The fifth midfield slot is where the value lies

 

As I outlined yesterday, FPL's scoring system is so stacked in favour of midfielders - and so many of the game's 'midfielders' are in fact outright forwards, or at least frequent goalscorers - that it makes no sense to play fewer than 5 of them (except in rare cases).

Moreover, there is such a plethora of midfield choices at the lower end of the price scale that you can usually find very good points prospects for only 6 million (and often even better options at 6.5 million; although 6.0 is usually all you can afford in the initial squad), and sometimes at 5.5 or 5.0 (though just about never at 4.5!!).

However, among these 'less formidable' players (there's usually a good reason for their price being so low...), even more so than with more premium options, you are very unlikely to find someone who scores consistently well for a long period - much less across the season as a whole. In this price-bracket, you tend to find players like (last season) Alex Iwobi, Justin Kluivert, Anthony Elanga, Antoine Semenyo, and Jacob Murphy - who blow really hot for 4 or 5 or 6 games (maybe 8 or 10, if you're really lucky),.... and then lapse back into comparative anonymity again for a while.

More expensive players in the other midfield positions tend to be more consistent: they get really high weekly scores more often, contribute at least some additional points very frequently, and rarely or never suffer an extended string of 'blanks'. Because of this, they are worth sticking with, even if they do blank a few times (unless there are stronger indications than just the FPL returns that they and/or their team have suffered a serious crash in form). Also, you tend to be a bit locked-in to your more expensive players, because it is cumbersome to transfer very expensive players in and out (you generally have to burn through additional transfers and/or leave a significant amount of money unused in the bank for a week or three...; both of which are highly undesirable); and, if you want to buy them back again later, you may suffer a heavy hit from 'transfer tax'.

None of this is true for the cheaper midfield selections. It is easy to move them in and out of your squad at will. And you will want to, because it is highly unlikely that any of them will sustain a long run of good returns.

You should be constantly rotating your 5th midfield slot (and perhaps your 4th as well!), every month or two, to bring in whoever in that price category is hitting a hot run of form.

[Last year, a lot of people went for Morgan Rogers early in the season, and were sufficiently satisfied to hang on to him for the whole season. This was a HUGE mistake. Although he produced consistently enough to amass a very respectable points total for the season, his big returns were quite intermittent: he never put together a run of big-points weeks in succession, while numerous of his position rivals in the 'cheap' midfielder category did. Rogers was rarely even the best midfield performer overall in that price bracket (he was, narrowly, for the last couple of months of the season; but then got overtaken on the last day by Semenyo!); and he was never the best - not usually in the top 3 or 4! - over any short run of games. His season return of 161 points was barely more than the best defenders, and pitiful alongisde the best midfielders. You really want closer to 200 points for every starting position in your squad - even more for midfielders, since that is where most of your points come from! - if you are to have any hope of attaining the upper strata of the global rankings. You could achieve that if you succesfully rotated through all the best budget midfield options when they were in their best form; you can't get anywhere near it by sticking with a player like Rogers for the whole season. (Which is not to say anything against Rogers. He's very, very, very good as a real-world player. He's just not a season-hold for FPL. That's an important difference.)]