Efficiency · Gameweek 1

Value lives in defence this week — Calafiori is the whole market's best buy

0.931 points per million at £5.5m: no player at any price converts budget into projection better.

eBy the evmax model · 21 August 2026

Points per million is a lens, not a verdict — but this week the lens is unambiguous. Calafiori's 5.12 expected points at £5.5m yield 0.931 points per million, the best figure in the game. In the budget tier, Shaw (3.98 at £4.5m, 0.884 per million) and N.Williams (4.1, 0.82) lead; Diop at £4.0m (0.807 per million) is the enabler that actually projects points.

Calafiori0.93Shaw0.88Ndiaye0.86N.Williams0.82Diop0.81Fée0.80Mosquera0.79Tarkowski0.78Raya0.77Verbruggen0.74
Top 10 by Pts/m. Green = top pick · red = under 10% owned. Full list in the table below.

In midfield, Ndiaye is the mid-tier standout — 5.13 expected points at £6.0m, 0.856 per million — with Le Fée (4.79, 0.799 per million at just 9.9% ownership) the differential version of the same trade.

One warning about this whole page: efficiency is how you pick your sixth through fifteenth player, not your first.

At the top of the price list the lens inverts. B.Fernandes returns 0.737 points per million — respectable — while Haaland returns 0.503, the price of his ceiling and his fixture insurance. Premium slots are bought for raw points and captaincy leverage; nobody ever won their league on a striker's value ratio. Spend the efficiency budget where it belongs: everywhere else.

Bottom line: Calafiori (0.931 points per million) and Ndiaye (0.856) are the two purchases this page exists to recommend; treat premium value ratios as trivia.

The data

#PlayerPts/mxPtsPriceOwned %Ceiling
1Calafiori ARSMid0.935.125.513.8%13.88
2Shaw MUNBudget0.883.984.523.3%7.99
3Ndiaye EVEMid0.865.136.020.0%15.04
4N.Williams NFOBudget0.824.105.013.3%10.80
5Diop IPSBudget0.813.234.020.8%10.28
6E.Le Fée SUNMidDifferential0.804.796.09.9%13.02
7Mosquera ARSMid0.794.365.517.3%9.36
8Tarkowski EVEMidDifferential0.784.676.09.9%11.16
9Raya ARSMid0.774.636.030.2%8.17
10Verbruggen BHABudget0.743.344.516.8%8.04
11B.Fernandes MUNPremium0.748.8512.048.7%19.70
12Thiago BREMid0.745.898.016.0%14.16
13Welbeck BHAMidDifferential0.734.386.02.9%13.52
14Van Hecke TOTBudgetDifferential0.733.635.08.2%10.17
15Senesi TOTMid0.724.356.011.3%10.55
16Hume SUNBudgetDifferential0.723.244.51.4%9.10
17Dalot MUNBudgetDifferential0.703.535.03.2%9.65
18Roefs SUNBudgetDifferential0.703.505.05.7%8.73
19Lammens MUNBudget0.693.465.019.9%7.64
20Dubravka TOTBudget0.692.744.024.8%6.86

Bottom line

Calafiori (0.931 points per million) and Ndiaye (0.856) are the two purchases this page exists to recommend; treat premium value ratios as trivia.

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How we get these numbers. Market odds (de-vigged) → Dixon-Coles scorelines → 50k Monte-Carlo simulations, scored on the official Fantasy Premier League points table. Ceiling = the average of a player's best 15% of our 50,000 simulations — the score when his best realistic games happen, not a fantasy cap. Every figure here is machine-readable at /api/fpl/gw1/efficiency.json.