Nolito is a 29 year old 1.75m (5 foot 9 inch) Spanish International winger/forward who has signed for Manchester City from Celta Vigo for a reported fee of £14m. We look at the player, assessing his stats and his fantasy prospects for Manchester City with particular emphasis on fantasy premier league. The player costs £9.0m in FPL
FANTASY PREMIER LEAGUE NEW PLAYERS – MAN CITY MIDFIELDER NOLITO
STATISTICS
Here’s the stats for his last 3 years for Celta Vigo in La Liga only. There’s no European stats for Nolito as Celta didn’t qualify in either of those years. There’s also a comparison between players of similar stats currently in the league
His international record is 9 games for Spain with 4 goals scored which is a 44% strike rate
HIS PROSPECTS
Starting at the basics, Nolito’s gametime despite his pedigree is not guaranteed. I imagine Guardiola will play 4-2-3-1 or some version of 4-3-3. Obviously Aguero will be the striker. In an attacking midfield 3 it’s hard to see De Bruyne and Silva not playing. That leaves Sterling, Navas, Nasri and Nolito for the last spot. So pre-season will be crucial to see if he starts. He does have the advantage of being a Guardiola signing. He will also add another source of goals to the team apart from Aguero. City have had to compromise the 1 striker formation in order to spread goals around apart from Aguero. Silva and De Bruyne while they do score goals are primarily creative assist based players. Nolito will add pace directness and more importantly goals.
It’s interesting what Spanish football commentator said of the transfer and the players prospects:
“Pep Guardiola needs specialists. As you know the style that he decides to produce needs a particular type of player, and Nolito fits into that role perfectly well,” said Balague.
“Playing on the left-had side of the attack for instance; he knows the system because he has of course been at Barcelona, so he knows when he has to dribble, when he has to go, when he has cross, when he has to pressure. He knows all that, so it will not be new to him.
“So those of you who may expect, because it is Man City, the biggest names in the world, you have to realise that for Pep Guardiola’s system, he needs a particular type of player. And as I say, Nolito fits that perfectly.”
The tricky things for me are 3 fold:
1 is the rotation potential. Especially with Sterling a sort of likely replacement/ rotation partner
2. The price of £9.0m. Are you really going to gamble on a £9.0m player new to the league with rotation risk when you can get proven players like Payet, Eriksen, Mane and Ozil for a similar price.
3. Aguero and De Bruyne are the main attractions for Man City coverage. Aguero hard to ignore in my mind and although De Bruyne is £1.5m more expensive if you’re doubling up on Man City attackers it’s hard to side step him for Nolito
SUMMARY
Very good stats for a midfielder
Does have rotation risk with Sterling especially
Pricey at £9.0m in comparison to some proven FPL midfielders
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