Fantasy Football Potential – Maxime Le Marchand

Fulham have signed French defender Maxime Le Marchand from OSG Nice for a fee in the region of £12 million. Le Marchand joins Jean Michael Seri in joining the Cottagers from Nice this summer. He played 65 times for Nice in Ligue 1 scoring the one goal.

Maxime Le Marchand has also played European football for Nice, playing 10 games across the Champions League and the Europa League. He didn’t have much success in the Europa League last season, as the centre back scored an own goal in their 1-0 group stage loss to Lazio.

Speaking to fulhamfc.com, Le Marchand said:

“I’m very happy to sign for Fulham, this is a big club that’s very popular. “I’m also happy to have joined up with a good friend, Jean Michaël Seri. I know that there is a lot of hard work ahead and I hope to bring my very best to this team.”

Fantasy Premier League Potential (4.5m)

With the amount of money Fulham spent on him, you would expect that he will have a place in Slavisa Jokanovic’s starting eleven. At £4.5m he may be a good option, especially with someone like Tom Cairney on set pieces. However Le Marchand isn’t renowned for his goal scoring prowess, so it may be difficult to receive attacking returns from him.

He is owned by just 0.2% meaning he could be a fantastically high differential and I don’t expect that percentage will go up much more throughout the season unless Fulham can produce a top half finish. There are a quite a few better options for £4.5m so it may be worth looking elsewhere than selecting the Frenchman.

Fulham’s first five fixtures are as follows: Crystal Palace (H), Tottenham (A), Burnley (H), Brighton (A) and Manchester City (A). It is a varied start to the season for Fulham but I can see Fulham getting a clean sheet or two in this run of games.

Written by Harry Clark (@HarryClark67)