eight FPL points in GW13.
4. Phil Foden
In fourth place, we had Phil Foden and just like Mo Salah, he was a bit disappointing. The Man City winger didn’t even start the game against Brighton and so he returned just one point after a short cameo off the bench.
5. Jarrod Bowen
Bowen was the player that we had as our differential captain pick this gameweek, and once again he didn’t live up to our expectation.
The West Ham man had a pretty decent game, but just couldn’t score and so he returned just three FPL points in GW13.
The best GW14 captain
1. Erling Haaland
We all know that Erling Haaland is a doubt this gameweek. However if he’s cleared fit, then he once again would be the ideal GW14 captain.
We all know how good Erling Haaland is, we know he’s a top player and his underlying stats are great, we also know that he’d get a decent amount of chances against Leicester this gameweek, and if he gets clear cut chances, we know he’d score them.
It’s really hard to go against a player like Erling Haaland, most especially when he’s owned by a huge amount of FPL managers – going against him, could see you move up the ranks, or you could also just go down the ranks real quick.
This week though might just be the best time to look elsewhere in terms of captain picks. The reason being that Erling Haaland and Man City are playing away from home.
Well, if you go through Erling Haaland’s stats away from home, you’d find out that he takes lesser amount of shots, he scores lesser amount of goals and his xG just isn’t as good, when he plays at the Etihad.
Away from home, Haaland has accumulated an xG of 3.08, while at the Etihad this season, he has an xG of 6.54 which is double of his expected goals away from home.
In terms of shots, away from home he has taken 15 shots and that has led to three goals, while at home, he has taken 27 shots and has scored 12 goals.
These stats prove that Haaland performs better when he plays at the Etihad and since he doesn’t play at the Etihad this week, it would not be worst idea to look elsewhere in terms of captaincy.
2. Harry Kane
A player that could be a good Haaland alternative, is Harry Kane. The Spurs man has been in incredible form all season, but because of how good Erling Haaland has been, he isn’t getting enough plaudits.
Kane has been a gem of an FPL asset this season – the Spurs man has scored 10 goals, picked up two assists and returned a total of 82 FPL points.
This week he goes up against Bournemouth and that is a really good fixture on paper and one that you’d expect Kane to do well in.
He’s just like Haaland as well, he just doesn’t perform all that well when he’s away from home – the two times Kane as blanked all season, have come from away games.
Would he outscore Haaland this gameweek? well, personally I’d say no. But point prediction tools, have Kane well above Haaland this gameweek.
In GW14, Kane is predicted to get 7.7 points, while Haaland is predicted to get 6.9 points.
To find out more GW14 predictions, such as clean sheet odds, goal scoring odds, defender return odds and point predictions, you can check out this article: GW14 clean sheet odds, goal scoring odds and point predictions.
3. Kieran Trippier
In terms of differential picks this gameweek, we have Trippier up there as the best the differential GW14 captain. The Newcastle defender has been great this season, scoring goals, getting assists and keeping clean sheets.
And this week, we’ve got him in our list of captains. The last time he featured on this list, he did quite well – he got himself a clean sheet, three bonus points and nine points.
He plays Aston this gameweek and that could be tricky, but we’d back Trippier and Newcastle to keep a clean sheet. Even if they don’t keep a clean sheet, Trippier carries a lot of threat from set-plays as well.
So, he could get an assist from a corner or a goal from a free kick.
So yeah if you want to go down the really differential route, then Trippier is a good option.
4. Bukayo Saka
Another really good player worth the captain’s armband this gameweek, is Bukayo Saka. Saka this gameweek, plays against a team with the worst defense in Nott’m Forest.
And we know that we said that last week about Mo Salah, but we weren’t wrong. Last gameweek, Liverpool had a ton of chances and they should’ve scored a couple of goals, if not for Henderson’s heroics.
This week again, we’d be looking to target Arsenal players and the one we’ve got on our radar, is Bukayo Saka. Saka has got himself 3 goals and 25 points in his last three games for Arsenal in the PL.
He also has been a threat for Arsenal in recent games, if you take a look at some of the positions Saka is picking up and where he’s taking shots from, you’d be more than impressed.
From the image above, we can see that Saka is getting a lot of chances in the box and he’s also taking a lot of shots in dangerous areas as well. His underlying stats are great, he’s playing at home, we really do expect Saka to perform well this gameweek.
5. Mo Salah
Another really good option this gameweek would be Mo Salah. It’s really hard to back-up the Egyptian this season and that’s just because there are a lot of other players performing better than him.
Liverpool also haven’t been all that great as well, and that seems to be affecting Mo Salah. This gameweek, however he’s worth the shout.
He’s just got a goal in the UCL and so we’d be hoping that it somehow springs him and Liverpool back to life. He also plays against one of his favorite opponents as well, in Leeds.
So if you have Salah then it won’t be the worst of ideas to captain him. If Nunez plays, then I’d be more drawn to a Nunez captain than a Salah captain this week.
Redeyedrae, is an FPL content writer with years of experience in playing and writing about FPL. He has written for major FPL blogs like ALLABOUTFPL, Fantasytipsters, FF Titans, and nevermanagealone. With his deep knowledge of the game, he has become a trusted source for FPL fans worldwide. His content is well-researched and always up-to-date. He’s passionate about helping FPL managers gain an edge in their leagues by sharing insights and analysis about everything fantasy football on raensports.
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