New Signings – Fantasy Premier League 2016/17. West Ham
What a difference a year makes! Roughly 12 months ago, some bozo on here was ribbing this lot to the max, predicting a rough season and possible relegation due to the appointment of “woeful” Slaven Bilic as head honcho in replacement of the ever sturdy Sam Allardyce. An unknown French dude was supposedly the key to Hammers success but this bozo just didn’t believe it. Who was this character, you ask? None of your goddamn business, that’s who. Now, moving swiftly on; West Ham have been quite busy in the current window, snapping up some very interesting players, 4 of which we’ll cover in this here article. Two youth prospects (Domingos Quina & Toni Martinez) aren’t really expected to break into what is fast becoming a stacked Hammers team but they are worth a mention nonetheless. Quina, a 16 year old Portuguese attacking midfielder, has been highly touted as one for the future and West Ham have done well to nip in and take him on board. Martinez, slightly older at 19, was snapped up from the Valencia youth and is again seen as one for the future. Like Quina, he’s not expected to get much if any game time this season but as fantasy managers we’d be doing ourselves a service to keep an eye on the progression of Martinez and Quina as we may well be punting on them in a season or two. With those two now out of the way, lets have a peek at the Hammers signings that are more relevant to the upcoming fantasy season, shall we?…
For West Ham’s pre-season games, line-ups and general musings here is their link on the Pre-season hub we have created West Ham Pre-season info
Håvard Nordtveit – Defensive Midfielder / Center Back (£5.0m) Classed as a mid in FPL
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Signed from German outfit Gladbach, this defensive minded Norweigan has seemingly been drafted in to help plug the holes in a Hammers defence that was pretty porous at times last season. Despite playing an attractive, attacking style of football and finishing a more than respectable 7th, West Ham ranked 8th from the top 10 in terms of goals conceded – shipping a hefty 51 times over the course of the season. A reduction of 10 or so goals may have resulted in a top 4 finish, what with there being just a four point gap between themselves and Manchester City. Considering this, it’s not surprising that Bilic went after a solid member of a rather impressive Gladbach team and we’d expect Nordveit to do a job for the Hammers. Looking at his attacking stats there’s not a whole lot to whet the appetite, fantasy wise. Nordveit spent a full six seasons at Gladbach but only managed to find the net on 13 occasions and contributed few assists, making him an unattractive pick for us fantasy folk. It’s worth noting that he has been classed as a midfielder in FPL. We all know the value of an out-of-position gem in the game we love / hate so much so had he been classed as a defender then those goal scoring stats wouldn’t look all that bad really; 4 last season and 3 the season before. Decent, but only if there were clean sheet points to go along with the odd goal, which there isn’t!
Fantasy Prospect; 4/10
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Gökhan Töre – Winger / Attacking Midfielder (£5.5m)
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Now, onto the attacking side of things and first up we’ve got a loanee drafted in from Turkish side, Besiktas, a club most of you will know from their appearances in the Champions League down the years. The Hammers have dished out £2.5mln to bring Töre in for the season with a view to making the deal permanent next summer for a further £7.5mln should he do the business. The Turkish international (26 caps, 0 goals) started out as a professional in Germany with Hamburg, making 24 appearances before moving on to the Russian league of all places to ply his trade for Rubin Kazan. That venture didn’t go all that well for Gökhan and he was soon out of there, signing for Be?ikta? in 2013. During his three seasons in Turkey, Töre saw plenty of game time, making 111 appearances in total and finding the net 19 times; far from a spectacular return we think you’ll agree. Add 28 assists to that tally and we’re starting to look decent but we’d have to think that Töre will need to up his game considerably if he is to be effective in the Premier League. At just 24 years of age there is certainly time for improvement and it will be interesting to see if he gets into the starting 11 from the off but one thing is for sure; West Ham have a few players that could easily force Töre to sit out most games unless he hits the ground running. One to keep an eye on for sure.
Fantasy Prospect; 6/10
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Manuel Lanzini – Attacking Midfielder (£6.5m)
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Here’s a name we should all know from last season as he was on loan at the Hammers, and has now been added to the permanent squad for the upcoming season. Lanzini started the season off rather quietly, appearing here and there and not really showing much of anything. That was, until playmaker Dimitri Payet was ruled out for a couple of months through injury. Young Manuel burst into life in the absence of Payet and proceeded to become a heavily fancied fantasy option, scoring and assisting regularly before he himself picked up an injury that kept him out for a while. It seemed that by the time Lanzini was available again, West Ham had switched up their formation and he took time to settle back in but an okay tally of 6 league goals from 25 appearances may be a sign of what is to come from the young Argentine. How this talent ended up playing in the UAE Arabian Gulf League is anyone’s guess but now that he is on board at West Ham we’d be foolish to overlook what will likely be a much cheaper alternative to Payet, although maybe not quite as productive, but we shall see. At just 23 Manuel Lanzini has a bright future ahead of him and once he can nail a starting spot we’d expect him to continue to do well. The main drawback is the fact he is off to the Olympics with Argentina so he may not be available for the season start. Keep an eye on that one.
