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Ah, deadline day – when professional sports teams worth hundreds of millions of pounds behave like uni students the night before their essay is due.
From a real-world perspective, it’s both better and more fun that deadline day is back to being at the end of August.
From an FPL perspective… it was far easier when they moved it forward for a bit, and we knew who all the actual players were going to be when we made our teams!
As usual, things have well and truly been shaken up for us in Fantasy Premier League. We’ve had new players come crashing in, old players losing value, and – in many situations – are left shaking our magic 8-balls and trying to figure out who the hell is actually going to play.
How to make sense of it all? With the help of your pals here at Full 90 FPL, of course!
Let’s crack on, and look at the Fantasy Premier League impact of the main Deadline Day moves… after a sensible note of good old-fashioned caution!
Yes, yes, we know it’s boring. But in general, in regular FPL, we are going to fade most new signings in the short-term.
You know the drill.
It doesn’t matter how well somebody did for their old team. It matters even less when they came from a different league.
We have absolutely no idea how they’re going to adjust to the Premier League, nor even if/where/how much they’re going to play for their new team.
Reijnders wasn’t automatically the new De Bruyne, just because he had a good debut. Wirtz didn’t immediately dominate in the Premier League, as he did in the Bundesliga.
Tempting as it is to reach for the shiny new toy… try to resist. See them play at least a couple of games, then decide whether they’re actually a better option than those we already had.
With all that said!
In FPL Draft… you should be looking to grab the more exciting/promising new arrivals where your team structure allows it. You can afford to think much longer-term here.
With all caveats duly inserted, let’s look at some of the most FPL-relevant new signings.
(We’ve already covered all the main moves that took place earlier in the summer. So, we’ll just focus on the big buys in-and-around the deadline here).
Xavi Simons to Spurs is probably the most interesting new arrival.
He should be nailed, and playing as a 10. He shoots an okay amount, and is good for assists too.
I (James) was mega high on James Maddison before his injury, and this is the guy Spurs have chosen to replace him.
His xGI per 90 for the last two years isn’t quite as good as Maddo (0.46 to 0.51), and that’s with Simons playing in the Bundesliga. But, Simons is also only 23, so has time and space to grow (and Leipzig sucked for no apparent reason last year).
I am high on this guy, and if you told me you wildcarded, and he was in your squad, I would say: “yeah, fair enough.”
Muani has been up-and-down as a goalscorer.
He got 15 goals in 32 games for Frankfurt in 22-23, PSG went out and splurged €90m on him… and he promptly got 8 goals in his following 36 appearances.
Last year did see a return to form, with 8 goals in 16 league appearances on loan at Juve.
Who’s the real Muani? Who the hell knows, but he’s here to add plenty of confusion to the Spurs FPL options.
He’s played the most games by far at centre-forward. The eagle-eyed among you will have noticed that Spurs already have two centre-forwards. Richarlison has started the season well, and Solanke is just a very good player. They both also get injured quite a bit, so he’ll almost certainly get time up top at some point.
For now though, he’s either pinching minutes off them, or – more likely, I’d say – subbing in for Johnson or Kudus. He’s started slightly more on the right, but tends to drift more towards the left when he actually plays.
TLDR: he’s just a bit of an FPL annoyance right now. No offence to the lad.
Sigh.
If Newcastle had just signed one of these guys, I’d be excited.
They’re obviously a good side, with particularly good wingers. Gordon got a ton of shots in the short amount of time he moonlighted as a striker.
Unfortunately, we’ve got both to deal with.
They even both cost loads of money… so we don’t get any clues there, either, about who will actually start.
My educated guess would be that Wissa gets the first crack, and Woltemade comes off the bench.
Wissa is a proven, excellent Premier League striker, and Newcastle are obviously gunning for another top four finish.
Unfortunately, the Champions League will almost certainly shake things up. Maybe they rotate, or maybe Wissa starts but gets the hook after 60mins.
Newcastle’s fixtures aren’t great after Wolves in Gameweek 4. If they just add Wissa, I’d be interested anyway. With both strikers, though, I’m leaving this one well alone.
James and I (Joe) disagree on this one. What fun!
James favours the wait and see approach.
He rightly points out that Etikite has had a good start. And that Liverpool might want to protect their super-expensive new striker somewhat, either through rotation or subs, particularly with the Champions League starting in a couple of weeks.
I would get Isak right now… if I hadn’t just used my two free transfers in Gameweek 3.
I think if you spend £125m on a striker, you’re starting them up top. Etikite might have started well, but Isak will probably do even better with the same players around him. I think Isak is nailed for starts in the central role, and Etikite rotates with Gakpo on the left, and comes on for around 30mins when he doesn’t start.
