How does captaincy work in FPL?

How does captaincy work in Fantasy Premier League (FPL)?

We answer this questions below as part of our FPL Training Academy series, covering all the basics of the game.

Our How to Play FPLpage covers everything you need to know, with guides for complete beginners and managers who want to gain an edge over the competition and win their mini-leagues.

For everything else, including our tips on best players and expert team reveals, see our Ultimate Guide to FPL – there’s plenty of free information but for access to our best stuff and incredible toolbox, you’ll have to become a Hub member.

How does captaincy work in FPL?

Your Fantasy Premier League captaincy is one of the most important decisions you have to make each gameweek.

If you get the captaincy right more times than not, you are likely to have a good season.

Your captain gets his points doubled. That means you should always pick the player on your team who you think will score the highest number of points.

If your captain fails to start the game but gets substituted at any point, the points he scores during his time on the pitch will be doubled. Read our guide on how a Fantasy Premier League player scores points here.

You cannot captain a player on your bench.

How does the vice-captain work in FPL?

If, for whatever reason, your captain misses the entire game, the points scored by your vice-captain (V) will be doubled instead.

The vice-captain is something that gets overlooked frequently as it’s very seldom needed.

Always set your vice-captain as you never know what could happen: players miss games for all sorts of reasons, and not all of them will be obvious prior to the gameweek’s deadline.

Much like your captain, the vice-captain cannot be a player on your bench.

What if none of my captains play?

If neither your captain nor your vice-captain play (perhaps they were both due to participate in a postponed match), you’ll receive zero points from both players.

Check out our fantasy football ultimate guides

Our Ultimate Guide to FPL has everything you could ever need to guide you through each gameweek. Regularly updated, it includes all our FPL content in one handy place – from team reveals from some of the best FPL managers in the game to tips on the best players and much more.

We also have ultimate guides for Dream Team and Telegraph Fantasy Football, which are also home to tips and regular articles from experts in these formats.