🚨 GW19: The FPL cheat sheet 🧠

⏰ Gameweek 19’s deadline is Tuesday, 30th December, 18:00 GMT ⏰

🚨 Remember, this gameweek is your last opportunity to play any remaining chips.

🤞 Jurrien Timber’s absence was “just precautionary” - @AFCAMDEN (decent source)

🙃 Maresca on Cole Palmer and Reece James: "We will need to see how they are. Then we will need to decide [if they face Bournemouth]."

🤦‍♂️ Riccardo Calafiori was injured during the warm-up after feeling some discomfort.

🤕 Marc Cucurella was withdrawn during GW18 due to a hamstring issue.

🔄 Gabriel returns for Arsenal.

👀 Amorim “waiting to see” if Mason Mount will be fit this gameweek.

👉 Keep reading for chips.

Alright?

Twixmas. The witching week. The Merryneum. Whatever you call the Christmas Gooch, it’s undoubtedly a challenging (and moist) place to be for FPL managers. Days and gameweeks seem to merge together into one big, homogeneous chunk, like the three-day-old cheese platter you’re still chipping away at.

To make matters worse, definitive news is hard to come by. Manager press conferences are less frequent, and the number of unexplained player absences tends to increase exponentially.

But challenging (and moist) though it may be, the points you score whilst wedged in the Christmas Gooch count for just as much. Here’s how to ensure you maximise your tally for Gameweek 19.

It’s mad that Live FPL Tables is free. The least we can do is let you know about it.

Live FPL Tables lets you view your mini-leagues in real time. So as soon as a goal goes in, you can see whether it’s enough to finally oust your smarmy mate from their top spot (spoiler: it never is).

It does loads more, too. For example, it’ll show you the transfers in/out, the players that are most likely to threaten your league position, and even the league template. It’s also the only platform we’ve found that offers this functionality for H2H and draft leagues, if you’re into that stuff.

Here were the most transferred-in players from Gameweek 18 in the LazyFPL backroom staff league:

We load it up about 17 times during an average gameweek. You should check it out 👇

Lazy summary: Use your remaining chip if you have one.

As you probably already know, we get one set of chips for each half of the season. Gameweek 19 is the finale of the first half of the season, which means, if you’ve still got a chip left, you might as well use it this week.

This isn’t poker - your chips don’t stack.

Here’s how to use yours if you still have it:

Free Hit

15% of the top 10k managers still have their Free Hit, making it the least-used chip of the four.

If you’re using yours this week, here’s a team our boffins put together which isn’t rubbish:

Wildcard

With 14% of the top 10k managers yet to pull the trigger on their Wildcard, it’s comfortably the second-most underused chip.

Here’s a passable Wildcard team:

Triple Captain

If you’ve still got your Triple Captain, you’re probably not the type who wants to use it on Erling Haaland away at Sunderland. You should, but you’re probably not the type.

So maybe have some fun and stick it on Hugo Ekitike or Matheus Cunha? I mean, it’s the sort of fun that is highly likely to be ruined by the Norse God, but still, maybe that’s your kink.

You’re in a tiny minority (less than 3%) of active managers who haven’t used theirs yet, which means whoever you pick, you won’t have much company.

Bench Boost

8% of the top 10k managers ought to be pulling the trigger on their Bench Boosts this gameweek. If you’ve got yours, play it. Blimey, we’re proper smart us.

Lazy summary: There are some high-profile doubts, but none of the highest-owned assets are out for the long term.

As we all know, the ancient lore of the Premier League dictates that a maximum of four Arsenal defenders can be fit at any one time.

So when Gabriel made the bench in Gameweek 18, Jurrien Timber and Riccardo Calafiori owners were rightly worried.

We don’t get a press conference from Arteta before Gameweek 19, but here’s what we managed to scramble together:

Gabriel

He’s back. He played 19 minutes in Gameweek 18, and it’s only a matter of time before he’s starting games again.

