New Signings – Fantasy Premier League 2016/17. Southampton
It has been another summer of turmoil down on the South coast as once more Southampton have lost a number of their key assets. Liverpool clearly felt that they did not have enough ex-Southampton players in their ranks so decided to shell out a reported £34m on Sadio Mane. Spurs splashed out £11m on midfield enforcer Victor Wanyama, while Graziano Pelle has buggered off to China where he will earn a reported £260k per week. The world has officially gone mad! However perhaps the biggest loss will be manager Ronald Koeman who has taken over the reins at Goodison Park. Koeman has been replaced by Frenchman Claude Puel who has spent the past 4 seasons in charge of Ligue 1 side Nice, and prior to that he had spells in charge of Lyon, Lille and Monaco. Over the years he has developed a reputation for developing youngsters and playing an attractive brand of football. This should see him fit in well at Southampton. Although he has big shoes to fill as Koeman had built on the work of Mauricio Pochettino. What he have seen in recent years is that Southampton typically spend their money wisely and judging from their latest two signings they have once more spent wisely.
For Southampton’s pre-season games, line-ups and general musings here is their link on the Pre-season hub we have created Southampton Pre-season info
Nathan Redmond (£6.0m)
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After three years at Carrow Road Redmond decided to leave Norwich after they were relegated for the second time in three seasons. Redmond clearly wasn’t bought by Puel as his appointment was confirmed after the purchase of Redmond, although he has apparently been a long-term target for the Southampton hierarchy and we’ve seen how successful they have been over the years. The 22 year old will undoubtedly be seen as a direct replacement for Sadio Mane, but is he good enough to do so? Last season Mane scored 11 and assisted six while Redmond managed just six goals and three assists. Such basis stats are not always the best means to compare two players and some of the underlying stats suggest that Redmond can replace Mane. He created more chances per 90 minutes than Mane did. Surrounded by better quality players we must assume that more of these chances will now be scored! He’s certainly not the goalscorer that Mane is, he’s only managed to find the back of the net on 18 occasions in 174 league appearances. Although he did get his Saints career off to a flyer yesterday with two goals. Against… Zwolle. I would certainly expect him to pick up more fantasy points than in previous season but whether or not he’s worth considering will be determined by his price.
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Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg (£4.5m)
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Just as many will view Redmond as a replacement for Mane they are likely to see Hojbjerg as a replacement for Wanyama. He is a defensive midfielder by trade but can just as easily play as a box-to-box midfielder. The 20 year-old has long been seen as one of Europe’s hottest properties and when he moved to Bayern back in 2013 many expected him to kick onto the next level under Pep Guardiola. Unfortunately it didn’t work out at the German club as he was kept out of the team by Kroos, Thiago and Schweinsteiger. Frustrated by a lack of game time he joined Augsburg on loan in January 2015 helping them to qualify for the Europa League where his tireless running and positivity going forward played an important role. He spent last season on loan at Schalke but struggled to cement his place in the side. What can we expect from him at Southampton? Assuming Puel adopts a 4-2-3-1 formation I would expect Hojbjerg to play as part of a two man holding midfield. He should have the physical strength to adapt to life in the Premier League and I expect Puel will work with him on the training ground to encourage him to get forward on a regular basis. Is he likely to be a fantasy asset? For now I would take a wait and see approach.
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Fixture Tracker – the first 6 games
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First ‘RMT’ of the season. I’m fairly set on both Kun and Ibra… 0.5m ITB, ideally to cover Ayew to Barkley (incase of a rise) in GW3 or to cover a different bandwagon that takes off.
Rip it apart please!
Hey Rambo nice team mate but one question I want to ask is can you do Bolasie to Townsend? I can’t remember what price Bolasie is.
Yes the extra 0.5m could do Bolasie (6m) to Townsend (6.5m) so I may well do that. I may go for Cabaye at (6m) as well for the added set pieces and guaranteed starts. One to monitor over the next few weeks but I feel there’s good value for money in the Palace midfield! Cheers Matt!
No problem mate there definitely is good value in the palace mid and if Tekkers does go to them it makes it even more appealing having a giant in the box for the set pieces and Crosses.
Looks god Rambo can’t complain with GK choose although thk Spurs , Lei MU have better chance of keeping more clean shts in first 5-6 GW
You have had to scacrfice your def somewhat but I like the Shaw , Baines pick the others will do a job for you
Your MF looks strong Haz , Bol good fixtures Ayew first two fixtures good & the right swap in mind Red & Mol fillers but Red might do well.
Fwd line is probably the best front 3 one could afford really good effort 😉
Cheers for this Slivers!! GKs aren’t set and with the 9.5m there’s a bit of room for switching before we start. Same goes for the 3 cheaper defenders and Bolasie/Townsend/Cabaye… Thanks again!
