Welcome back to another Hive FPL season!
A quick reminder that GW2 starts tonight, with the match between West Ham and Chelsea so get those squads changes in soon!
The return of the Premier League saw a great match between Liverpool and Bournemouth, a statement of intent from Man City and a classic fixture between United and Arsenal. What will GW2 offer FPL players?
Record numbers join Hive FPL
We currently sit at 92 verified Hive accounts within the Hive leagues! That's a 28.8% increase on last season and represents both great retention within the community (the vast majority who played last year are back for more) and good recruitment of new players.
It's not too late to join our Classic League if you'd like to. However, for obvious reasons, the head to head leagues close at the start of GW1 by default.
Division 3 to be launched in 26/27
Those big numbers also mean that from next season we'll be establishing a 3rd Division within our Head to Head leagues.
It was always the intention for us to have 3 Divisions (if not more) to make sure that managers can play against other players of a similar level/interest in the game and to add the fun of promotion and relegation into the mix.
While we maintained over 50 Hive accounts in those leagues since they came in for the 23/24 season, it didn't really feel right to stick 10-15 players into a 3rd Division.
Now that we're up to 66 Hive accounts in Division 2 and aiming to recruit more new members next year then the time seems right to add a 3rd tier.
What does that mean if I'm in Division 2?
Well it means that if you'd don't finish in the top 40 of Division 2 this season, you'll be relegated to Division 3 for the start of 26/27! Division 3 Rewards will be half of what they are in Division 2.
From what we've seen in the past couple of years those bottom 26 sides are likely to be made up of players who drift away from the game throughout the season.
Top tip - If you don't want to get relegated to Division 2, then make sure you update your team most weeks!
After all, that's the whole point of introducing the H2H league, to give everyone something to play for, every week of the season. Ultimately the players being rewarded are those who remain active and engaged which of course fits neatly with the overarching idea of the reward pool on Hive.
The Hive FPL community's 25/26 starting squad
The below shows the most popular players picked across the Hive FPL for the start of the 25/25 season.
This is not quite a valid team, being £1.5 million (£1.6 if you don't already own Reijinders) over budget but that wouldn't be a difficult fix with managers having to choose between Frimpong or Ait-Nouri and downgrading one of them to a £4.5mil pick. In that category, Wan Bissaka and Tarkowski are the most popular picks by Hive teams.
There aren't many surprises here, the players we are picking are also amongst the most picks across the game. In fact, it's probably the players that aren't popular amongst the community that are worth consideration.
VVD for example is the 9th most popular defender for Hive FPL teams but is the 3rd most popular defensive pick across FPL more generally appearing in about a quarter of teams worldwide. Where Hive FPL players have gone for a high price Liverpool defender, it appears the attacking returns of Frimpong (owned by 34% of Hive players vs 28% overall) are more attractive than the defensive contributions of Van Dijk.
The one player that Hive FPL managers have gotten ahead of the curve on is Reijinders who has already risen in price following his display in the 4-0 win against Wolves.
31% of Hive teams had him in their squad at the start of the season about twice the number in the overall game. Despite the rush for managers to get him in their squad for GW2, he is still a more popular initial pick for our community than he is in the game overall (at time of writing owned by 29% of teams).
Prices rises of course may limit many teams ability to bring in some of these early flyers. Kudus was already a popular pick for GW1 and his 2 assists and all around performance against Burnley will have attracted further attention. Undoubtedly Spurs visit to Man City will mean that managers are reluctant to move on him immediately but he's certainly one to act quickly on there after if you're thinking more medium to long term.
As for differentials, the Hive community is big on Cody Gakpo. He appeared in just 8% of teams across the entire FPL for GW1 but was selected by nearly 1 in 5 Hive managers who were instantly rewarded when he scored against Bournemouth. Whether that proves to be a successful punt longer term probably depends on Liverpool's activity in the transfer market over the next week or so and then the high probability of squad rotation from September onwards.
Other players in a similar category include both Forest centre backs, Murillo and Milenkovic who are more than twice as popular in the Hive leagues than the FPL overall as well as their Forest team mate Elliot Anderson who appears to be (alongside Reijinders) a budget midfielder of choice for many Hive managers despite being in just 6% of FPL teams across the world.
GW2 player picks
I'm sure they'll be a few managers out there already sweating over the composition of their squad after just a single round of matches. My suggestion would be not to pull the trigger on wholesale changes just yet with the transfer market still open and indeed very active and of course an international break followed by the resumption of European football to come.
However, if you are inclined to make transfers these are probably the players to keep an eye on based on their GW2 opponents.
Arsenal defensive options
A home game against Leeds certainly looks like a good bet for the Gunners to record a clean sheet making any of Raya, Saliba or Gabriel decent picks for GW2.
However, what you probably wouldn't expect those players to score heavily on this week is defensive contributions/saves given that Arsenal will almost certainly dominate possession at home to a newly promoted team. Saliba alone racked up 14 def cons in GW1 returning a healthy 9 points in the process. I'd be surprised if Leeds force him into as much action as United did on Sunday.
The options to avoid are Arsenal's full-backs. White and Calafiori started against United, with the later scoring the winner on his way to 13 points, but both were substituted on the 70min mark.
Given Arsenal's strength in those positions I think it's highly likely we'll see a fair amount of rotation even early in the season. Calafiori has been transferred into an additional 136,775 squads already this week (16th most popular transfer so far) but with Lewis-Skelly waiting in the wings, that feels like a high risk move.
Budget defensive options
If you're looking for something a bit cheaper at the back then Palace, Sunderland and Burnley players are all likely to offer good value for money.
As noted in our GW2 match previews, the Palace v Forest and Burnley v Sunderland games have historically been low scoring affairs and there's no reason to suspect that they won't continue to be in GW2.
Richards at £4.5 is pretty much a guaranteed pick for a Palace side who already have 1 clean sheet this season.
Esteve is the most popular £4.0mil defender in the game at the moment and Dubravka is in more squads than any other keeper in the game. Presumably managers have the pair lined-up as bench options but it'll be interesting to see how many might bring them into the starting XI for GW2.
Goals between Bournemouth and Wolves?
Both these teams conceded 4 in the opening round of games, albeit against arguably the 2 best sides in the division. The question is whether attack is in fact the best form of defence in this fixture?
Semenyo is of course the obvious pick and already appears in 13% of FPL squads. However, he has now risen in price to £7.1 million which depending on your budget, might make him out of reach for just a straight transfer.
However, some real value could be found in a differential pick. With Kluivert, Cook and Christie unavailable and Dango having competed his move to Brentford, Bournemouth's options are limited in the midfield.
Brook started on the left against Liverpool and added an assist from an xGI of 0.38 while in the same game Tavernier played in a more withdrawn central role than he's usually deployed in but offered up 20 def cons to claim a couple of additional points. Ownership of the pair currently sits at 0.2% and 0.5% respectively.
On the Wolves side, Strand Larsen finished last season strongly and he certainly had his moments against City in GW1. He appeared in Ben Crellin's first draft team for GW1 so is clearly a player that elite FPL managers see value in during at least the early stages of the season. Bournemouth's rejigged defence made a couple of errors against Liverpool which were punished, can Strand Larsen do the same?