Fantasy Prospect; 7/10
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Sofiane Feghouli – Winger / Attacking Midfielder (£5.5m)
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Last, but most certainly not least, a player who has been making waves for a number of seasons in La Liga for Valencia; Sofiane Feghouli has been and still is an excellent player and is currently West Ham’s most exciting summer signing by far. Four seasons at Grenoble was enough time for Los Murciélagos to realise his talents and snap him up, and there he has stayed, bar a brief loan spell at Almeria, steadily improving as the seasons go by. Deployed mainly as a wide player, although at times shifted to a central attacking role or even the odd time as a central midfielder, Feghouli has almost always done what was asked of him to a high level and we’re expecting him to continue improving in a more free flowing attacking West Ham team. Work rate is the first noticeable trait in Feghouli. The Algerian has no issues with helping out on the defensive side as well as providing a skillful outlet at the other end of the field. 31 goals in five seasons at Valencia, a club who are almost always chopping and changing due to financial issues, is a decent return, considering. Feghouli is a good creator also, ticking another box for us fantasy managers. At international level, Feghouli is second only to the mercurial Riyad Mahrez in terms of importance to the team and even that is debatable. 11 goals in 40 appearances for Algeria is an excellent return, we think you’ll agree. All in all there’s no real downside to this signing and once priced reasonably he could well be one of the gems of the upcoming FPL season. Of that there is no doubt, even less so if the Hammers manage to snag one of the top strikers they are currently trying to sign. Watch this space people, Sofiane is an excellent player and should suit the fast pace of EPL.
Fantasy Prospect; 8/10
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Fixture Tracker – the first 6 games
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Thoughts on latest draft? Not sure on Bolasie there are better options at 6.5. I’m not totally convinced by Miki as will be his first season. Carrol will probably have to go when West Ham sign a striker. Shaw will have to be monitored, not really sure between him and Terry. Long could go well this season. Seems strange going without Arsenal not sure on the value for money there
Like the team, quite similar to mine. Think your defence is very solid but personally I wont be doubling up on City with KdB and I’ll be trying to spread across as much of the top teams as possible. I have many of your early concerns too but it is early and we’ll get answers closer to the start.
Regards Bolasie, I think I’ll only have the 6m available but if I had 6.5m like you do I would strongly consider Townsend instead. Very good basis to build on, Smash!
Yeah I guess Sanchez and Ozil are probably the obvious alternative to KDB. I have had Coutinho but Liverpool fixtures are not great plus they have so many midfielders there. They do tend to score goals against anyone though. Yeah Townsend is probably the best option at 6.5. I also think pieters at Stoke is a good option for a defender but can’t fit him in. I would love to have Payet but 9.5 for a West Ham player don’t seem right
@Smash, I will concentrate on your defence seeing that Rambo talked about your attack. Not sure that Leicester defence would be my first choice for 5.0 and their fixtures. But I am not going to argue against having the keeper of the defending champions too much. Taylor from Swansea is cheap, but borderline unusable after GW2. Maybe Pieters, Mee or one of the 3 Bournemouth boys could be a better option based on fixtures.
Thanks. Yeah I did have Forster. Yeah Leicester could quite easily go either way. I think they will be closer to the defensive football they showed towards the back end of last season rather than the attacking style at the start. Yeah those Swansea fixtures are pretty terrible after the first two.
Just out of curiosity… Who are the premium players in each position / spine of peoples teams currently?
I’m thinking Courtois, Shaw, Hazard & Kun as my spine with Baines / Cresswell, Miki & Lukaku alongside – early days but thinking of planning around these.
Butland, Baines, KDB, Aguero
Like it Ant! May very well just throw Butland in and not worry about the position.
Haven’t even attempted to construct a team yet, but I assume it be something like any keeper/s with good fixtures/rotation, Baines, Payet and Kun or if Arsenal actually buy a quality striker that is worth at least 2 million less than Kun they could be it.
Seems the right idea, could all still change bar Kun that is.
Hi OR, pics probably explain mine better so far. The greyed out ones are just place keepers for now. The core definites really are just probably Baines, Hazard, Kun and Ibra. Every other spot is up for grabs but the other players featured on either the team shot or the watchlist are basically the key contenders for me thus far.