Please tell me that’s not how you would actually set this squad up in gw1…
Not a chance, I’ll have McAuley as captain…
Just saw reports that mertsaker could be out for 5 months! Gabriel at 5.0 just got more appealing.
Jesus what happened to him? Wasn’t Gabriel the starter anyway?
Knee injury, I assumed Gabriel would be the starter but this near enough confirms it! I could say that Wenger will buy another defender but we know that ain’t happening!!
Ah right I wonder how he picked that up! Yeah I don’t think Wenger will buy anyone unless it’s some 18 French man or some Asian player that will never play.
Not with those fixtures he doesn’t1 GW7 on maybe.
Evening Mr Negativity sorry i mean NIN
What’s negative about looking at the fixtures before buying a player? How many cs’s you reckon Arsenal will get in the first 6 or so weeks?
6
They won’t get one in GW1 anyway!!
Nope, highly unlikely. Or against Leicester, or Saints, or Chelsea.
That would interest me Mitro. Problem is I’ve been burned by Gabriel before
Hi everyone……. Back for the new season and raring to go! Obviously things will change as transfers and specilation changes but I am gonna post my team so far……. good luck to everyone and hello from me for the new season!
Evening Magic, looks pretty good to me for a team the two big boys up front. I’d maybe downgrade Bellerin to Ward / Dann and upgrade Drinkwater. Outside of that it looks pretty good to me. Good job.
+1 on what NIN says but I’d also like to add that you need to keep an eye on Fernandez because I think Van der Hoorn may be competition for him. Also I wouldnt have two 4.0 defenders one is alright because there’s always one punt every season but I don’t see there being 2.
Cresswell is out for four months supposedly.
Seen that yesterday which made me change my team again. Atleast there are more options at 5.5 this year. Who will be the new LB?
Anyone know who will play LB now? Byron at West Ham interests me but not sure on his game time
Just had a look at their squad and Byram seems the obvious choice. I wouldn’t be surprised if they just bought a LB though. Play it by ear i suppose.
They can have Moreno if they want!!
Byram it is so
Crap
haha
Oi Kop! Zwolle might be a small team but don’t look down on them. It ain’t no fair the English teams get 10 billion from TV rights, even the team that relegates will probably have a bigger budget and the entire Eredivisie (Dutch league with Ajax, PSV, Feyenoord and so on). Fairplay my f-ing ass. It is that I like the EPL so much, but I don’t like how unbalanced shit is in Europe. No way a Dutch team will ever win a cup again. Ajax won the CL 4 times, and it will stay at that. It will always about the big money throwers.
He wrote a big piece and that’s the only thing that stuck. :p SERVES YA RIGHT!
Why do you think that’s evolved Raz? Good promoting since the dawn of the premier league or a better level of football which has raised more intrest from abroad?
Similar to the French league, there’s essentially 0 depth. No attraction for top players, hence all the best Dutch players leaving to play elsewhere and earn more money. Who wants to play against shite like Hercales and De Graafschap every week
There is depth and though the level of the Dutch league is currently very low, it is still more competitive than many other leagues. It’s like Irelands economy taking on America. Don’t compare it to the French league. The EPL has more in common with the French league (money spending wise) than the Eredivisie.
I know you are a gloryhunter, thus supporter of Manchester United, but even small teams have a certain amount of appael.
You don’t know fuck all mate
And yes, the level currently is lower in Holland because everybody leaves the country for the money. When you have good Dutch talent, Chelsea sends a few people and convinces their parents and the kids to move to England. Parents get a house and a job and the kids go football at Chelsea and waste their talent there (9 out of the 10 times). Good examples are Nathan Ake and ummm Jeffrey Bruma (whom turned into utter shite). Now Mourinho is coach of ManU I also see zero future for Mensah, since Mourinho buys teams and doesn’t like to play youth/talent.
NN makes stupid comments about Heracles and De Graafschap. Check.
NiN saying the Dutch league has 0 depth. Check.
NiN is a supporter of United. Check.
All United supporters are gloryhunters. Check.
Last one was a stretch, but I only did that one with a wink since you made countless of assumptions. Because the other shit you said was utter bs and condenscending. Something again United supporter are known for (since we are generalising).
Whatever NiN. Isn’t the first time you’ve been condenscending to me. You’ve been at it for almost a year now. And shrugs, English might not be my native language, I”ll still try to speak my mind.
In all honesty, the whole Untied gloryhunter thing is banter and utter bs. But you should know this. Every fanbase has a certain image, United has a lot of fans, just not in Manchester. Arsenal get wrecked every year for not winning trophies since 2005.
Anyway, I’m sort of done with the negative way you talk to me. Whatever, call me emotional. I’m done with it. Last time you did this, you even called me a certain bad name. It pissed me off, figured I would not speak to you again, but I did. You were okay and nice for a while. But I see you are at it again. Seriously, if all you are ever going to do is put me down, I will think twice before returniing to the chat her.
Have a nice evening.
