This week’s FPL Challenge allows managers to select a team of seven players made up of only goalkeepers and defenders with an unlimited budget.
Here, FPL expert Tom Johnson reveals how he’s tackling Gameweek 31.
After a long break for international football and the FA Cup, Fantasy returned with a bang in Gameweek 30. Following the conclusion of Chelsea v Spurs, managers have less than 48 hours to prepare for Gameweek 31 in both FPL and Fantasy Challenge.
This week's challenge is called Park The Bus and rather than selecting a full team including midfielders and forwards, as well as the defensive players, this week is purely about the goalkeepers and defenders. Managers have to utilise a 2-5-0-0 formation, selecting two goalkeepers and five defenders.
There are no budget restrictions for this challenge, meaning managers can pick the likes of William Saliba (£6.3m), Virgil van Dijk (£6.5m) and Josko Gvardiol (£6.1m) all in the same team without compromising elsewhere.
Target Leicester
The first port of call when picking defensive Fantasy assets is predicting clean sheets. In Gameweek 31, the best chance of a shutout looks to be from Newcastle United, who travel to Leicester City.
The Foxes are in dire form under Ruud van Nistelrooy, winning just once in their last 16 matches. Significantly for this week’s Fantasy Challenge, they are without a goal in seven matches and haven’t scored at home since Gameweek 15.
In that spirit, I’ve opted for three Newcastle assets in Nick Pope (£4.9m), Tino Livramento (£4.5m) and Dan Burn (£4.4m).
All three players registered a clean sheet in Newcastle’s last away match, against West Ham in Gameweek 28. Burn in particular, provides an attacking threat, as shown by his goal against Liverpool in the EFL Cup final.
It’s worth mentioning that if he wasn’t an injury doubt, I’d have selected Kieran Trippier (£5.6m). However, one of the benefits of Fantasy Challenge is the rolling deadline.
If Trippier is named in the starting line-up on Monday evening, I will swap him in for Livramento.
Attacking defenders
As well as attempting to predict clean sheets, chasing the upside of attacking returns is also a viable strategy for this week's Challenge.
My other three defender picks, alongside Burn and Livramento, are all defenders who love to get forward and threaten the opposition goal.
Firstly, Daniel Munoz (£5.1m) has been in fine form of late, blanking just twice in his last nine matches. In that time he has returned five clean sheets, three assists and found the back of the net once.
Despite scoring three times this season, the Colombian is still underperforming his Expected Goals (xG) tally of 4.10. Perhaps this is the week he delivers on the numbers!
Furthermore, Crystal Palace have been exceptionally solid at the back in recent weeks - no team can better their Expected Goals Against (xGA) figure of 3.70.
Joining Munoz in my back five is Gvardiol. No defender has scored more goals in Fantasy this season than the Croat's five.
Only Trent Alexander Arnold (£7.3m) can better Gvardiol's 38 shots and Expected Goal Involvement (xGI) of 6.87 among defenders, while he ranks top for penalty area touches, with 87.
Despite an inconsistent season, the Man City defence has shown signs of improvement. Over the last six Gameweeks, they rank joint-second for big chances conceded and fourth for xGA.
My fifth and final defender is Marc Cucurella (£5.3m), who has a trip to Brentford.
Although perhaps not the best fixture to target for a clean sheet, Cucurella’s attacking numbers over the last six Gameweeks are very impressive.
The Chelsea left-back has taken five shots, scoring twice, and ranks joint-third for penalty-box touches, with 17. In total, no defender has scored more Fantasy points over the last six Gameweeks than the Spaniard’s 39.
The second goalkeeper
The trickiest and final decision for my Fantasy Challenge team is my second goalkeeper. David Raya (£5.5m) and Guglielmo Vicario (£4.8m) are both strong candidates.
In Raya's favour is Arsenal's defensive prowess. They have the best xGA (25.93), have allowed the fewest big chances (40) while only Liverpool can better the Gunners' 98 shots on target conceded throughout 2024/25.
However, losing centre-back Gabriel (£6.4m) to injury is a big blow, and Gameweek 31 opponents Everton have only failed to score once since Gameweek 21.
Because of this, I'm currently favouring Spurs' goalkeeper, Vicario.
The Italian has returned at least one save point in each of his last six matches, providing insurance to fall back on if Southampton do manage to score.
However, that appears unlikely. Only Leicester have created fewer Expected Goals than Saints' 28.14 this season.
