Once again, the siren call of a Double Gameweek

With Arsenal suddenly having a Double Gameweek scheduled this week (only confirmed in the last few days, after they booked their spot in the League Cup Final last Tuesday), a lot of folks are getting frantically excited about the possibility of playing a bonus chip in GW26.

I had been tempted to title this quick post on the prospect, The Double Gameweek Delusion. I have written before that the value of Double Gameweeks for a bonus chip play is massively over-estimated by the FPL community - it's a misguided superstition that has been elevated to the status of a cult. However....

Well, as a Bench Boost opportunity, this coming Gameweek certainly looks like a waste of time. You should only really count the points returns of your weakest players (the ones you properly should have left on your bench: many people try to delude themselves into thinking they've done well from the chip by stacking the bench with some of their best players!). If a doubling player is worth having, he's probably worth starting; hence, you won't generally have doubling players on your bench unless almost your entire squad are enjoying double-fixtures - and that's not going to happen unless we have a really BIG Double Gameweek (which are almost uknown these days: we won't get one at all unless all the fixtures postponed from FA Cup Semi-Finals weekend get rearranged to the same gameweek; and that won't be until the very end of the season - a dangerously long time to hold on to your bonus chips, for such an uncertain hope of any advantage...). Here, it's difficult to see value in any Wolves players, even playing twice. (Even if they should produce a marginal advantage over your regular squad players with their lone fixtures, it's very unlikely to outweigh the hassle of using up transfers - which should always be seen as having some effective 'points cost' - to move them in and out again.)  And your Arsenal players obviously aren't going to be on your bench! So, there is no Bench Boost opportunity here.

As a Triple Captain prospect, though.... perhaps there is a case to be made.

Gabriel looks like being the most popular choice. Timber might be an equally strong option. And some might fancy Declan Rice, who's been their most consistent source of 'assists' (as well as producing an occasional goal!) - although his form has looked a little muted of late. And a bolder ploy could be to gamble on an attacking player like Madueke or Trossard or Havertz (the main argument against being that there is much more rotation risk in the attacking positions).

In general, goalscoring midfielders (who get more points than forwards for the same attacking contribution, and might pick up additional points for a clean sheet and/or 'defensive contributions'), or forwards in such freakishly good form that they might well return a multi-goal haul, are the best options as captain or Triple Captain.

But Arsenal are having an exceptional season: their defence is miles better than anyone else's - picking up a clean sheet once every two games, and only conceding an average of 0.65 goals per game. Thus, they do seem to have a very strong prospect of picking up at least one, possibly two clean sheets from this pair of games. And, of course, there's a chance that a defender could earn 'defensive points' or bonus points as well (although that's probably a fairly remote prospect: you rarely earn 'defensive points' against weaker teams; and defenders don't often earn bonus points in a game where their team has scored a few goals...), and perhaps even chip in an attacking contribution (although that's rather a lot to hope for from a defender, even a comparative goals-and-assists monster like Gabriel).

If you choose an Arsenal defender who starts both games, it's reasonable to expect that they should return at least 8 points this gameweek, and perhaps in the 10-15 point range. That's a pretty decent return on the captain's armband.

However, betting on clean sheets is always a precarious hope: even the weakest teams can occasionally surprise you with an uncommonly spirited performance (Brentford, particularly, but also Wolves of late, are actually pretty dangerous in attack), and late goals can appear out of nowhere....

Punting the TC on Gabriel or Timber this week is a high-floor/low(ish)-ceiling kind of play; it's a fairly conservative option for the chip - one that gives you an unusually strong chance of having a player who'll produce an 8- or 10-point gameweek, but a fairly remote likelihood of a really big score.

There are going to be at least TWO more Double Gameweeks this season. So, bolder FPL managers will probably hang on for one of those to play this chip. (Manchester United could still get one, if Brentford reach the semi-finals of the FA Cup; that could make a Triple Captain bet on Bruno Fernandes or Bryan Mbeumo very tempting...)

But going for an Arsenal player this week is a very alluring bird-in-the-hand option: it almost certainly won't produce the biggest Triple Captain return of the season, but it does seem to offer a much stronger-than-average prospect of a decent 8-10 point return. (NB  Again, people like to brag about the total points they received from their Triple Captain pick, tripling the number of his actual game contribution. But, of course, he would have played for you anyway, and he would have been your captain anyway; so the actual value of the chip is only his basic points return - the extra points that you got from making him Triple Captain rather than just captain.)

But be warned... the particular hazard of this Double Gameweek is how unusually protracted it is: Arsenal's two games are nearly a full week apart, and with an FA Cup tie against Wigan intervening. There is a not insignificant chance that an Arsenal player you bet your Triple Captaincy on here will get injured before the Wolves game next Wednesday....

So, are you feeling LUCKY??