FPL Gameweek 5 Review: What Went Right And Wrong — 2 Oct

GW5 autopsy: the week the little guys scored — and why we don't panic

Antoine Semenyo put up 17 points at Manchester City, and with roughly 1 or 2 in 10 of us owning him, that's the haul that moved ranks this week. Not the glamour names — the mid-owned man doing damage on the hardest ground in the league.

The average manager scored 48. The top score was 126. The gap between those two numbers is almost entirely explained by who was holding the fringe hauls. Brobbey banged 17 for Sunderland with under 1 in 10 of us on board. Then came the real lottery winners: Dasilva (15, owned by hardly anyone), Schuster (14, barely 3 managers in a thousand), Manzambi (13, likewise next to nobody). If a rival jumped you by 40 points this week, odds are one of those names did it — and honestly, good luck to them, because nobody picks Schuster on purpose.

Here's the part that matters for us. The template did its job. Groß hauled 14 with about 3 in 10 of us owning him. Tarkowski's 14 and Hall's 13 were both held by nearly 2 in 10. Those are the scores that kept our ranks steady while the chaos happened around us. Owning what everyone owns isn't cowardice — it's the reason a week like this didn't hurt.

The captaincy is the one bruise. About 7 in 10 of us handed Haaland the armband, and the hindsight pick was Semenyo and his 17. That stings, but let's be honest with ourselves: nobody sane captains a 1-or-2-in-10 pick away at City, and chasing last week's perfect answer is how ranks die. The crowd captain protects us far more often than it burns us.

So what's the move? Don't chase Dasilva, Schuster or Manzambi — those were one-week fireworks from players almost nobody owns, and buying hauls after they happen is the classic trap. The actionable gap is Semenyo: already owned by enough managers that missing out hurts, cheap enough into the squad, and clearly in form if he's scoring like that at the Etihad.

The call: if you're missing Semenyo, that's your transfer this week — he's the one haul from GW5 worth acting on. Everything else, we hold. Protect the template, keep the armband on the obvious pick, and let the lottery winners enjoy their week.