Another gameweek done. Twenty-three goals across six matches, with West Ham's 3-2 comeback against Burnley providing the week's most entertaining theatre. The league averaged 37 points, though the spread between best and worst tells a different story entirely.

Aston Villa dismantled Bournemouth 4-0 with clinical efficiency. Buendía opened the scoring, Malen added a second, then Barkley and Onana completed the rout. It was the sort of performance that makes defending look optional. Elsewhere, Manchester City's 3-0 victory over Liverpool felt less like a statement and more like a reminder of the gulf between first and second. Doku, Nicolás González, and Haaland got on the scoresheet, though the captain's return of 4 points would prove frustratingly familiar across The Premier Pundits.

Chelsea beat Wolves 3-0 with Gusto, Neto, and João Pedro scoring. Nottingham Forest dispatched Leeds 3-1, while Brentford's 3-1 win over Newcastle featured two goals from Thiago. Across The Premier Pundits, managers averaged 37 points, a respectable haul that masked significant variance in how they got there.

All ten managers captained Haaland. Every single one. It's the sort of unanimity that usually signals either genius or collective miscalculation, and this week it landed firmly in the latter camp. The Manchester City forward returned 4 points, which is to say he played, didn't score, didn't assist, and collected his baseline captaincy points. Nothing more. It's a reminder that even the most obvious choices can disappoint, and that perfect consensus rarely translates to perfect returns. Nathan McBannister still finished first in the gameweek with 41 points despite Haaland's blank, suggesting his squad depth elsewhere did the heavy lifting. Rachel Brown and Oliver Chen both captained the same player and both saw their weeks shaped by factors beyond the armband.

Bench points ranged from a miserly 1 point to Rachel Brown's 10 points, a gap that speaks volumes about squad construction and transfer timing. The league average sat at 4.9 points, meaning Brown's bench outperformed the norm by more than double. That's not luck; that's having the right players in reserve at the right time. Oliver Chen's bench yielded 7 points, respectable but not exceptional. Nathan McBannister managed just 3 points on the bench despite his gameweek win, suggesting his starting eleven did virtually all the work. The variance here is instructive. In a league where everyone captains the same player and scores within 15 points of each other, bench management becomes the differentiator. Brown's ability to accumulate points from unused players while others left minimal value on the sidelines kept her competitive despite taking two transfers for a 4-point hit.

Nathan McBannister made one transfer at no cost, swapping Gyökeres for Thiago. That move paid immediate dividends. Thiago scored twice against Newcastle and finished with 13 points, a strong return that justified the move. Oliver Chen took a different approach, transferring Saka out for Mbeumo. That swap cost him 10 points in net value. Saka managed 12 points; Mbeumo returned just 1 point. It's the sort of transfer that looks clever on paper and painful in hindsight. Rachel Brown made two moves for a 4-point penalty, suggesting she was chasing form or responding to injury news. The mid-table pack averaged 0.9 transfers per manager, indicating most held their nerve this week. Those who didn't faced mixed results, with Nathan's move working out and Oliver's backfiring spectacularly.

Nathan McBannister leads the league with 682 total points, up two places to first after his 41-point gameweek. Rachel Brown sits seventh on 648 points, unchanged from last week despite her 39-point haul. Oliver Chen remains eighth with 645 points, also static, after scoring 36 points. The gap between first and third is 37 points, suggesting the season remains genuinely competitive despite McBannister's current advantage.

Chelsea travel to Burnley in a fixture that favours the visitors given their current form. Bournemouth host West Ham in a match between two sides heading in opposite directions. Liverpool face Nottingham Forest at Anfield, a chance for the hosts to respond after their 3-0 defeat this week. Brighton entertain Brentford in what should be an entertaining encounter between two sides comfortable in possession. Fulham's trip to Sunderland and Wolves' visit to Crystal Palace complete the slate. Managers should monitor team news closely; international fixtures may have left some squads depleted. The fixture list offers no obvious standouts for captaincy, meaning differentiation will come from identifying which players are most likely to perform against their assigned opponents rather than relying on consensus picks.