Defenders · Round 3
Denzel Dumfries heads the defensive picks for Round 3
Denzel Dumfries leads defenders at 6.08 xPts, ahead of Virgil van Dijk (6.05).
Denzel Dumfries tops the defensive rankings this round at 6.08 xPts, priced at £5.7m. Virgil van Dijk (6.05 xPts) is the next-best option.
Defenders from high-scoring expected fixtures offer attacking returns on top of clean-sheet potential — the best of both worlds.
The data
| # | Player | xPts | Price | Pts/m | Ceiling | Owned % |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Denzel Dumfries Netherlands | 6.08 | 5.7 | 1.07 | 11.47 | 16.8% |
| 2 | Virgil van Dijk Netherlands | 6.05 | 5.5 | 1.10 | 11.48 | 22.2% |
| 3 | Achraf Hakimi Morocco | 5.52 | 6.0 | 0.92 | 11.18 | 25.5% |
| 4 | Maxim De Cuyper BelgiumDifferential | 5.39 | 4.7 | 1.15 | 11.07 | 2.7% |
| 5 | Micky van de Ven NetherlandsDifferential | 5.27 | 5.1 | 1.03 | 4.31 | 4.3% |
| 6 | Thomas Meunier BelgiumDifferential | 5.13 | 4.8 | 1.07 | 11.02 | 1.2% |
| 7 | Emmanuel Agbadou Ivory CoastDifferential | 5.03 | 3.9 | 1.29 | 4.22 | 0.6% |
| 8 | Ghislain Konan Ivory CoastDifferential | 4.95 | 4.0 | 1.24 | 4.23 | 1.0% |
| 9 | Guela Doue Ivory CoastDifferential | 4.82 | 3.9 | 1.24 | 4.33 | 2.3% |
| 10 | Jeremie Frimpong NetherlandsDifferential | 4.80 | 5.0 | 0.96 | 4.29 | 0.1% |
| 11 | El Hadji Malick Diouf SenegalDifferential | 4.75 | 4.1 | 1.16 | 3.84 | 1.4% |
| 12 | Cristian Romero ArgentinaDifferential | 4.73 | 4.9 | 0.96 | 3.93 | 6.5% |
| 13 | Noussair Mazraoui MoroccoDifferential | 4.60 | 4.4 | 1.05 | 4.12 | 3.1% |
| 14 | Gabriel Magalhães Brazil | 4.53 | 5.5 | 0.82 | 3.75 | 19.6% |
| 15 | Abdoulaye Seck SenegalDifferential | 4.34 | 3.8 | 1.14 | 3.77 | 0.0% |
Bottom line
Start Denzel Dumfries — 6.08 xPts at £5.7m is the best defensive value this round.
How we get these numbers. Market odds (de-vigged) → Dixon-Coles scorelines → 50k Monte-Carlo simulations, scored on the official FIFA World Cup Fantasy points table. Every figure here is machine-readable at /api/round/3/defenders.json.