Obviously, I also think Isak is going to be absolutely incredible. He just scored 21 and 23 goals for a worse team, and now gets Salah, Gakpo, Wirtz, etc. etc. around him.
If I was wildcarding right now, he’d 100% be in my team.
I’d probably have him and Haaland, and just start two forwards. If I had to choose one, however, I’d definitely take Isak. I think they end up with very similar numbers, and he’s a whopping 3.7 less – that’s a saving that can transform your entire defence, or get you all these excellent mid-priced midfielders in one go.
And, here we have yet another sensible real-life transfer which only muddies the waters in FPL. Don’t all these fancy sporting directors know what they’re doing to us, with these moves?!
Piero Hincapié is a guy who can play centre-back or left back for Arsenal. They’re going to pay around £45m to make the loan permanent next summer, so… we can assume he’s going to play regular minutes.
I cannot imagine Saliba or Gabriel are at risk. So, I think he is likely to play left-back… which is a problem if you own Calafiori.
Calafiori has started the season well, and cost quite a bit himself last summer, so I wouldn’t rush out to buy Piero just yet.
I would pick him up in Draft, though – an Arsenal defender, if he does end up starting, would be very valuable indeed down the line.
Yet another water-muddier!
Admittedly, Chelsea’s attack has looked pretty crap this season. As it did for most of last season.
They were also lacking a winger for their rotation, so… fine! I admit it – this move makes sense!
It does also mean that they have four starting-calibre wingers for two spots, however.
Neto was probably their most consistent attacker in the second half of last season, and has looked good again this year. I think he’s got a starting berth for now, with Gittens coming off the bench.
Estevao has been exciting in bursts, and is obviously a great long-term prospect. He also has outstanding underlying stats – 2.0 xGI in three games (~180mins total).
He’s also only 18 though, and would be a prime candidate for rotation.
Garnacho could be a number 10, if Palmer misses time, but is more likely a left winger for Chelsea.
He loves to shoot (3.44 shots per 90 last season) so we would be very interested if he did become nailed as a starter.
Unfortunately, though, I’d guess that Neto has one of those starting spots nailed down, so he’s duking it out with two other players for the other one. And, he diminishes the value of Estevao, just as he was looking like nice value.
Another fine mess, in short.
Still, he’s also worth a pickup and a stash in Draft, if he’s available.
Elliott is a good creative player, and racked up 9 assists in only 1,330mins in 23/24 (his last healthy season).
Villa have looked like literally the least creative team in Premier League history so far this season.
He might not literally start the first game, but he’s a seasoned player in the Prem, who could give them a spark, and he’s very cheap. One to watch!
Like Muani, I’ll chuck Sancho into the ‘who the hell knows’ category.
He was rubbish for Man U, as has been well-documented. He was excellent when he went back to Dortmund on loan.
I watched him a fair bit at Chelsea, and thought he looked… meh. His stats weren’t terrible (8 returns, on 5.23 xGI, in 1,750 mins). He just didn’t actually look very threatening. Lots of dribbling and taking people on, as usual, with little end product.
As noted, Villa are crying out for an attacker, so he’ll definitely get a chance. Emery is also a brilliant manager, and we just saw how he got Rashford going immediately. With Watkins and Rogers, he also has two quality forwards to play off.
So… I’m still somewhat skeptical, for now. But, if the early signs are good, and it looks like he’ll be part of a wider Villa turnaround… well, at only 5.9, he’ll be pretty damn tempting.
I’m not interested. There we go – easy enough!
Yes, he’s one of the best keepers in the world. But I don’t really want to spend 5.5 on any keeper, and – if I did – I’d probably rather have Raya or Pickford.
Yes, their fixtures are a bit worse than City’s, but Arsenal in particular can clean against anyone. Man City, meanwhile – as I’ve been saying for ages now – do have good underlying defensive stats, but routinely fail to keep clean sheets regardless.
Yep, that’s right – I’m counting this as a transfer!
We just spent the summer thinking it was nailed-on he would move to Liverpool. And so he would have, before Glasner threw his body in front of the whole thing.
That move to Liverpool put me off owning him in the preseason, since we didn’t know if he would then rotate with Konate.
Now that he’s starting, he immediately becomes one of the most appealing defenders in this price bracket, for me.
Palace’s defence has looked excellent. They also have a good few upcoming fixtures, if you’re happy to get someone in for 3-4 weeks before a planned early wildcard.
I know, I know – I said some variation of ‘let’s wait and see’ quite a lot.
But, that is definitely the right approach to take to new signings, unfortunately… even if it is boring!
What we can take away is:
Hopefully, I hit both notes in this piece… somewhere in the midst of those many, many caveats.
Either way, thanks for reading, everybody, and we’ll be back with more content very soon indeed!
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