With the Share Split mania settling down and a huge match day ahead we can get back to thinking about actual football. I couldn’t be happier about that.
If the immediate share split reaction was a bit subdued compared to the sky high expectations, I don’t think the coming weeks will disappoint. You can really feel the confidence in the market.
I think that will continue but there is also a lot of change ahead. We’ve got excitement for boosted In Play right now, the upcoming massive April 16 announcement of a further media bonus for the Summer, and big European nights all just around the corner.
Coupled with the end of a season and the start of pre-season, it’s going to be a hectic, confusing, and potentially very profitable time ahead (if you get it right!). This is probably my favourite time of year on FI.
The big thing in the last few days is In Play Dividends. They aren’t universally popular. I’ve always been fairly neutral on them.
But at current pay out rates, I am starting to like IPD’s. There, I said it.
I like the effect they are having on the market at the moment. It rewards players who are actually good at football, and offers a welcome break from the overdone search for the best bench warming 17 year old of recent months.
It’s not even that I particularly play for IPD’s at the moment. But IPD buyers boost prices on players I might be buying anyway.
So, you can either play for IPD’s yourself and try to find value, or you can offload unwanted players to IPD buyers at the right time. It creates more price movements and opportunities (or risks!) for everyone.
Provided it doesn’t keep rising out of proportion with other dividends, I am happy with it. It’s also quite self limiting and can’t get out of hand because to play for IPD’s alone you need to find extremely good value, and that will get harder and harder as more people try it.
But right now there is clearly some excellent value available as people get used to it.
Finally, for those who enjoy the free content and would like a peak at a ton more stuff available in the members area, including the new FI Transfer Centre, I have created a new tour: click here to check it out.
Starting today, I have now made a 10% discount on my members area available for those who sign up for 3 months (existing members can also get this discount straight away, see the instructions on the Dashboard).
Risers
Sergio Aguero
Aguero and other fantastic yet ageing strikers like Suarez were taking a beating on the market since January.
Not even Champions League involvement spared them.
But with the renewed interest in IPD’s, Aguero and others have a new lease of life.
It’s a new trend and although this close to the end of the season it can’t last long, it’s going to be a big factor in the short term and an on-going one for next season.
It’s going to give people another reason to hold high performing players, and may make high quality players a little bit less vulnerable to shifting market trends.
Interesting to watch how this develops.
Ryan Gravenberch
Rumours of some Juventus interest for Gravenberch have sent the price soaring.
Given that he is 16 years old (!) I actually think he is best off staying at Ajax and cooking a little longer. He has done very well to get a couple of games for the first team and if that carries on then by 18-19 he might be ready to step up.
Somewhere like Juventus he could easily stagnate.
Regular readers will know that very few things wind me up more than the overused and lazy “he’s the next…”. Apparently Gravenberch is the next Pogba.
Pogba is 26 years old. Pogba is not done being Pogba. Although by the time Gravenberch is an adult he might be.
You can see the reason for the comparison on the pitch. He’s fairly deep lying, with a bit of goal threat. Like Pogba, he would probably need penalties to be a real performance force. Without that, or a major change to his style, he’s going to be an average performance player.
This is a trade supported by the trends and not the substance, the reality is you are not seeing any real returns for years, not even short term media, and it is questionable whether they will ever be strong even in the best case scenario.
That makes this trade very vulnerable to reality/boredom/trend shifts.
Fallers
.... Not much!
Pretty much everything falling has an obvious explanation in the last few days.
You’ve got the usual injuries (Bellarabi) and a few over bought players like Moise Kean getting modest pull backs.
But it’s nothing major. And it’s not just because the smaller prices make the drops look smaller.
It’s a sign of the confidence in the market right now.
Of course, that doesn’t mean you can be complacent and hold weak or off trend players too long. The trends are what they are and the prices will follow them.
Hot Gossip
Hirving Lozano
These links to the EPL, especially Manchester United, have been around a while, it’s not really a secret that this is where he wants to play his football.
United are apparently preparing an offer, and people close to Lozano are doing their best to pump up the interest.
He should be a very decent performance player and if he started doing well for a big EPL club, he’s got a bit of star quality.
What really makes this trade is last years World Cup where his displays for Mexico really raised his profile. Lots of people know who he is and that won’t be forgotten if the hype builds.
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