Jurrien Timber

Arteta said that Timber landed awkwardly during training. This doesn’t sound like a serious issue (and unofficial reports suggest his rest was more precautionary than forced), but he remains yellow-flagged ahead of Gameweek 19.

Riccardo Calafiori

He got injured in the warm-up against Brighton, but according to Arteta, it was a recurring discomfort: “It's something that he felt yesterday, it's something very awkward that happened and today in the warm-up, he wasn't comfortable.”

This might not be the last we hear of it.

Cristhian Mosquera

He’s out with an ankle injury until mid-January, according to the fantasy website.

Ben White

White is also out with a hamstring issue. It’s not serious, but he’s been ruled out of featuring in Gameweek 19.

William Saliba, Piero Hincapié and Myles Lewis-Skelly are all fit.

Wait - but are they any good?

The elephant in the Arsenal shirt here is that Arsenal’s defenders have been frustrating to own in recent weeks. A clean sheet against Everton in Gameweek 17 is one of only two clean sheets they’ve managed since Gabriel’s injury.

There’s hope for owners yet, mind you. As already mentioned, Gabriel is closing in on a start, and Arsenal’s defensive stats have remained the best in the league despite the Brazilian’s absence.

In other words, they’ve been a bit unlucky not to have kept more clean sheets.

Lazy summary: It’s Erling Haaland, but it’s much closer this week.

It’s a close one this week, but the Norse God still leads on underlying stats, ownership and being a mythological figure - all the measures we usually look at.

The biggest point in his “cons” column is his fixture - a visit to Sunderland. Of the popular alternatives (Hugo Ekitike (Leeds at home) and Matheus Cunha (Wolves at home), Haaland is the only one playing away from home.

It’s also worth noting that Haaland blanked against Sunderland in the reverse fixture in Gameweek 15, whilst Ekitike scored a brace away at Leeds in the same gameweek.

Still, Sunderland’s defence has overperformed in recent weeks. They’ve actually conceded more expected goals (9.3) than Leeds (9.0) over the last six gameweeks, and only marginally fewer than Wolves (9.7).

Cunha remains an unknown quantity without Bruno Fernandes and Bryan Mbeumo, and whilst Ekitike is in a rich vein of form, he’s overperforming his stats (he has six attacking returns over the past four gameweeks from 2.8 expected goal involvements).

Haaland is on penalties, will be the most-captained player and has three double-digit returns in his last five games (two of which came away from home).

The Professor is rolling a transfer this week, which is very Prof-like.

The big question is over the bearer of his captaincy armband. At the moment, it’s on Erling Haaland, but depending on the visions he sees on his next trip to the desert, that might swap to Matheus Cunha before the deadline.

Here’s his team:

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1) Rayan Cherki now has the most assists in the Premier League (8).

2) Chris Wood has had surgery on his knee, which should assure Igor Jesus’ minutes.

3) Bruno Fernandes is pushing to train already, according to Amorim. He’s been ruled out of Gameweek 19, but there’s a suggestion that he might be back sooner than first thought.

4) Nottingham Forest’s John Victor (£4.0m GK) has started in three consecutive games over Matz Sels.

5) The yellow card suspension tally increases to 10 yellows after this gameweek. If any of these players receive a yellow in Gameweek 19, they’ll miss Gameweek 20: Antoine Semenyo, Micky van de Ven, Harry Wilson, Bruno Guimarães, Pedro Porro, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Moisés Caicedo, James Tarkowski, Richarlison, Granit Xhaka, Elliot Anderson, Patrick Dorgu, Ibrahima Konaté, Neco Williams, Nikola Milenković, Nathan Collins & Enzo Le Fée.

Right, we’re back in your inbox on Friday, 11:00 (GMT) ahead of Gameweek 20’s Saturday morning deadline, where we’ll have a fresh batch of chips to try not to use. The fun never stops.

From all the basement dwellers at LazyFPL, we hope your transition from Gameweek 2025 to Gameweek 2026 is a happy one.

Stay lazy.

The LazyFPL Team.