FPL Budget Picks: The Best GK Under £5.0

Budget Keepers Under £5.0m: Who's Actually Worth Your Money

Twenty-eight keepers qualify at £5.0m or under. Most of them are traps. Here's the shortlist that isn't.

Verbruggen (BHA, £4.5m) tops our list, and it's not close on value. Our model has him for around 26 points over the next six, he's a proven Premier League keeper, and Brighton's fixtures are about as kind as they come — starting at Sunderland. About 2 in 10 managers already own him, which tells you the template has done its homework. At £4.5m, this is the whole argument for budget keepers in one player.

Trafford (LEE, £5.0m) matches that 26-point projection with an equally soft run — though the opener at Arsenal is a freebie for nobody. He's less proven at this level and costs £0.5m more, which is why he sits second. Only about 1 in 2o have him, if a differential keeper is your thing.

Kelleher (BRE, £5.0m) is the safe pair of hands — proven, kind fixtures, projected just behind the top two at about 25. Villa away first up. Hardly owned, perfectly respectable.

The rest, briefly: Kinsky (TOT, £4.5m) has decent fixtures but an unproven claim on the shirt and a trip to Old Trafford first — a lot of managers (nearly 2 in 10) are holding a hope, not a keeper. Tzolakis (HUL, £4.6m) is a similar gamble. Petrović (BOU, £4.5m) is quietly interesting — proven, favourable run, barely 3 in 100 own him — but starts at Chelsea. Leno (£4.5m) and Roefs (£4.9m) are steady starters with average fixtures; fine, not exciting. Lammens (MUN, £4.9m) and Martinez (CHE, £5.0m) cost near the ceiling of this bracket for middling or tough runs — that's paying more for less. Horníček and Rushworth are cheap but unproven starters, and a keeper who might not play is worth precisely nothing.

The romance of a £5.0m punt is not worth the £0.5m. Buy Verbruggen — cheapest price in the bracket, best fixtures, proven, projected as well as anything costing more. If you want to zig, Trafford is the best alternative, but you're paying extra to own the road less travelled. Take the boring one. It funds a forward.