For fantasy premier league managers under 35 the title is a pun if you had no idea what I was talking about. For those over, I hope you had a little chuckle.
Have the days of not touching a new foreign transfer with a barge pole in fantasy premier league now gone? Remember the bad old days of Kezman, Shevchenko, Alfonso Alves, Sergi Rebrov, Djemba Djemba and Bosco Balaban. Or more recently Aquilani and Bebe. Successes like Odemwinge VDV and Torres were the exception to the rather disastrous rules where players failed to adapt to; the pace of the game, the weather, the food and you didn’t even consider any fantasy premier league player going to the North East as you knew he and his high maintenance girlfriend would be back to Seville before you could say tchau . Even Drogba took a season before he started terrorising defences with his physicality.
So have things changed forever, is everyone going to be a fantasy premier league success, a Papa Cisse or a Gylfi Sigurdsson or are we just conveniently forgetting the Bryan Ruizs of this world.
In this article I will analyse all the significant transfers of players from foreign leagues who have had no premier league experience where you would have expected them to get in to the team straight away and make an impact. I’m therefore not considering fantasy premier league squad players bought in to provide Carling Cup cover or young players as I would expect neither to make an immediate impact to the team. This rules out players like Chelseas Lukaku, Courtois and De Bruyne. Or Fulhams Kasami or Sunderlands Dong Wong Ji. Or Sebastian Coates of Liverpool. I also haven’t included defenders as here you’re really looking at a selection issue for clean sheets rather than individual goal or assist impact. I will not only look at their overall points total but there initial impact. Its no good having someone who will take 10 games to get a goal or assist, you need to sign people to make an immediate fantasy premier league impact.
Firstly lets fondly take a trip down fantasy premier league memory lane to remember the successes. Remember an event in fantasy premier league terms is a goal or assist.
SUCCESSES
Kun Aguero – Atletico Madrid to Man City £39.6m
Overall: 23 goals and 9 assists in 31 starts.
Event every 81 minutes
Start: A double in his début when coming on as sub followed by 6 in his next 4.
Nothing more need to be said, fantasy premier league gold.
Papa Deba Cisse – Freiburg to Newcastle Utd £10.56m
Overall:13 goals and 2 assists in his first 13 starts
Event every 74 minutes
Start: 2 goals in his first 4 fantasy premier league starts is good
An overwhelming fantasy premier league value success
Nikica Jelavic – Rangers to Everton £5.8m
Overall: 9 goals 0 assists in 10 fantasy premier league starts
Event every 106 minutes
Start: Once over his initial injury problems 4 in his first 6
An overwhelming fantasy premier league value success
Gylfi Sigurdsson – Hoffenheim to Swansea City loan
Overall: 7 goals and 4 assists from 17 starts
Event every 136 minutes
Start: 1 goal and 3 assists in his first 4
Again an overwhelming fantasy premier league value success
Juan Mata – Valencia to Chelsea £23.5m
Overall: 6 goals and 13 assists in 29 starts
Event every 133 minutes
Start: 1 goal and 3 assists in his first 6
A strong first season fantasy premier league success in overall and start terms. Reasonable value as well at £9.5m starting price
Pavel Pogrebnyak – Stuttgart to Fulham loan
Overall: 6 goals from 12 starts no assists.
Event every 158 minutes
Start: Strong if anything faded a bit
A strong fantasy premier league success at reasonable value
Shaun Maloney – Celtic to Wigan £1m
Overall: 3 goals and 2 assists in 8 starts and 5 sub appearances.
Event every 155 minutes
Start: Took a while to get selected but had a reasonably even distribution of points over his appearances once picked
A good fantasy premier league success once selected
So lets look at the failures:
FAILURES
Gervinho Lille to Arsenal £10.56m
You would think that being in a front 3 with virtual certainty of selection in a team forced to attack because of their defensive frailty and with RVP to finish off any chances you create would be a guaranteed recipe for fantasy premier league success. Unfortunately it started with a Joey Barton inspired sending off and only got worse.
Overall: 4 goals and 6 assists from 19 starts and 9 sub appearances plus is a little ordinary return from someone who was so expensive. The real problem is the lack of starts.
Event every 168 minutes
Not a total disaster stats wise but you would expect more for someone so expensive.
Yohan Cabaye – Lille to Newcastle £4.4m
Overall: 4 goals and 8 assists in his first 34 starts
Event every 236 minutes
Wasn’t expensive but not doesn’t get forward enough and Newcastle are too defensive to produce good fantasy premier league returns.
Bryan Ruiz – FC Twente to Fulham £7.0m
Infamous for having one of the worst debuts in last years fantasy premier league when he was substituted after struggling badly with the pace of the game.
Overall: 2 goals and 4 assists in 17 starts plus 10 as substitute.
Event every 252 minutes
A total disaster
Albert Crusat – UD Almeria to Wigan £2m
Overall: 1 goal and no assists in 4 starts with 11 as sub
Event every 486 minutes
A total fantasy premier league non event
Drenthe Real Madrid to Everton free
He had his moments and was a relatively cheap midfielder for Everton and in fantasy premier league terms. Fell out with Moyes in the end.
Overall: 3 goals plus 5 assists in 10 games plus 11 as sub.
Event every 130 minutes
Great production but I consider him a failure as he never really nailed down a starting place in fantasy premier league and was just too inconsistent.
Stracqualursi: Tigre free transfer
Overall: 1 goal and 1 assist in 7 starts plus 14 as sub.
Event every 368 minutes
A total fantasy premier league disaster albeit a free
Petrovic Goodwillie and Vukcevic Partizan, Dundee and Sporting to Blackburn totalling £7m
These 3 didn’t deserve a separate mention. £7m has to be a reasonable some of money for Blackburn and this certainly didn’t look good use of it. One thing is for sure, I’m no fan of big Sam but he wouldn’t have bought these three. Vukcevic’s stats were best but only spanned 4 starts
Overall: 17 starts plus 29 as sub for 3 goals and 2 assists combined.
Event every 390 minutes
A hopeless waste of fantasy premier league, not to mention real, money
CONCLUSION
So what does all this tell us. Firstly, the days of being wary all foreign players coming to the fantasy premier league for the first time appears well and truly over. Quality last year didn’t fail. The only expensive signing that I have put in the failure column was Gervinho and you could make a case for his adequacy if not success if you spin it right. It was just that he couldn’t get picked. The rest of the failures probably weren’t really expected to make a huge impact in any case and weren’t very expensive. Interestingly 2 of the bigger successes were from the German league. The French league was questionable with 2 failures. There were 2 failures from Spain although the quality players were a success..
All of this is very good news and maybe a reflection of improved recruitment and the league in itself becoming less and less English for want of a better word. It certainly means the Hazards and Podolskis shouldn’t be approached like a wary buyer in a used car yard that’s for sure. I will certainly now look at all new quality transfers with a positive fantasy premier league attitude.
