The clearest signal from Gameweek 2 did not come from a transfer. It came from the armband. Of the 995 highest-ranked managers in the Bawler sample, 99.8% owned Bruno Fernandes, 98.6% gave him the captaincy, and 58.2% of the whole sample - 579 managers - went further still and played their Triple Captain chip on him alone. That chip triples a player's score for one week and most managers save it for later in the season, often for a fixture where a team plays twice. Spending it in Gameweek 2 on a single midfielder was a statement of conviction.
It paid off. Fernandes scored a hat-trick against Ipswich Town at Old Trafford, taking his tally to 25 points from two games. The sample's average score for the gameweek was 129.2, against 81 for the game as a whole - a gap of 48.2 points. A single captaincy decision, multiplied by three for well over half the sample, explains a large share of that.
The contrast with Erling Haaland is just as telling. He is owned by 70.9% of everyone who plays FPL but only 29.8% of the elite sample - the sample's largest gap in the other direction, at -41.1. Only 0.6% gave him the captaincy this week, against 98.6% for Fernandes. The best-performing managers were not just picking a different captain. Plenty of them are choosing not to own the reigning Golden Boot favourite at all.
There was not much else going on. The sample made an average of 0.27 transfers each - roughly one move for every four managers - and only 1.5% paid the four-point penalty for an extra transfer. Most of Gameweek 2 was squads left alone rather than squads rebuilt.
Where transfers did happen, Yoane Wissa was the most-bought player, brought in by 2.6% of the sample. He arrived at Newcastle from Brentford in a deadline-day move worth a reported £55m, signed to replace Alexander Isak after Isak's exit to Liverpool. Despite being this week's top buy, Wissa is owned by only 3.8% of the elite sample against 11.7% of everyone else - a gap of -7.9. The buying interest has not yet turned into broad conviction at the sharp end of the table.
Rayan Cherki tells a similar story from the other side. He was bought by 1.6% of the sample this week, but his overall ownership sits at just 4.7% among the top managers against 25.9% among all managers - a gap of -21.2, one of the widest fades in the data. Pep Guardiola has since confirmed Cherki suffered a quadriceps tear that will keep him out for around seven to eight weeks. The elite sample was already notably light on him before that news broke.
Three names appear on both the bought and sold lists this week at almost identical rates: Benjamin White, Bryan Mbeumo and Dominic Calvert-Lewin. White was bought by 1.8% and sold by 1.8%; Mbeumo bought by 1.9% and sold by 1.6%; Calvert-Lewin bought by 1.7% and sold by 1.5%. That is not a consensus move in either direction - it is one part of the sample cashing in on players another part is bringing in. White is back after a serious knee injury and was declared fit for pre-season; some managers are backing his defensive returns, others are moving on. Calvert-Lewin remains owned by 72.8% of the top sample despite modest returns so far, suggesting the churn is about squad structure as much as form.
On the selling side, Iliman Ndiaye was let go by the most managers (1.9%), followed by White, Jack Hinshelwood (1.6%), Mbeumo and Calvert-Lewin. Bart Verbruggen was sold by 1.2% of the sample despite being owned by 66.8% of it - still one of the most-owned goalkeepers at the top of the game. Richarlison, who has just 2 points from two games, was sold by 1.5%.
The core of the elite sample's squads did not move much. João Pedro is owned by 98.8% of the top managers against 69.8% of everyone else, and Riccardo Calafiori by 91.7% against 43.6% - a gap of 48.1, one of the widest in the data. Neither picked up significant captaincy share this week, but both remain fixtures in the squads that are currently outscoring the rest of the game.
Beyond the Triple Captain, chip use was light: 5.3% of the sample played Bench Boost, 0.5% used Free Hit and 0.3% went with Wildcard. This is a snapshot of one deadline, not a plan for the next one. Most of the sample made no transfer at all, and the players bought or sold this week moved by fractions of a percentage point. What it shows is where conviction sat when the Gameweek 2 squads were locked in - not what the best managers will do next.