Welcome back to another daily fantasy football tips article where this week I've decided to switch things up a little bit. I'm putting it out there than ANY of you, with a basic knowledge of fantasy football, can win £600 in Gameweek 8. So far this season, myself and NaturalFootyFan have won a combined total of over £1,000 and I'm going to share with you how.
First and foremost, please click here to open our guide to Bet4theBest's scoring system in a new tab. It makes sense to familiarise yourself with their scoring system before reading this article. Don't worry, it should only take you around 5 minutes to read.
Each week, over £5,000 is shared out between hundreds of fantasy football managers on Bet4theBest.com. I've personally topped the £10 league a few times, but as it stands my highest finish in the £20 league is 3rd (which still won me around £400).
The table below displays the first place payout for all three leagues between GW5-GW7. It's important to note that the top 15/20 teams in each league receive a payout too, it's not just winner takes all.
* Split between two winning entries, both received £282.89 each.
As you can see, the more you bet, the more you win… the fundamentals of gambling. However, when explaining daily fantasy football (Bet4theBest) in comparison to sportsbook gambling (SkyBet, etc) I usually say the following:
“Sportsbooks require you to predict what is going to happen and you have to be 100% correct to win. Daily fantasy on the other hand, only requires you to be more correct that 80% of the people you're against.”
As you can see, during GW5 and GW6 it required a score of around 80 points to top the table whilst in GW7 it only took 62. If we take the last three weeks scores and divide them by three, we get the average of 76 points. Therefore, it's a fair to say that if your team scores 76 points in Gameweek 8 you'll definitely receive a payout and could come first. That means you'll need to score 6.9 points per player (roughly 6.0 if you include captaincy points).
I'm now going to provide a few tips based on the trends I've noticed from the data collected above:
| POOLS | GW5 | GW6 | GW7 |
| £5 | £149.93 | £182.65 | £166.92 |
| £10 | £298.32 | £565.78* | £333.6 |
| £20 | £601.48 | £729.04 | £666.7 |
How to win £600 playing fantasy football in Gameweek 8
Below you will see that that I've taken the winning team from the GW5, GW6 & GW7 and placed them side by side. I've then noted the formation, number of goals, assists & clean sheets, and points per position.
As you can see, during GW5 and GW6 it required a score of around 80 points to top the table whilst in GW7 it only took 62. If we take the last three weeks scores and divide them by three, we get the average of 76 points. Therefore, it's a fair to say that if your team scores 76 points in Gameweek 8 you'll definitely receive a payout and could come first. That means you'll need to score 6.9 points per player (roughly 6.0 if you include captaincy points).
I'm now going to provide a few tips based on the trends I've noticed from the data collected above:
Selecting your formation:
3-4-3 is the dominant formation within Bet4theBest and in theory it's logical to have seven attacking players to optimise your chance of having players that score (if you read the guide to Bet4theBest's scoring you'll know that assists are insignificant compared to goals). If you're going to win you'll need at least six goals from your attacking seven. However, whilst having three strikers is a given, the data above definitely raises the question of whether you should opt for four defenders (in a 4-3-3) instead four midfielders (in a 3-4-3). From the winning teams above, defensive players have averaged 6.1 points, midfielders 5.8 points and strikers 6.6 points. Therefore, defenders on average have picked up more points than midfielders, though I guess it comes down to whether you're more confident calling a clean sheet or a goal.Selecting your defenders:
You may, or may not have noticed that in GW5 and GW6 both winning teams had stacked defenders from one club hoping for a clean sheet. It's a risky tactic as it requires putting all of your eggs are in one basket, but if it pays off you're laughing and can guarantee an average of six points from your defenders. As a backup, ensure that you stack defenders from teams who are known for having goalscoring defenders. In GW5, Scott Dann's goal was enough to compensate for the lost clean sheet, and the same in GW6 with a goal and two assists from Chris Smalling and Daley Blind respectively.Selecting the right captain:
It goes without saying that your choice of captain in pinnacle to your success. If we take GW6 for example, having Aguero as captain returned 24 points. Assuming you need 6.0 points per player, this provided ‘Here 4 Money' with 18 points to be spread around the underachievers in his team such as Lanzini (1), Valencia (2), Firmino (3). However, it does depend on the nature of the game week. In Gameweek 7 no player scored more than one goal which mean that no large deficits were created due to captains. The winning team had Ibrahimovic (4 points) as captain but an excellent defensive display (despite Ivanovic scoring 0) was enough to claim the victory.Cheat Sheet:
- Stack one goalkeeper and three defenders from the same team.
- Opt for a formation of either 4-3-3 or 3-4-3.
- Focus on selecting attackers who score, assists are redundant.
- A defender goal > everything.
- Select a captain who scores 2+ and you're laughing.
