⏰ Gameweek 10’s deadline is Friday, 6th November, 18:30 GMT.

🤕 Konsa was withdrawn on 62’ in Wednesday’s UCL match. Arteta said he had “some issues”. We’ll dig into it.

👀 Saliba is “in contention” for Gameweek 10 [HandofArsenal].

🙏 Calvert-Lewin couldn't train today (Thursday), but Farke is “carefully optimistic” about him.

🌏 This is the last gameweek before another international break.

🎙️ Get 13 minutes of The Professor’s wisdom in our free Gameweek 10 preview podcast here (or wherever you get your podcasts).

Alright?

It’s the Guy Fawkes gameweek.

Guy Fawkes was, of course, an avid FPL manager. Some historians have even theorised that a mini-league feud was his primary motive for plotting against King James I.

The story goes that King James and Guy Fawkes were famous FPL rivals. Unable to compete with Fawkes’ managerial acumen, King James resorted to creating two FPL accounts: “King James I of England” and “King James VI of Scotland”. He would manage both teams until Gameweek 10, then choose the best one to focus on for the rest of the season.

That led to consecutive seasons of mini-league dominance.

After the Premier League refused to intervene, Fawkes had to take matters into his own hands. In 1605, the Gameweek 10 deadline fell on November 5th, and the rest, as nobody actually ever says, is history.

Here’s how to smite your mini-league foes without plotting to blow them up.

Four of our five Premium pundits are in the top 150k (1.5%). It’s the best combined start our pundits have ever had.

LazyFPL Premium members have a front-row seat, learning from them about how to build on a good start. One new member finished last season with an overall rank of 2.2m, and wrote to thank us because he’s currently at 149k and climbing.

Whether you’re consolidating a good start or looking to improve on a bad one, our pundits have mastered this game (as much as one can master FPL), and we pay them to teach you how to do the same. That means extra newsletters, premium podcasts, team reveals, transfer explanations, the Lazy Academy, and loads more.

Get it all for a fiver a month, and if you don’t like it, we’ll refund you.

Summary for the Lazy: Konsa is the big concern, but it’s unclear how serious his issue is.

The Champions League saw Man United, Arsenal, Man City, Liverpool and Aston Villa in action.

Here’s the notable stuff:

The Premier League has selfishly arranged a Friday night game this week, so we’re sending this before Brighton and Sunderland get underway in their competitions.

Bournemouth and Crystal Palace are playing as we speak. Tavernier, Kluivert, Rayan, Silva and Evanilson are among those benched for Bournemouth. You don’t own any Palace players, so we won’t bore you with those details.

Summary for the Lazy: Konsa has an issue, and it may need to be dealt with prior to the international break.

There’s an international break after Gameweek 10. Mercifully, it's only two weeks long, but good managers still like having a few free transfers to deal with any unwanted surprises. If it’s possible to roll a transfer, many will.

But speaking of unwanted surprises, the Konsa news throws a spanner in the works. Here’s what we know:

Konsa was on thin ice for most of his owners anyway, because of the aforementioned news about Saliba. For many, Plan A was to keep him for the Hull fixture and then make a decision over the international break.

His withdrawal against Slavia Prague and Arteta’s subsequent comments mean keeping him is more precarious now. Managers will want clarity on his Gameweek 10 availability from Arteta’s press conference, and if he’s ruled out, plenty of owners will take the opportunity to sell him before a fortnight’s worth of price drops.

There’s an additional consideration here. Earlier in the week, Arteta was asked about Konsa’s status in the side with Saliba’s upcoming return. Arteta’s response was to suggest that both could play at the same time, with Konsa playing at right-back if needed.

Whether this was Arteta being a hipster or a genuine plan remains to be seen, but it’s possible that, even with a fit Saliba on the pitch, Konsa still gets minutes.

And thus, managers have a decision to make:

Scenario 1 - Keep Konsa: The argument here is to start him for the Hull game and use the bench if needed. You ride out the international break and see where the dust settles in Gameweek 11 and beyond before making a decision.

Scenario 2 - Sell Konsa: Managers in this camp would rather not have a minutes-threatened player in their team, because even if he ends up playing in Gameweek 10, he could well be a doubt for Gameweek 11 and beyond. Better to sell before he gets rotated.

There’s no right answer here. Your decision will depend on Arteta’s press conference comments, how many free transfers you have, and what the rest of your squad looks like.

For our money, security of minutes is the most valuable currency in FPL, and if it looks like he won’t play against Hull, he’ll be at risk of dropping in price over the international break too. It’d be better to sell before you’re priced out of a preferred alternative.

Speaking of which…

Summary for the Lazy: Other Arsenal defenders, Van Hecke, Vušković, Muharemović, Silva, Ajer.

Here are some replacement options for Konsa if you decide to get rid:

1) Another Arsenal defender.

Managers who have doubled - or even tripled - up on Arsenal defenders have had a pretty good time recently.

Despite Konsa’s impressive performances in an Arsenal shirt, Saliba and Gabriel are likely still Arteta’s preferred pairing. If Saliba comes straight in for Konsa (no guarantee, btw), he’s the obvious pick if your funds can stretch to £5.9m.

