GW 22 was my worst Gameweek of the season, with a GW rank of circa 5million, so it's ideal that the next deadline comes less than 48 hours after allowing those of us that want to get back on the trail of a green arrow.
Ahead of the last deadline, I made a cardinal sin of making a transfer on a hunch. After appearing on Scout the Gameweek and talking through my desire to get both Harry Kane and James Maddison. I went against those plans (although Kane was never as concrete as Maddison) due to the incoming news about them both losing their double gameweeks.
With Kane, there was always the option of Emmanuel Dennis. He allowed my to keep my team structure to allow for an easy reintroduction of Salah when he's back from AFCON, and he also had a tasty looking double against Newcastle and Burnley. Even when the Burnley game was thrown into doubt, I still convinced myself that a Watford double up with Josh King was what I wanted (combined with the structure point above) for their trip to Newcastle. I even gave Dennis the armband, even though I knew there was a big risk of only getting one game this week.
With my plan for Maddison though, I was scratching through what to do, and decided to try and be clever and punt on a Brighton player. They were playing straight after the deadline so there was less risk involved in their first game being called off, and they had the double. So in came Leandro Trossard, for no other reason than him being an attacking midfielder. I looked at Jakob Moder and Alexis Mac Allister, but a quick comparison of stats suggested Trossard was the one, and so it was quickly decided to shunt him in with 30 mins or so to go ahead of the Friday night deadline, and it nearly paid off, as he arguably should've scored when Cucarella put him through one-on-one with Jack Butland, but the keeper made a decent save.
I'd seen the people mentioning Bruno, and I had the cash to do the same, but I hadn't watched United in recent weeks, so hadn't noticed what a few had about his positional tweak, and so I dismissed him due to his lack of returns this season. The bits that I had seen on Man U meant Ronaldo was never an option, and I didn't really fancy their defenders, so i decided to avoid altogether. The avoidance of Bruno, and to a less extent - De Gea, compounded the red arrow.
Moving on the Gameweek 23, and if there is no late Covid rumours/news then it could potentially be the first week where I don't actually take a points hit since Gameweek 16 ( and I could even finally use my bench boost chip - still undecided) . With nearly £9m in the bank I can have the pick of any player in the game I want, and this week, that man is Phil Foden.
I sold Foden with a heavy heart in gameweek 21, after his covid rumours surfaced. Thankfully I brought in Jarrod Bowen to replace him and Bowen has contributed 49 points to my team in 2 gameweeks, after handing him the armband in GW21, but I want Foden back. It's likely to be in place of Trossard, although if I decide on my bench boost, I may replace Declan Rice to give myself a bit more of an attacking threat).
In his 3 appearances in my team previously, Foden returned double digits twice, and I'd never have considered selling him if it wasn't for Covid, and therefore he's coming straight back into my team as a part of a Man City Triple-up, ahead of their favourable fixture run (Southampton, Norwich and Brentford are their next three). My only debate is whether to hand the captains armband to Foden or De Bruyne.