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            <p>Fantasy Football Hub's resident Fantasy Premier League (FPL) captaincy expert <a href="https://twitter.com/ChrisTanFPL">Chris Tan</a> takes a close look at the best FPL captain options for Gameweek 1.</p>
<p>Chris has already taken an in-depth look at the <a href="https://www.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/fpl-gameweek-1-fixtures-clean-sheet-odds-goalscoring-potential-and-players-to-target">FPL Gameweek 1 fixtures</a> in a new weekly article series, which will be running in addition to his best captaincy article.</p>
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<h2><strong>Best FPL captain for Gameweek 1: The candidates</strong></h2>
<p>Welcome back! It’s been a welcome break after a gruelling season and I feel energised and ready to go.</p>
<p>I’m usually quite stats heavy, however for the first few weeks I will refrain from using them too much and wait for a reasonable sample size before I draw any conclusions.</p>
<p>If you’ve been following my articles for a while, you’ll know I have a preference for captaining midfielders due to their higher upside over forwards and home matches, as there tends to be more attacking returns.</p>
<p>The main candidates for this week that I'm considering are are:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Erling Haaland (£14.0m)</strong> v Burnley (A)</li>
<li><strong>Bukayo Saka (£8.5m)</strong> v Nottingham Forest (H)</li>
<li><strong>Gabriel Martinelli (£8.0m) </strong>v Forest (H)</li>
<li><strong>Marcus Rashford (£9.0m)</strong> v Wolves (H)</li>
<li><strong>Bruno Fernandes (£8.5m) </strong>v Wolves (H)</li>
</ul>
<div id="attachment_56548" style="width: 1292px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-56548" class="size-full wp-image-56548" src="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Captaincy-candidates-GW1.jpg" alt="" width="1282" height="731" /></p>
<p id="caption-attachment-56548" class="wp-caption-text">FPL Gameweek 1 captaincy candidates</p>
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<h2></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Best FPL captain for Gameweek 1: The fixtures</h2>
<p>See my in-depth article for a review of each of this gameweek's fixtures, including the odds of teams scoring two or more goals and keeping a clean sheet and players to target based specifically on each teams' weaknesses.</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/fpl-gameweek-1-fixtures-clean-sheet-odds-goalscoring-potential-and-players-to-target"><strong>In-depth fixture analysis for Gameweek 1</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<div id="attachment_56531" style="width: 604px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-56531" class="size-full wp-image-56531" src="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/FPL-Gameweek-1-best-captain-fixtures.png" alt="" width="594" height="931" /></p>
<p id="caption-attachment-56531" class="wp-caption-text">FPL Gameweek 1 best captain - fixtures. Source: Official FPL website</p>
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<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Best FPL captain for Gameweek 1: Twitter poll</h2>
<div id="attachment_56539" style="width: 612px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-56539" class="size-full wp-image-56539" src="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/FPL-Gameweek-1-best-captain-twitter-poll.png" alt="" width="602" height="318" /></p>
<p id="caption-attachment-56539" class="wp-caption-text">FPL Gameweek 1 best captain - Twitter poll</p>
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<h2></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Best FPL captain for Gameweek 1: Players' records</h2>
<p>Haaland bagged a hat-trick against Burnley in the FA Cup quarter-final.</p>
<p>Rashford has returned in every start against Wolves and scored when he came on at half-time against them last season.</p>
<p>Martinelli scored in the home game last season then was taken off on 63 minutes when the game was 4-0.</p>
<p>Fernandes picked up an assist in his last two matches against Wolves.</p>
<p>Saka picked up an early injury in the last home game against Nottingham Forest that ended 5-0. It's likely he would have got more than a single return otherwise.</p>
<p>Another player to mention - who I've not included in my five main captaincy candidates - is <strong>Harry Kane (£12.5m)</strong>, who scored in both games against Brentford last season.</p>
<div id="attachment_56533" style="width: 1461px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-56533" class="size-full wp-image-56533" src="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/FPL-Gameweek-1-best-captain-past-performance.png" alt="" width="1451" height="484" /></p>
<p id="caption-attachment-56533" class="wp-caption-text">FPL Gameweek 1 best captain - past performance</p>
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<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2 style="text-align: left;">Best FPL captain for Gameweek 1: Members' stats breakdown</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">These stats are taken from the Fantasy Football Hub <a href="https://www.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/opta">Opta stats tool</a>.</p>
<p>As mentioned earlier, I will not be using the stats until we’ve had a few weeks to sample from.</p>
<p>However, I will show the players' stats per start from last season to highlight the difference in home versus away output.</p>
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