Fantasy Premier League: Playing your wildcard this week? Here's what to consider

Gameweek 6 is proving a popular time to wildcard, with positive fixture swings for Arsenal, Manchester City and Brentford as games turn less favourable for Newcastle United, Liverpool and Brighton & Hove Albion.

I am among the many FPL managers playing my wildcard this week as I have no Arsenal or Brentford players and only have Erling Haaland (£15.3m) from Manchester City. If you are in the same boat, you might want to do likewise.

Here is my wildcard draft, looking at which players are nailed in my team and why, and which positions are up for grabs. Hopefully this will help you with your picks if you are also wildcarding.

Wildcard draft strategies

This is my current wildcard draft team as things stand (with £0.5m in the bank). A few picks are nailed on, but the team is subject to change based on press conference updates and/or injuries.

Players who are definitely in my team (barring injuries)

Gabriel — The first player in my wildcard squad. Arsenal’s defence is the best in the league and the Brazilian has immense goal threat from set pieces. A long-term hold.

Bukayo Saka — The best attacker at Arsenal and their next three games are great from an attacking perspective — Leicester City (H), Southampton (H) and Bournemouth (A). A captaincy contender in Gameweek 6 and 7.

Bryan Mbeumo — Fantastic value and Brentford’s medium-term fixtures are great so I plan to hold on to him for as long as possible. Nailed to start, will play 90 minutes most weeks and he is on penalties too.

Erling Haaland — No explanation needed!

The likely lads

Trent Alexander-Arnold — The only reason he is not a certainty is due to my team’s low value. I may end up downgrading him to team-mate Andy Robertson (£6m) or Josko Gvardiol (£6m) so I can upgrade elsewhere.

Rico Lewis — Extremely likely to be in my wildcard team. He is brilliant value at £4.7m and he should get more minutes after Rodri (£6.4m) suffered an injury. Given his price, he is worth the risk.

Antoine Semenyo — Good value. His underlying numbers are great — the fourth-most shots in the box (14) with a total expected goals (xG) of 1.7 and an expected assists (xA) of 1.3. His next two fixtures are Southampton (H) and Leicester (A) but then he has Arsenal (H), Aston Villa (A) and Manchester City (H). I have Villa’s Morgan Rogers to cover him in those tough games, since his team will face Fulham (A), Bournemouth (H) and Spurs (A).

Morgan Rogers — I got him at £5m and he is great value. He plays 90 minutes every week and will tick along nicely with attacking returns.

Jacob Greaves — Ipswich Town have good fixtures and he rotates well with Vitalii Mykolenko. He will be my fifth defender and I don’t plan to play him if I can help it.

Realistically, I cannot see any of the above players leaving my draft.

Positions up for grabs

David Raya — This is because I might go with another Arsenal defender instead. He was seen limping in the tunnel at the end of the Manchester City match and also didn’t feature against Bolton Wanderers on Wednesday in the Carabao Cup, so I will monitor him. If he is a doubt, I will likely downgrade him to Mark Flekken (£4.5m) and get William Saliba (£6m).

Eberechi Eze — If I go with Son Heung-min (£10m), Bruno Fernandes (£8.3m) or Cole Palmer (£10.6m) then Eze would make way. I would have to downgrade Alexander-Arnold, so will probably stick with Eze.

Chris Wood — I may go with Dominic Calvert-Lewin (£6m) — I am torn between them. Both are around the same price, on penalties and are their respective side’s key attackers. I suspect this will go down to the wire.

Dominic Solanke — I may go with two cheap forwards in Calvert-Lewin and Wood and use the money to upgrade Greaves to Pedro Porro (£5.6m). This gives me a deeper squad overall and Porro is a great option.

Vitalii Mykolenko — Everton have great fixtures and he is a fine backup, especially as Lewis will not start every game for City. However, the Everton left-back is just back from injury so I will keep an eye on this week’s press conferences. If he is passed fit then he will stay. He could become Nathan Collins (£4.5m) from Brentford or Ola Aina (£4.5m) of Nottingham Forest, who also have good fixtures.

The upside strategy

When playing a wildcard, it is usually best to go for as many nailed-on players as possible. This would still be the case if you are wildcarding with only one free transfer.

However, having more free transfers means you can afford to be more risky with your picks. With the new FPL rules this season, you do not lose your banked transfers when you wildcard.

I have two free transfers, so if I do not make any transfers by Gameweek 8, I will have three free transfers. This is doable since I am wildcarding and will be picking a fresh team.

To give you an example, I was looking at possibly going with Nicolas Jackson (£7.7m) as my second forward for Chelsea’s two home games against Brighton and Nottingham Forest and then moving him on to Solanke in Gameweek 8 when Spurs’ fixture get better.

You could also go for Luis Diaz (£7.9m) for two gameweeks. He was rested for the midweek Carabao Cup match with West Ham so should be good to start the plum game against Wolves (A). Liverpool have Crystal Palace (A) in Gameweek 7, and then Chelsea (H) and Arsenal (A) in Gameweek 8 and Gameweek 9. Therefore, you can look to move him on before the Chelsea game to Fernandes (£8.3m), who has a good run with Brentford (H), West Ham (A), Chelsea (H), Leicester (H) and Ipswich (A). Or Crystal Palace’s Eze, who embarks on a decent run against Nottingham Forest (A), Spurs (H), Wolves (A) and Fulham (H).

If you are somehow on three, four or five free transfers and wildcarding, you can look at doing this with two or three players. Play the short-term fixtures and then move to a long-term option.

You do not have to commit to your moves and can change direction or even decide to keep the player you got originally — but have a look at permutations if you have transfers saved up.

It is still a risk to do this as you can get injuries to other players in your squad and the FPL landscape can change quickly. As ever, it depends on your risk appetite.

(Top photos: Getty Images)