RADIO
Welcome to the 2023/24 Fantasy Premier League season, RotoBallers! The FPL game launched on July 5 and all the prices are revealed. Today, we will continue our team previews with Newcastle United and work through the EPL teams, looking at what catches our eye as well as their FPL outlooks.
We began our FPL coverage two years ago and are going big for the upcoming 2023/24 campaign. We will have position previews, team previews, and reactions to the most significant transfers in the preseason. Then, during the year, we will bring you our usual Staff Roundtable, weekly rankings, and a new monthly article: the Watchlist.
The first game of the 2023/24 Fantasy Premier League season is August 11 at 3:00 PM ET. Also, look out for the rest of our excellent soccer coverage as the squad gets you all set for every English Premier League and UEFA Champions League with our EPL DFS lineup picks and betting picks.
FPL Team Preview: Newcastle United
Newcastle United's fourth-place finish last season was their first top-10 finish in five seasons in what was their return to the Champions League for the first time in 20 years. After becoming "the richest club in the world", their next target is ending a more than half-century wait for a trophy. While the Premier League title might not be their most realistic option, they shouldn't be ruled out and will certainly expect to make a challenge for the top honors.
Last Year's Newcastle United Stats
- League Finish: 4th, 71 points
- Most goals: Callum Wilson, 18 goals
- Most assists: Kieran Trippier, nine assists
- Most FPL Points: Kieran Trippier, 198 FPL points
Who is your favorite Newcastle United defender for the upcoming FPL campaign?
- The standout is Kieran Trippier given his set-piece ability, but he's also the most expensive at £6.5m. FPL managers might be turned away due to his second half with just one of his 10 goal involvements coming after the World Cup. However, no other Newcastle defender offers anything close to the attacking threat Trippier does so I'd be more willing to pay the extra £2.0m for the attacking upside. He's currently being rostered by about one-third of teams, so he's a bit more contrarian this season.
Which Newcastle United midfielder is catching your eye?
- Harvey Barnes looks set to join the Geordies and he will certainly be someone of interest. Of the current crop, Joe Willock at £5.5m certainly has appeal. Only Miguel Almiron (158) had more points on the team among midfielders than Willock (123) and the former Arsenal man's 11.59 xGI (expected goal involvements) was third on the team behind Trippier (12.88) and Wilson (18.54).
The Newcastle United forward who will be bagging us some FPL points is...?
- At present, Alexander Isak is on more FPL teams than Wilson but give me the latter at just £0.5m more. I compared their stats last year and Wilson was not only the more efficient of the two, but he also outperformed Isak on a per-game basis. Even though I do like Isak, give me the proven entity in Wilson for just half a million more.
| Player | FPL points per match | Goals per 90 minutes | xGI per 90 minutes | Goals per shot | Shots per 90 minutes | Shots on target per 90 minutes |
| Wilson | 5.1 | 0.86 | 0.89 | 0.21 | 3.36 | 1.49 |
| Isak | 4.5 | 0.59 | 0.56 | 0.16 | 2.90 | 1.36 |
What run of fixtures favors Newcastle United the most for the 2023/24 FPL season?
- They have a really tough opening five games, facing five sides that finished in the top half but that is followed by five much more favorable fixtures between Gameweeks 6-10. Those weeks consist of two newly promoted sides and three opponents that finished in the bottom half last season. I don't look too far ahead but it's also notable that Gameweeks 23-31 sees Newcastle face only one team that finished in the top half last campaign.
How many Newcastle United players will you have in your Gameweek 1 squad?
- At present, I doubt I'll have any. That's in part due to their rather brutal fixtures to start the season and also as I want to see how they set up. With Sandro Tonali expected to feature in the midfield, Newcastle has plenty of attack-minded options to feature in front of him so who, how, and where they play will likely lead me to bring in a couple of their players after the first five games of the season.
What is one bold FPL prediction for any Newcastle United player?
- Bruno Guimarães has been a colt figure since joining Newcastle and with the arrival of Tonali, it could free him to push forward more. I wouldn't be surprised if Guimarães tops 150 points with 12-15 goal involvements this season should that be the case.
