The stuff you should know.
⏰ Gameweek 17’s deadline is Saturday, 20th December, 11:00 GMT ⏰
🌍 Any players going to AFCON will be out from Gameweek 17.
🤦♂️ Igor Thiago was left out of Brentford's Carabao Cup squad vs Newcastle. Andrews says he has a "couple of knocks".
🤕 Jérémy Doku is out for the remainder of 2025.
🤞Dominik Szoboszlai is back in training and hoping to be fit for Spurs. Jeremie Frimpong is set to return to the squad for Gameweek 17.
👌 Liam Delap and Estêvão will be ready to face Aston Villa in GW18 (Maresca).
🧐 Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall posted a picture on his Instagram of him holding his hamstring with the caption “A little blip. See you soon.”
🩼 Jean-Philippe Mateta has been “playing through pain for 4-5 weeks”, and his minutes are being managed (Sam Tabuteau).
🔴 Ben White will be out for a “few games”, Arteta confirms.
👀 Keep reading for the Prof’s painful transfer.
Alright?
‘Twas the gameweek before Christmas,
When all through your team,
All of your players are sticking,
To a depressingly familiar theme.
Yellow and red flags aplenty,
For Doku, Thiago and Muñoz.
And your carefully selected players,
Being rotated “just because”.
But then came St. Lazy,
Who definitely isn’t sinister.
Who would never, under any circumstances, forcibly enter your home via your chimney,
For fear of being placed on a register.
Nor would St. Lazy creep into your children’s bedrooms.
And wtf is going on with the naughty and nice list?
We’re just here to tell you how to have a good gameweek.
And fill you in on anything you might’ve missed.
An answer to the hardest question.
At this time of year, a lot of us will get hit with a question that’s near-impossible to answer: “What do you want for Christmas?”
And your inability to articulate your desires is why you always end up with stuff like Lynx body spray gift sets, novelty ties and books about footballer haircuts in the 80s.
Well, fear not. Now you can ask for the gift of an annual LazyFPL Premium subscription.
Get 52 weeks of extra emails written by the Professor, access to our WhatsApp channels, invites to our exclusive mini-leagues and a Christmas present that’ll actually improve your life (and your FPL rank - same thing, really).
Here’s how it works:
1) Click the button and send the link to whoever is trying to figure out what to get you for Christmas.
2) They click Gift and enter a few details, including when they want the gift email sent.
3) You receive an email with a button to claim your gift.
4) You get 12 months of LazyFPL Premium.
5) They’re happy. You’re happy.
We’re only running Lazy-as-a-gift until Sunday, so if this tickles your fancy, you’ll wanna move quickly.
Gameweek 17’s fixtures.
What happened in midweek?
Tuesday - EFL Cup Quarter-final
➡️ Cardiff 1-3 Chelsea
⚽️ Goals - Alejandro Garnacho (2), Pedro Neto
🦮 FPL Assists - João Pedro, Facundo Buonanotte, Andrey Santos
Three second-half goals by two of Chelsea’s substitutes were enough to sweep aside Cardiff. Enzo Fernández and Reece James were amongst the unused substitutes. Cole Palmer was not in the squad.
Wednesday - EFL Cup Quarter-final
➡️ Man City 2-0 Brentford
⚽️ Goals - Rayan Cherki, Savinho
🦮 FPL Assists - Tijjani Reijnders
Erling Haaland was rested for this game, as was Phil Foden until Oscar Bobb had to be replaced in the 19th minute. Foden was subsequently subbed off in the 82nd minute, which should reassure owners. Also substituted early were Nico O'Reilly and Rayan Cherki, who scored an excellent goal.
Brentford were without Igor Thiago, who has not just one knock, but “a couple of knocks”.
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➡️ Newcastle 2-1 Fulham
⚽️ Goals - Yoane Wissa, Lewis Miley, Sasa Lukic
🦮 FPL Assists - Jacob Murphy, Sandro Tonali, Antonee Robinson
Wissa started for Newcastle for the first time since signing, and scored 10 minutes later. This week’s most popular transfer, Harry Wilson, played the full game.
Thursday - Conference League
➡️ Crystal Palace 2-2 KuPS
⚽️ Goals - Justin Devenny, Christantus Uche
🦮 FPL Assists - Devenney, Tyrick Mitchell
A rotated Crystal Palace side witnessed the latest version of Two Goals, 1 KuPS on Thursday night, and a Desmund 2-2 draw wasn’t enough to secure automatic qualification. Glasner’s men will now play a two-legged play-off round in February.
Nearly all of their key players were rested for this game, but Jean-Philippe Mateta (77’) and Marc Guéhi (64’) made cameos.
The moves to make this week.
Lazy summary: Mbeumo (AFCON) is being transferred out en masse. Wilson is the most common replacement.
Bryan Mbeumo’s departure to AFCON is dictating the narrative ahead of Gameweek 17.
Harry Wilson is by far the most popular replacement. He has seven attacking returns (three goals, four assists) from his last four games, and has managed to eke out that tally from just 2.1xGI (expected goal involvements). No wonder Tom Hanks rates him so highly.
The fact that Hanks was backing him so early is why he’s a top manager.