Condescending.. lol. Whatever you need to believe to make yourself feel better. I’m glad i upset you. I didn’t even respond to your post, you started talking to me and then got all emotional, which i found very funny and played off it for laughs. You’ve been coming at me for about a year too you hypocritical douche. Lets not forget early last season when you were following my rmt responses around and disagreeing with me for the sake of it until i called you out on it. You disappeared for about a week and came back all nicey nicey until a few on here rubbed your belly for you. I genuinely don’t care what you think of me. You don’t like it, don’t talk to me. Simple.
“i’m done with the way you talk to me” – get over yourself. It’s a big bad world out there and not everyone will get along. Deal with it.
Lads!! Chill………….
Agreed Mitro. Getting a little bit sick and tired of this crap in recent weeks. We pride ourselves on the community and the friendly atmosphere we have managed to create on here over a long period of time. Stuff like this just leaves a bad taste in my mouth and makes me doubt why we do this.
I am chilled. Very, in fact. Just saying it as i see it, as is Raz. It’s a public forum, people are gonna clash here and there.
Add trump in here and I may well have started WWIII
we are here to have a laugh and help one another – that’s what the site is about! Don’t get me wrong the lads especially cookie and mito go to town on me but they are having a laugh…. I hope! 😉
And that is exactly what i do on here, Mitro. How many hours have i put into this place through rmt’ing like a madman once the switch happened, all the way up to now with writings and such? Countless. I’ve had beef with one person on here, just one, in over three years. I’ve put way too much time into this place to be sitting back whilst someone is saying i am condescending, arrogant and all this shite. Total bs that i wouldn’t expect anyone to stand for but because i have no issue going to town on someone i’ll be made out to be the bad guy. Go figure.
Can’t really call it the ”English” Premier League no more, it’s more like the ”International” league. Both players and managers are from other nationalities, this helps with the interest.Players like Bergkamp, van Nistelrooy first made me watch the matches.
What makes it the ”English” Premier League is that it’s still played in England. See it as the Euros or Worldcup being held in England. 😉
Anyway, when you look at Germany, Italy and Spain, they still have much more native players. They also do much better at Worldcups.
Also, many people know the English language.
And well, the league currently isn’t dominated by 1 or 2 teams, like the German and Spanish league.
Shut up Meg. That’s a family guy reference. Or are we too upper brow for that these days?
Erm, not sure how to put this but the article needed a line adding last night to reflect the 2 Redmond goals. I wrote that one line!! Sorry Kop
Still never heard of them though!
I thought there was something fishy about that line!
Upbeat?
Yeah
I probably should have tried to spell ‘yeaterday’ correctly as well!
Haha
PEC Zwolle has a nice history and they played very attractive football 2 seasons ago. Last season they did not play as well. But considering the material they have to work with, I respect what they did. Two seasons ago they were a bit like ummm Southampton.
As for Heracles, last season they had a season similar to that of Leicester. Very small team, even smaller budget (probably one of the smallest in Holland). I think they ended up as sixth, selling their Riyad Mahrez during the winter break. Which was a big loss.
I meant no disrespect Raz, I’d literally never heard of them. Couldn’t even have placed them in Holland in all honesty. Sounded Swiss if anything.
Init, look at what your one sentence has done!
Always glad to help :oogle:
This is hard work. Lots of love for Zlats I really can’t decide. Thoughts on both of these teams? Any other suggestions? Or which team?
@Smash, I would easily choose Team B out of those two. I must disclose that I am in the IbraKun camp. So naturally I am going to side with that team.
It’s only his price which is putting me off. But I much prefer him to Mik. It’s only the weakening of other areas that is putting me off. I would maybe have to sacrifice KDB and improve Bolasie and Gradel?
You could, you wouldn’t need a bunch of money to improve Bolasie and Gradel. There are certainly a good amount of mids in the 6.5 to 8.5 range. Not sure if you got to see this, but I put this together yesterday.
Basically it just projects out all those mids to 3420 minutes and sees what kinda of points they were on pace to earning last season if they all played the same amount of minutes.
I did but thanks again as every time you look at it you see something different. Tadic is interesting as is Ayew if he plays up top just his fixtures ain’t great. All of Sanchez’s points come at once so he’s tough to judge
Same thing here only sorted in order of points. I just prefer it that way, makes it easier to read for me.
Thanks Firminho really had a good season. But guess he played up top a lot
I prefer the two expensive forwards myself Smasher but i reckon making a downgrade or two in defence so you can maybe an upgrade in the midfield would be beneficial.
Yeah I feel Gradel and Bolasie needs changing. Seems a bit weak. So guess it would be KDB or Shaw. I think Baines could go well this year
Or De Bruyne actually yeah. That’s a tough one though. I’d love to start with him myself but i’m struggling to squeeze him into any of my drafts.
Yeah I would love to start KDB but not sure at this stage. Previous years I have always gone too cheap on defence