Is it better to pick Midfielder over Forward?

[JasonH]

Is it better to pick a midfielder instead of a forward? Because:
1. A midfielder goal is 5 points versus a forward goal of 4 points
2. A midfielder has 1 clean sheet point. A forward does not earn the clean sheet point.

If this is true, then over the season midfielders like Salah, Hazard, Sanchez, Pogba would earn more points than Kane, Lukaku, Jesus, Aguero, correct?

[swadd1er]

If Salah scored 10 and Aguero scored 10, Salah would have 50 and Aguero 40. 10 clean sheets each, 10pts vs 0.

But it’s incomparable when the “top” strikers tend to get a boat load more chances and more often than not outscore the midfielders over the course of the season. Obviously yellow/red cards, playing time and bonus have an impact.

It isn’t necessarily better to pick a midfielder over a forward, it comes down to form, fixture and statistics but at the end of the day you have to pick 3 strikers for your team and it would be silly not to go with 2 of Lukaku/Morata/Kane/Lacazette/Aguero/Jesus in my opinion. Apart from Wilson and Niasse this weekend, there wasn’t really an in form cheap striking option bar Abraham early on and more recently Murray.

It’s all about the balance but with the amount of Midfield premiums delivering points this weekend (De Bruyne, Sané, Silva, Salah, Coutinho, Pogba, Hazard, Sanchez, Ozil, Fabregas) and Wilson/Niasse firing. A front 3 of Morata, Niasse/Wilson, Jesus/Aguero will be very popular to load up on a 4th premium in midfield.

There’s paragraphs I could go on and type but the simple answer to your question is “there’s a lot of depending factors”.

[The Royal BlueNose]

I'm thinking going full midfield heavy - especially when the Man City strikers (who will probably be the top scoring team come the end of the season) have two relatively pricey, not-locked down starters.

I'm probably tilting slightly because Aguero stayed benched yesterday, and he's an expensive player to have on the bench.

[Owsler]

I'm currently having more 'luck' with midfielders than forwards, but I don't expect the big hauls you can get from someone like Kane or Aguero.

[Shevchenko]

Fill GK with Pope and Elliot. Look for a nicely rotating based priced defender. Add Azpi/Alonso. Mix some awkward priced defender (ranging from Dann to Daniels to Jones to Otamendi to Vertonghen). Pick OOP or pseudo OOP midfielders like Hazard, Salah/Mane, Sane and even Alexis. Mix them with cheap key midfielders like Zaha, Richarlison or Gros. Add RLC. Done? Then spend whatever left in your funds for forwards, preferably you have enough for two of Kane/Lukaku/Aguero/Morata/Jesus and one cheapie like Niasse/DCL/Okazaki/Abraham/Wilson.
Balance is the key. Every players have their own purple patch (due to fixture and form), a squad with balanced spreaded funds will allows you to pick the in form one with your one FT every weeks.

[swadd1er]

If I had the wildcard I’d probably end up with something like,

Pope, Elliot,
Azp, Mee, Dunk, Yedlin, Daniels
Hazard, Pogba, Salah, Silva, RLC
Jesus, Morata, Wilson.

I’d also give or take a position here and there depending on the form/fixtures when I wildcarded of course.

[Klaren]

I'm currently having more 'luck' with midfielders than forwards, but I don't expect the big hauls you can get from someone like Kane or Aguero.

A hat trick yields 17 points to a striker, but a midfielder can get 15-16 points (depending on CS) with only 2 goals. And while I don't have the stats to back this up, I'm quite sure in average, there would be more cases of a midfielder scoring 2 goals than a striker getting a hat trick.

For example scoring 2 goals each in the last 2 matches was enough for Salah to pretty much get the points equivalent to Kane, Aguero, Lukaku etc would get when they score hat-tricks.

Therefore while it might have been luck in your case as you mentioned, overall I think midfielders like Hazard and Salah are likely to score more than top strikers assuming no injuries.

However of course this depends on the quality of the players, and therefore my above logic only applies to the current season we are in. An extraordinary striker is likely to score significant higher number of goals due to the number of chances he gets, but I don't see any strikers in premier league right now that has a potential to score significantly more goals than top midfielders to make up for the CS and additional points that midfielders get for each goal.

[Zimmerman]

11 hatricks scored last season
14 (15/16)
10 (14/15)

Got to assume braces are more common place.
Salah x 2, Hazard and Sanchez yesterday that four I can think of in a couple of weeks without even a scratching my head (compared to three hat tricks so far).

But that’s obviously the extreme case.

A (top) striker is more likely to score most weeks (or even pick up a brace than your average midfielder.

There are a few exceptions (the Hazard and Sanchez types).

[Football Hero]

Strikers score more, midfielders assist more; simples.

[Football Hero]

Is it better to pick a midfielder instead of a forward? Because:
1. A midfielder goal is 5 points versus a forward goal of 4 points
2. A midfielder has 1 clean sheet point. A forward does not earn the clean sheet point.

If this is true, then over the season midfielders like Salah, Hazard, Sanchez, Pogba would earn more points than Kane, Lukaku, Jesus, Aguero, correct?

Yes, you are correct that midfielders like Hazard and Pogba score just as many goals as the forwards that contend the golden boot each season.

[Mav3rick]

Is it better to pick a midfielder instead of a forward? Because:
1. A midfielder goal is 5 points versus a forward goal of 4 points
2. A midfielder has 1 clean sheet point. A forward does not earn the clean sheet point.

If this is true, then over the season midfielders like Salah, Hazard, Sanchez, Pogba would earn more points than Kane, Lukaku, Jesus, Aguero, correct?

In FPL, it's always a bit more complicated than that, as you can't choose a mid or a forward in isolation, since you have to pick a midfielder or striker to pair them with. You also have to hunt out value, as well as looking for raw points, and both value and raw points can often be found in the same place in an FPL squad, so, as swadd1er said, it's all a balancing act.

In the case of midfielders like Salah, Sanchez or Hazard (who really play as forwards) then yes it's likely one or two are decent picks to build a squad around, but the overall balance still needs to be right.

[wibble_mcwoo]

It really isn't that difficult to work this one out, you know. Just look at past seasons. Taking some of the premiums with a few seasons under their belt, they've scored as follows for the last five seasons (going backwards, ignoring Kane's sub season):

Hazard 224 104 233 202 190 - Av 191
Sanchez 264 167 207 - Av 213
Silva 130 96 191 151 147 - Av 143
Sterling 149 96 158 132 82 - Av 123

Kane 224 211 191 - Av 208
Aguero 175 184 216 156 121 - Av 170
Lukaku 221 185 135 168 159 - Av 174
Rooney 76 118 132 190 143 - Av 132

Average for the four midfielders: 167, for the four strikers: 171.

Not a very scientific analysis, but past experience tells us that they can score pretty similarly. A quick google showed me the dream teams for past seasons (see the link below), and either class can have a beast season: we've had Lampard and Ronaldo dominating, but we've also had Henry, Suarez, Van Persie.

https://fpldiscovery.wordpress.com/2014 ... l-history/