Fantasy Premier League allows you to pick 15 FPL players – but only 11 make the cut every week
(Image credit: Darren Walsh/Chelsea FC via Getty Images)
So you've signed up to play Fantasy Premier League. You've got your FPL team name and you've worked out which players you want to target in each area.
£100m might seem like a lot of money to spend when they are only a handful of players worth over £10.0m in the game – but you're going to have to pick substitutes, too. Not that your subs get you any points.
So what's the point in substitutes? Let us explain.
FPL: How substitutes are used for in Fantasy Premier League
Ederson in action for Man City (Image credit: Robbie Jay Barratt - AMA/Getty Images)
There’s always a chance that one of your starting XI might not play – whether that's due to an injury, suspension, or a match being postponed for unforeseen reasons (it happens). In that circumstance, one of your substitutes will automatically be brought in, allowing you to still accumulate points.
For example, let's say your goalkeepers are Ederson and Bart Verbruggen. Ederson gets injured during the warm-up: but you can’t swap him out because the deadline has passed. Don’t worry though. Verbruggen will play that weekend and earn you points instead.
If an outfield player misses a match, they’ll be replaced by the highest-priority substitute who played that week, maintaining your team's formation. So, if you have three defenders, a defender will replace another defender.
(Image credit: Marc Atkins/Getty Images)
Another advantage of having a bench is the flexibility it offers to tweak your team before a match. That's right: like real life, it can be tactical.
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For instance, if you have Taiwo Awoniyi who is up against a team in the bottom three, and Erling Haaland facing Arsenal in a top-of-the-table clash, you might decide to bench the higher-valued player in Haaland, in favour of Awoniyi. After all, one of them has a harder job than the other.
Keep in mind that substitutions are processed at the end of gameweeks, so your adjustments won’t be reflected immediately.
Mark White is the Digital Content Editor at FourFourTwo. During his time on the brand, Mark has written three cover features on Mikel Arteta, Martin Odegaard and the Invincibles, and has written pieces on subjects ranging from Sir Bobby Robson’s time at Barcelona to the career of Robinho. An encyclopedia of football trivia and collector of shirts, he first joined the team back in 2020 as a staff writer.