But it’s a big “if”. Arteta has already warned that he doesn’t want to rush Saliba’s return, and there’s every chance Mosquera (who came in for Konsa in midweek) will deputise against Hull if Konsa is ruled out, giving Saliba the international break to recover further.

Gabriel offers the most reliable minutes, but he’ll cost about £3.5m more than Konsa. Unless you’re minted, that’s probably out of reach.

2) Van Hecke (£5.0m).

Over the past six games, Spurs have the lowest expected goals conceded (4.45) in the league. It’s been a remarkable turnaround for De Zerbi’s men, and Van Hecke has been one of the big beneficiaries. His 43 points over the last six games include three clean sheets, a goal and three DefCon bonuses.

Leeds (A), Ipswich (H), Sunderland (A) and Fulham (H) are next. What a time to be a man with a Van.

3) Vušković (£5.2m).

Brighton are on the precipice of a rather nice fixture swing. Having weathered the storm of Liverpool and Man City, they have Brentford at home before Hull (A), Newcastle (H), Bournemouth (A), Nottingham Forest (A), Everton (H), Ipswich (H) and Fulham (A). Blimey.

Vušković offers DefCon and some goal threat (he already has a goal and an assist this season). He’s the next-best Brighton defender after De Cuyper.

4) Muharemović (£5.1m).

With the third-highest DefCon tally in the league (he’s hit the threshold in 6/9 games this season), Muharemović is a safe pair of hands. And sometimes that’s all you want. Someone to cradle you with DefCon potential as the nights get shorter.

He has some set-piece threat, and Leeds are on the precipice of some good home fixtures (Spurs, Coventry, Ipswich) punctuated by away trips to Chelsea and Man City.

5) Silva (£5.1m).

A few newsletters ago, we warned that Bournemouth were due some luck. They were massively underperforming some of the best stats in the league.

Since then, they’ve won three consecutive Premier League games, scoring seven goals without reply. Silva has scored 24 points across those games, hitting DefCon in two of them. Ipswich (A), Nottingham Forest (H), Fulham (A), Brighton (H) and Hull (H) await, so expect more of the same.

6) Ajer (£4.5m).

A good one if you don’t have any money in the bank. Ajer has kept his place in Brentford’s back four, and there’s no obvious reason why he’ll lose it. He’s hit DefCon in two of his last three games, and he has the fourth-highest defensive contributions amongst defenders in the game.

Unlikely to get you many attacking returns, though he did bag a goal against Aston Villa in Gameweek 6. His fixtures aren’t great, but he’s an easy bench if needed.

Summary for the Lazy: A lot of managers have spare cash. Strengthen your bench and save the rest for the inevitable rainy day.

There’s no cost-of-living crisis where FPL managers are concerned. Sure, you might need to remortgage your house to do the big shop, but at least you can afford a strong bench for your fantasy team.

If this is your first season playing FPL, you should know that this isn’t normally how it goes. As James Cooper, one of the best managers in the world, said in a recent LazyFPL Premium podcast: “I’ve got £3m in the bank. I wouldn’t dream of this in any other season. It’s all getting a bit weird”.

He’s right - it is all getting a bit weird. A few factors are colliding here:

The impact on the game is intriguing. Ordinarily, our hands might be forced by budget constraints, which usually makes for a more rigid template. In a parallel universe where Haaland, Bruno, Palmer and Saka are all performing, there would be little money left over for the other 11 positions, which naturally curtails our options.

But in this universe, the only real constraint is one’s imagination. It’s why only two players (Rogers and Haaland) are owned by more than 50% of teams at the time of writing. Every other player is owned by a minority of managers.

Hopefully, this is making life a little more interesting in your mini-leagues.

What does it mean for strategy? Well, for good managers, the playbook as we move towards the Christmas period looks something like this:

1) Invest in good bench players who play regularly.

2) Keep some money in the bank.

3) Save as many free transfers as you can.

If you can do these three things, you’ll be protected from unexpected rotation (which will only get more frequent as the season wears on) and you’ll be in a position to make significant changes on a rainy day.

And if there’s one thing that’s certain in FPL, it’s that the rainy days are never too far away.

Summary for the Lazy: It’s Haaland.

The Norse God blanked for only the second time in Gameweek 9, but we shouldn’t let that impede our judgement here.

He’ll visit Nottingham Forest, which is a harder fixture for attackers than it might look. They have better defensive stats than Arsenal over their last six games.

But the fact remains that Haaland has scored nine goals in nine Premier League games so far, while Nottingham Forest have conceded in eight of theirs.

Arsenal vs Hull would be the other fixture to target, but with a lack of talismanic options there, Haaland gets our vote.

If there were a theme for The Professor’s advice this week, it’d probably be “Get comfortable with not having a perfect team.” This is a mantra he’s touted a few times this season, and for him, it’s the key to saving up those precious Free Transfers.

Sometimes you have to accept that your team isn’t optimal, and that’s fine.

Here’s his team right now:

Konsa stays for The Prof at the time of sending, but on the off-chance that Arteta confirms he’s out, The Prof will likely sell him. What he really wants is to roll a transfer, and he’ll do that if he can.

Haaland gets the armband.

Right, in case you still haven’t Dot-cottoned on, an international break stands between us and Gameweek 11. After that, it’s pure carnage until Gameweek 20.

Enjoy the peace while you can.

Stay lazy,

The LazyFPL Team.