Welcome to the pre-season series “FPL bargain hunting”, the four-piece series where we find the bargains for all positions. It’s important to find THAT little gem that scores high and costs low. As frustrating as it is, the budget in fantasy football will never allow us to have star players across all places in our team, we need to fill some of those gaps with cheap but effective players to ensure we score points and have a nice chunk of cash for the big buys.
This is the third edition in the series and we are covering midfielders. As nice as it would be to have Hazard, Sanchez, Fabregas, Silva and Yaya Toure across our midfield five, it’s just not going to happen as money is tight these days! What is a bargain for the midfield position? The most expensive is Eden Hazard at 11.5m and the cheapest are a handful of midfielders that are priced at 4.5m, so we’ve decided that a fair, cheap and realistic bargain price for a midfielder is 6.5m. Here is what we have for you to choose from;
Yannick Bolasie (Crystal Palace, 6.5m)
Bolasie for 6.5m is a STEAL. The Palace winger picked up 12 assists last season, yes 12! This is one of the biggest bargains of the lot in my opinion, I think his price has been misjudged massively and we should take advantage of this. We know what Yannick Bolasie will bring to the table every week with that being direct runs, crosses into the box and constant attempts to get in behind the defence. At 6.5m this is a steal and although Palace do have a tough start to the season with them having to play; Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester City inside their first five fixtures , I still feel it’s a risk worth taking with Pardew’s men looking to cause an upset with their no fear approach.
Charlie Adam (Stoke City, 6.0m)
Charlie Adam is a solid fantasy football player to have, he’s not too expensive and will score you points throughout the season. Yes, he won’t hit Hazard or Sanchez numbers but that is why he is only 6.0m and a bargain at that. In the five seasons we have had Charlie Adam in the Premier League he has averaged 6.4 goals and 6.6 assists a season, that is solid and is a very respectable return. Stoke are looking to have a big season this year and we can be sure that Charlie Adam will be right in the thick of it looking to set up and score goals.
Matt Ritchie (Bournemouth, 6.0m)
Last season Matt Ritchie was vital in Bournemouth’s promotion campaign, he scored 15 times and assisted 17 goals in the league! Championship or not, those statistics are something that needs to be respected and admired, it shows that Matt Ritchie doesn’t only have the ability to put the ball into the back of the net, it shows he also can make that vital final pass leading to the goal. At 6.0m, Matt Ritchie is certainly worth putting into your team. Bournemouth have Aston Villa at home in their first game which will be played in front of a rocking, filled capacity Dean Court, a Bournemouth win could be on the cards and Matt Ritchie being highly involved is almost guaranteed.
Ki Sung-yeung (Swansea City, 5.5m)
8 goals last season for Ki and he already appears to be a very popular selection in fantasy football. Ki scored 129 points last season in 33 league appearances with him only costing you 5.1m, this season he will cost you 0.4m more than that but I do feel he has improved and so has Swansea, under a very impressive young manager in Garry Monk. If you decide to put the 26 year old into your team then it’s probably best to bench him for the first game away at Stamford Bridge, but after that you should let him loose. After the Chelsea game Swansea will play: Newcastle (H), Sunderland (A) and Man United (H), these are three teams they didn’t lose against in both home and away fixtures last season. Ki will definitely be looking to improve his assist count and sustaining his goal count, scoring points week in week out and for 5.5m I see it as a transfer worth making.
Tom Mellor
@MellorFootball
