FPL Gameweek 5 Review: What Went Right And Wrong

GW5 Post-Mortem: The Week the Punts Went Off — and Why We Shouldn't Chase Them

Antoine Semenyo's 17 points was the captaincy of the week — and only about 1.5 in 10 of us owned him at all, never mind armbanded him. The crowd went Haaland, as we did, as over 7 in 10 of us did. He didn't haul. That's the whole story of a scratchy gameweek: the average manager scored 48, someone out there hit 126, and the gap between those two numbers was made almost entirely of players hardly anyone owns.

Look at the haul list. Brobbey banged 17 for Sunderland with about 1 in 20 owning him. Dasilva got 15 for Coventry — fewer than 1 in 100 have him. Schuster's 14 for Brentford, owned by basically nobody. Manzambi's 13 for Villa, same story. If you had any of those, your rank flew. If you didn't — and statistically, we didn't — you fell.

But before we panic-sell half the squad, let's be honest about what the template *did* return. Groß hauled 14 and nearly 3 in 10 of us own him — that kept ranks steady. Tarkowski's 14 and Hall's 13 did the same job for their owners, both sitting at about 1.5 in 10. The well-owned picks didn't fail us this week; the captain did, and one captain blank is not a crisis. Haaland stays over 7 in 10 owned for a reason: he's the safest big score in the game, and one quiet week doesn't change that. Selling him after a blank is how ranks get wrecked, not repaired.

Here's the warning, said gently before anyone learns it the hard way: the temptation now is to bring in Brobbey or Dasilva off one haul. That's buying last week's points. A 17-point explosion from a player owned by 1 in 20 is exactly the kind of score that doesn't repeat — if it did, everyone would already own him. Semenyo is the one from that list with real ownership momentum behind him, and even there, we'd want to see it again before spending a transfer.

The call: protect what we have. Keep Haaland, keep the armband on him unless something changes, keep Groß, and spend this week's transfer on need — an injury, a non-player — not on chasing a one-week wonder. Hold. The flock that didn't flinch this week will be the one climbing next week.