# Virgil leads the gameweek 2 defenders

> 5.07 expected points, with 1.50 of it from clean sheets alone.

By the evmax model · 25 August 2026 · https://evmax.ai/fpl/gw2/defenders/

Virgil (LIV) projects 5.07: 1.50 from clean sheets, 0.74 from defensive contribution and 0.31 from bonus. Where a defender's points come from matters as much as the total — a clean-sheet projection lives or dies on one fixture, while defensive contribution pays regardless of the scoreline.

**Bottom line:** Virgil at 6.5 is the defensive pick of the gameweek.

## The data

| # | Player | Team | xPts | CS pts | DefCon pts | Bonus | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Virgil | LIV | 5.07 | 1.50 | 0.74 | 0.31 | 6.5 |
| 2 | Senesi | TOT | 4.56 | 0.93 | 1.07 | 0.33 | 6.0 |
| 3 | Truffert | BOU | 4.27 | 1.25 | 0.46 | 0.38 | 5.5 |
| 4 | Gabriel | ARS | 4.26 | 1.33 | 0.55 | 0.73 | 8.0 |
| 5 | Calafiori | ARS | 4.15 | 1.41 | 0.06 | 0.34 | 5.5 |
| 6 | Van Hecke | TOT | 4.13 | 0.97 | 0.62 | 0.31 | 5.0 |
| 7 | Guéhi | MCI | 4.10 | 1.31 | 0.42 | 0.27 | 6.0 |
| 8 | Raya | ARS | 3.95 | 1.64 | 0.00 | 0.30 | 6.0 |
| 9 | De Cuyper | BHA | 3.90 | 0.64 | 0.02 | 0.49 | 4.5 |
| 10 | Mosquera | ARS | 3.83 | 1.52 | 0.52 | 0.14 | 5.5 |
| 11 | Maguire | MUN | 3.81 | 1.43 | 0.42 | 0.24 | 5.0 |
| 12 | Tarkowski | EVE | 3.74 | 0.80 | 0.92 | 0.25 | 6.0 |
| 13 | Mukiele | SUN | 3.74 | 1.00 | 0.50 | 0.34 | 5.5 |
| 14 | Shaw | MUN | 3.73 | 1.61 | 0.16 | 0.04 | 4.5 |
| 15 | O'Reilly | MCI | 3.71 | 1.11 | 0.11 | 0.29 | 6.5 |
| 16 | Lacroix | CHE | 3.66 | 1.06 | 0.96 | 0.09 | 6.0 |
| 17 | Petrović | BOU | 3.58 | 1.25 | 0.00 | 0.29 | 4.5 |
| 18 | Andersen | FUL | 3.56 | 0.90 | 0.80 | 0.11 | 5.0 |
| 19 | Roefs | SUN | 3.45 | 1.10 | 0.00 | 0.50 | 5.0 |
| 20 | Thiaw | NEW | 3.43 | 0.68 | 0.57 | 0.16 | 5.0 |

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Method: Market odds (de-vigged) → Dixon-Coles scorelines → 50k Monte-Carlo simulations, scored on the official Fantasy Premier League points table.
Data license: CC BY 4.0 (attribution: evmax, https://evmax.ai). Machine-readable JSON: https://evmax.ai/api/fpl/gw2/defenders.json