Clearly, Wilson has the technical ability to overperform his underlying stats, but it’s likely that, at some point, he’ll return to something closer to his pre-Gameweek 13 numbers (two attacking returns in 12 games).
But that’s probably okay, because at the time of writing, Wilson only costs £5.6m. He doesn’t need to fill the hole Mohamed Salah has left (both in our teams and our hearts), he just needs to be better than the other sub-£6m midfielders. Which he probably is.
Other popular Mbeumo replacements include Morgan Rogers (good player, but bad fixtures) and Rayan Cherki. The latter is a minutes risk, but with Jeremy Doku injured, Omar Marmoush at AFCON and Oscar Bobb’s recent injury, starts won’t get more assured than this for a City midfielder.
Bottom line: if you don’t have Phil Foden and Bruno Fernandes yet, you should be making space in your midfield for those two.
Are the template forwards changing?
Lazy summary: Yes.
At least four times a season, you’ll have a moment of post-transfer euphoria where you sit back and think, “If my frontline stays fit, I’ll keep them until the end of the season. And possibly until the end of my life”.
But like any moments of apparent clarity that follow a climax, this is almost always wrong. The forwards template regularly changes, and it might be doing so again right in front of our mince pies.
A few things have happened over the last 2/3 gameweeks that are reshaping the front-three meta:
1) Yoane Wissa is back. This makes Nick Woltemade’s position tenuous.
2) Jarrod Bowen, Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Hugo Ekitike have all returned in consecutive games.
3) Popular picks like Igor Thiago and Jean-Philippe Mateta are in a dry spell.
Here’s a quick FAQ if you’re wondering where you should stand:
What should you do with Thiago?
He’s yellow-flagged with “a couple of knocks”, but Thiago has Wolves in Gameweek 17, so if he is fit, he’s got a decent chance of ending his run of three consecutive blanks. Keep him for now.
Still, he’s one to monitor. His underlying numbers have been poor recently (just 0.3xGI over the last three gameweeks).
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Is Woltemade under threat from Wissa’s return?
Yes. Time will tell to what extent, but the fact that Woltemade has only scored two goals in his last eight games (and one of those was an OG for their arch rivals) won’t help his case.
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Should I pick Bowen or Ekitike?
Both are good picks right now.
Bowen is nailed to start and is talismanic for West Ham. They also have a nice run of fixtures coming up after Man City this weekend (FUL, BHA, wol, NOT).
Ekitike also has a good run of fixtures. He’s only played a full 90 minutes once in the Premier League this season, so be wary of his minutes, but Slot has recently said that he expects the Frenchman to share the pitch with Alexander Isak more, which bodes well.
If we had to pick one, we’d pick Bowen. He’s a reliable starter, he’s scored more points this season, and he’s £1.1m cheaper.
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Is Dominic Calvert-Lewin suddenly a serious prospect?
Calvert-Lewin’s four consecutive goals over their last four Premier League games are well documented, but it’s worth noting that he’s also top amongst forwards for expected goal involvements during that time.
So yes, at £5.7m, he’s a serious prospect. He hasn’t fluked his way to four goals in four - he’s earning great chances. His fixtures (CRY, sun, liv, MUN, new) aren’t great, so he’s probably more of a solid bench option than a player you want to pin 1/11th of your gameweek hopes on. For now, at least.
The best captain for Gameweek 17.
Lazy summary: It’s back to Haaland-as-usual.
Last week’s captaincy conundrum was fun, but it’s back to HAU for Gameweek 17. He’ll play West Ham at home.
Don’t overthink this one. Make the Norse God your Christmas Number 1.
He looks like everyone’s Nan when she was in her 30s.
What about the Triple Captain?
Yup, if you still have it, this is your best opportunity to use it before we all get new chips.
The Professor will make another move this week. It’ll probably be the only one he makes, unless we get some conclusive news about Igor Thiago.
Rayan Cherki will come in.
Yankuba Minteh will depart, but the Professor releases him from his team like a vet might release a cherished bird back to the wild - with great sadness, and a not insignificant amount of fear.
Santa Haaland gets the captaincy.
Here’s his team (calm down, he hasn’t made the transfer yet):
Of course, if you get LazyFPL Premium for Christmas, you’ll get access to all of our boffin’s moves as soon as they happen, with deep dives into the logic behind them.
Player form (Last 6)
Team form (Last 6)
Other stuff we found interesting
1) So far this season, the gameweek’s top scorer has been an even split between defenders and midfielders. No repeat winners, no goalkeepers or forwards, and somehow no Haaland.
2) Chelsea have the same number of clean sheets (8) as Arsenal this season.
3) Erling Haaland on why his FPL price is so high: “I don’t know”. Riveting stuff.
Next gameweek’s deadline is 18:30 GMT, Friday 26th December. Or as some people like to call it, Boxing Day.
That means you’ll be hearing from us on the evening of Christmas Day. We’re like your half-cut Great Aunt who rings just when everyone is sitting down for Christmas Dinner, only she’s better at FPL.
We can’t legislate for the state we’ll be in by then, but you’ll get something from us.
Stay lazy.
The LazyFPL Team.