Like it Init! JRod will be high on my watch list during the next few weeks to see if he’ll be starting, could be a real gem. Will be very interesting to see how you start if you stick with both Kun and Ibra!
I’m fairly certain I will. Well, if it was starting tomorrow I would be anyway. Mainly because I think Ibra is in that potentially explosive bracket. With the likes of Bournemouth, Hull and Watford in the first few I’d be very nervous without him. Depends how he adapts of course but he’s never had an issue switching leagues / countries in the past as his trophy cabinet shows. We always get the ‘but can (he) adapt to the physicality of the PL’ etc asked of any new player. Question will be the other way round with him!
Right, so Big Sam leaving Sunderland makes Mannone a lot less attractive. I had him and Jakupovic in my team with the intention of playing Mannone every match. Is there a 4.5 keeper anyone would recommend instead of Mannone? I don’t rate the keeper position at all so I don’t wanna spend more than 8.5 on my keepers combined, I’m perfectly happy with a cheap keeper from a poorer team provided they regularly get points from saves. Mandanda might be the guy to go for.
Victor Valdes would be my shout, Tekkers.
Foster at West Brom.Not sure why so many people are overlooking him.
Victor Valdes if he’s number one. Or Foster would be my picks
Thanks guys. Valdes has crossed my mind, but I find it hard to justify owning a keeper from Middlesbrough when I can get one from West Brom or Palace for the same price. I’ve brought in Foster for Mannone for now.
People probably thought that about Watford this time last season
@Tekkers, I probably go with Mandanda based on fixtures and how they go along with Jaku. But not too far behind would be Foster. Problem with Valdes is that you will be choosing a keeper every week at the beginning of the season that is probably playing away. Hull and Boro don’t rotate badly as far as H/A, it is just that the away fixture seems to be the better fixture most of the time at the beginning. Don’t think I want 2 promoted teams for use on my keepers having to play away all the time.
Tekkers, just a word on Sunderland – Moyes is more or less a done deal so I wouldn’t really change any opinion of them at all. He’ll set up simarlarly and build from a solid defence, just like Sam did.
That certainly makes Mannone appealing again, thanks for letting me know.
Is it best to go with only one of Ibra and Kun and then if depending on who’s up top it determines which one out of KDB or Martial/Mkhitaryan? Right now I’m leaning toward Kun and Martial with Haz as well.
Another quick question are there many people going with out Kun and Ibra and instead going with Kane, Lukaku etc?
Kun is a necessity for me. Then it was between Ibra and KDB. At the minute I’m favouring Ibra to get some man u coverage. He may also be on penalties which will tip the scale further.
I was thinking the same but having them both really screws up the rest of the team and I’m trying to figure out if it’s worth it especially with Martial and Mkhitaryan in the team for 2 Mil less.
Kun, Martial and Haz seems fine, Not sure on your doubles partners up top. I guess if you can spend the left over cash wisely on the team that you have with Luka and Kane their set of fixtures is certainly more appealing on top of their better prices.
It will probably be Long and Carroll up top with Kun. I have done up a draft with Lukaku up top but it doesn’t have Kun in it which I’m not sure I like.
I’ll more than likely going with them 3 too, Matt. Kun 110%, I’ll always have a Fantasy soft spot for Hazard with the money he’s won be over the last few seasons so he’s getting a starting berth. Miki will be my main ‘punt’ for a new signing if he keeps at it in pre-season.
Yeah the trio of Kun, Haz and Mkhitaryan just feels more balanced than having Ibra in there as well. I want to see how Martial does because right now it’s between him and Mickey at 9.5 so it’s a straight swap.
Gents,
How’s this looking?
Looks good mate. Keep an eye on whether Mahrez leaves or not but I think he’ll stay. Also I’d change Watson to Hojberg.
Good team Forster and Friend saves you 0.5. But obviously VVD has attacking potential. Interesting how an Arsensl fan does not have any of their attacking coverage
Mahrez is holding Ozil’s position until he his back for GW2/3 KDB is there for when I need to bring in Sanchez……
Wait, I thought Mattx was the only Gooner here. >.<
Can't see, LOGOS SO SMALL!
Haha
Too much Arsenal coverage. Rest looks fine.
Very nice, wouldn’t have Gray myself but I can see his appeal. Going in the right direction for sure!!
What GW does the first international break fall on?
Hmmmm??
thats so pretty!
I was going for informative.
Hi Mitro, it’s between GW3 and 4.
After GW3, also after GW7 and 11.
He said 1st 😉