Manchester City top picks for FPL

The Premier League season is edging closer and closer along with the Official Fantasy game. Because of this we direct our focus towards the Manchester City top picks in FPL. Analysing their defensive and offensive stats from last season to pick out their best fantasy players.

Looking at the Manchester City top picks in FPL can be extremely helpful to managers. The champions were relentless last season and ended up winning the treble. Before looking at their players, lets take a look at their early fixtures.

Fixture ticker

Below we can see that Manchester City rank second on the fixture ticker. In their first six matches they face Burnley, Newcastle, Sheffield United, Fulham, West Ham United and Nottingham Forest.

The Man City defence

Manchester City held some great defensive data last season – ranking:

Third for clean sheets (13th)
Joint first for goals conceded (33)
First for expected goals conceded (33.07)

Manchester City defensive assets

Below we will compare the defensive options based on reliability in terms of minutes and potential for attacking returns.

Firstly it is important to highlight their minutes from last season.

We can see that goalkeeper Ederson (£5.5m) was significantly ahead after playing 3150 minutes played. Manuel Akanji (£5m) was the closest to Ederson after 2293 minutes. Ruben Dias (£5.5m) also proved vital to Manchester City playing 2008 minutes.

The gap between Ederson and the rest of the backline is concerning but it also suggests plenty of rotation between the defenders. Another factor worth considering is that Manchester City are close to securing another world class centre-back, Josko Gvardiol, who plays as a left sided centre-back.

Below we compare the attacking data of all Manchester City defenders.

The graphic shows that no Manchester City defender accumulated more than 3.00 NPXGI last season which suggests a huge lack of attacking threat.

Nathan Ake (£5m) edges the pack with 2.89 whilst Manuel Akanji and John Stones (£5.5m) aren’t far behind.

The Manchester City defence is problematic due to rotation so the safest option could be goalkeeper Ederson. However, John Stones became integral to the Manchester City midfield towards the latter stages of last season and could continue in that way.

The Manchester City attack

Manchester City were one of the best sides in the league last season offensively – they ranked:

First for goals scored (94)
Second for shots on target (214)
First for expected goals (80.47)

Manchester City attacking assets

Lets take a look at how the Manchester City attackers compare in terms of minutes and attacking potential.

Firstly, below we can see how each compares with the other for minutes played last season.

It should be mentioned that Ilkay Gundogan and Riyad Mahrez have left the club which opens up a spot for another attacker in the new campaign.

We can see that Erling Haaland (£14m) played more minutes than any other attacking player (2770), closely followed by Kevin De Bruyne (£10.5m) with 2424 – he is expected to miss the start of the new season due to injury.

Bernardo Silva (£6.5m) and Jack Grealish (£7.5m) sit third and fourth for minutes played last season.

Below is a graphic comparing the offensive stats of the Manchester City attackers.

Erling Haaland is clear of the other options with a NPXGI of 26.27. Kevin De Bruyne accumulated 19.75 last campaign making him a firm second. Jack Grealish was the third highest for NPXGI with 11.34.

The standout option in the Manchester City attack is Erling Haaland who leads for both minutes and NPXGI. Kevin De Bruyne would be a firm second if not for his injury but his price-point could also be an issue with other cheaper options available.

Another great option is Jack Grealish who became an integral part of Manchester City’ latter stage of their last season – he accumulated a solid amount of NPXGI. Phil Foden (£7.5m) could be favoured with the loss of Ilkay Gundogan and Riyad Mahrez – he also racked up a good amount of NPXGI and ranked higher than Grealish for expected goals.

Pre-season notes

So far Manchester City have played just three friendlies this summer – they have won two and lost one.
In the three games they have played they have failed to keep a single clean sheet but scored eight goals.
Amongst the goals scored was Erling Haaland (two), striker Julian Alvarez (£6.5m) and John Stones.