Should managers use the Wildcard in Gameweek 2?

The Premier League continues and after an eventful Gameweek 1 many managers will be looking ahead to the new round. The first round may not have gone your way in FPL so we take a look if managers should use the wildcard in Gameweek 2.

The Wildcard is a chip provided by the game to make as many changes as we want within our teams before the next deadline. FPL provides one Wildcard in the first half of the season and another in the second half. So, is it a good time to use the Wildcard?

Early days

For those taking up FPL for the first time it could be tempting to react to Gameweek 1. However, it is still very early days and the most experienced FPL managers tend to wait longer, gather more information and be patient before activating the precious chip.

Player ownership

Below we can see a list of the most owned players in the game. Although Manchester United are yet to play (at the time of writing), of the nine highest owned players that did play, seven of them collected a significant return. This suggests that most managers had a fairly solid Gameweek, or at least so far.

Injuries or doubts

Some managers within the community may have fallen victim to their players suffering injuries or not starting. The likes of Arsenal defender Gabriel (£5m) did not start in Gameweek 1 due to a tactical change and Manchester City midfielder Kevin De Bruyne (£10.5m) suffered an early injury against Burnley.

Changes like the above can be made via free transfers or even small hits if necessary. With this in mind it would be unwise to use the Wildcard on one or two changes.

Should we use the Wildcard in Gameweek 2?

No. It is far too early in the season so use the Wildcard. With only one round played we have very limited information to justify using such an important chip. Most of the highest owned players in the game have performed extremely well so unless you do not have most of them in your team then wasting the wildcard this early could be extremely damaging long term.