Jose has declared his pre-season is focusing on Sanchez, Mata and Martial as his front three (because of players to be rested following the World-Cup) so we’re going to be throwing all 3 at you today – first up, is Sanchez worth a slot in our FPL teams?

One eye on the past: In the long-term, he has an average of 2pts per game (goals, assists & bonus points) – which is woeful versus our value for money target of 3.7pts per game (5.7 including appearance points).

The bottom line, is that he has not performed consistently enough since his switch to Man Utd. But looking specifically at weeks 29 to 35, he played in 6 games out of 7, scoring 1, assisting 5 and scoring 5 bonus points – this kind of form just about ticks the value for money box.

His game-time since moving to Man Utd has been good, so don’t be fooled into false-hope that Jose’s promise of game-time at the start of the season is something new. What can be considered new however, is playing alongside Martial and Mata, which hasn’t been seen too often.

So this needs to be considered – do you think these players will bring the best out of him? A tricky-pacey winger in Martial, who pins defences back creating space in the hole (and might also be played number 9 – like Walcott), and a gifted assister who can sit and orchestrate attacks (like Ozil) – so if Sanchez gets freedom to roam, we might see Arsenal-sized returns.

One eye on the future: There is a mixed bag forecasted as far as Man Utd’s opening fixtures – they should score a couple per game at home, up to 3 goals versus Burnley in week 4 but might struggle to click versus Brighton and Watford. But all in all there are goals to be had across the period, it is just a matter of who grabs them.

Looking at Sanchez’s form against similar opposition, he has an average of 0.6 goal-involvement against most of the teams, but mostly assists – and his big chance-involvement is 0.4. So we cannot exactly take solace in how he has performed versus these types of opponents. But we can recognise that even with an available Lukaku, Pogba etc, our algorithms are forecasting Sanchez to be their most influential player – for both share in goal-involvement and games involved in goals (this largely driven by the afore mentioned purple patch from weeks 29 to 35) so if this comes true he will return well.

What to do: There are signs that Sanchez might come good (relative to his value because he will score points over the opening weeks) – but the Jose promise of game-time is a red-herring (he was always going to get this regardless). What you need to consider is that he costs £10.5M – over one-tenth of your budget from which we need to buy fifteen players. So “might come good” is not good enough right now.

Wait and be certain that we have the Sanchez of old, before bringing him into your team. But if I had to chose between Sanchez, Mata or Martial, it is Sanchez who will score higher, but I believe Martial will be better value for money.

FPL Tip: FPL is a game with a large element of chance, but it is good decisions about how to allocate your budget that increases your chances significantly – taking a gamble on a player who consumes a large proportion of your budget is very high risk.