Arguments for the £4.5m Raya pick: ✅ Brentford have very good fixtures throughout August & September ✅ Raya was the highest scoring FPL goalkeeper last season if you judge it by FPL pts gained per minute played. *This is the fairest metric to judge him by given he was out injured for a significant period of time ⏰ ✅ Raya averaged 3+ saves per match so racked up a very prominent and healthy number of save points too. ✅ Very often having a £4.5m goalkeeper backed up by a £4m sub represents the optimal play in FPL. Admittedly having the likes of Mendy at £5m as an option challenges that norm. ✅ If you do go for a £4.5m goalkeeper my advice would be to not have a further £4.5m goalkeeper on your bench. You’ll spend time deciding who to bench each week (usually based on fixtures) and the result is often that the benched goalkeeper does better. The time is better spent focussing on more important things like captaincy decisions, transfer plans, team research, player research and strategy planning. ✅ Going for Raya allows you to have a £4m back up in Balcombe which means that if Raya unexpectedly doesn’t play then you’ll have a playing goalkeeper that GW anyway. Need to monitor Brentford’s new reserve goalkeeper though (signed about 2 hrs after I posted this!). ✅ No coincidence that Brentford’s form was best (very noticeable difference) when Raya was in the team. ✅ You’re never gonna want 3 Brentford outfield players so having their 2 goalkeepers doesn’t block an important spot in the same way as a Alisson, Ederson and even Mendy type might do.   Arguments against:   ❌ You may believe that Brentford will suffer from ‘second season syndrome’ and may struggle this season. ❌ You may believe that other goalkeepers will score a higher number of points (they almost certainly will do) AND AND AND AND that those points are sufficient higher to justify the extra spend on a more expensive goalkeeper. For me, and despite FPL generously pricing goalkeepers this season, there’s still a strong case to say that a £4.5m backed up by a £4m is probably still the way to go.

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