Choosing your last outfield starter for Gameweek 2 means weighing a close attacking pick against the defenders you could play instead. Christos Tzolis and Dominic Calvert-Lewin offer different reasons for selection. Florian Wirtz brings a minutes question, while Riccardo Calafiori and Nico O’Reilly deserve consideration beyond the standard three-defender formation.<\/p>\n
For this decision, compare the players you own. Their prices explain how you built the squad, but the more expensive player has no automatic claim on a starting place.<\/p>\n
Tzolis costs 6.5m and occupies a midfielder slot. He played 75 minutes in Gameweek 1 and visits Aston Villa with Arsenal in GW2. You can make a case for starting him if you want exposure to Arsenal’s attack and accept the possibility of another substitution before full time.<\/p>\n
Calvert-Lewin costs 6.0m, occupies a forward slot and faces Brentford at home with Leeds. He played 90 minutes in the opening match and holds first place in Leeds’ penalty order. Those are concrete reasons to consider him for your XI, even after his GW1 blank.<\/p>\n
If you place greater weight on a full-match appearance and an established penalty position, Calvert-Lewin has the clearer case. A penalty remains a possibility, not an expected return, and one 90-minute appearance cannot guarantee the next. Tzolis remains a reasonable choice for managers who prefer his involvement in Arsenal’s attack.<\/p>\n
Keep the margin between them small. We have one league appearance from each this season, which gives us too little evidence for a confident points ranking. A credible update on either player’s expected start or minutes should carry more weight than a narrow preference formed before the team news.<\/p>\n
Florian Wirtz is a 7.5m midfielder with Nottingham Forest at home in GW2. He played 62 minutes in the opening match. You can like the fixture while allowing for another early substitution in your selection judgment.<\/p>\n
Starting him means accepting that trade-off: involvement in Liverpool’s attack at home, with uncertainty over how long he plays. Bench him only if you can name a stronger case for the alternative in your squad. His price alone should neither protect his place nor encourage you to force him out after one match.<\/p>\n
A longer appearance would strengthen the case for future starts in your XI. Until he supplies that evidence, avoid treating 80 or 90 minutes as the default expectation.<\/p>\n
Riccardo Calafiori costs 5.6m and visits Aston Villa with Arsenal. Nico O’Reilly costs 6.5m and visits Crystal Palace with Man City. Both occupy defender slots in FPL and offer attacking potential alongside their clean-sheet opportunity.<\/p>\n
Calafiori played 80 minutes in GW1; O’Reilly played 62. Include that difference in your assessment, with the same caution about a one-match sample that applies to Wirtz. Attacking involvement does not remove a defender’s substitution risk.<\/p>\n
If you expect one of these defenders to start and prefer his combination of attacking involvement and clean-sheet opportunity to your weakest attacking selection, use the extra defender. You do not need to preserve a 3-4-3 or 3-5-2 formation at the expense of the player you prefer.<\/p>\n
Compare the final outfield candidates on expected minutes and their routes to points. For Tzolis versus Calvert-Lewin, choose between Arsenal attacking exposure and the Leeds forward’s opening-match minutes and penalty position. For Wirtz or an extra defender, account for substitution risk on both sides of the comparison.<\/p>\n
Recheck the expected starters before the GW2 deadline on Friday 28 August at 17:30 UTC, 20:30 in Cairo. After the matches, use the new minutes evidence to reassess the close calls for GW3.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tzolis or Calvert-Lewin? Weigh their GW2 minutes and roles, account for Wirtz’s early substitution, and give your attacking defenders a fair chance of starting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18794,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1976,1978,173,1977],"tags":[1982,1983],"class_list":["post-18795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chip-strategy","category-fixtures","category-fpl","category-player-analysis","tag-gameweek-2","tag-gameweek-3"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}