Southampton boss Nigel Adkins moved to boost the club’s defensive ranks last week by snapping up England Under 21 defender Nathaniel Clyne from Crystal Palace on a four-year deal. The right-back arrives at St Mary’s under freedom of contract but, due to the fact he is under 24, the Saints are still required to fork out a fee for his services – talks are still ongoing between the two clubs as to the level of compensation:
Clyne will join up with former Palace defenders Jose Fonte and Danny Butterfield at Southampton and is expected to challenge the latter and Frazer Richardson for a spot in a back-four that chalked up 19 clean sheets last time round – the second best record from the promoted clubs, just behind Reading’s total of 20. Delighted to finally clinch the signature of a player who has been linked with the likes of Man United over the past year, Adkins went on to say:
For the last three years Nathaniel has been a very attack-minded full-back who bombs on – he’s got pace and he’s a good one-on-one defender. He got into the Championship Team of the Year last year, and for such a young age he has had a lot of first-team football in the Championship. All being well, we can push him onto the next level now.
The Statistics
Clyne moves to St Mary’s after spending four seasons at Palace, his only senior club. Handed his debut for the London outfit by then-manager Neil Warnock back in October 2008, he managed 26 league appearances and picked up a couple of assists in his first term at Selhurst Park. The following season saw him continue to develop at the Championship club, with 22 appearances producing a goal and an assist – Clyne’s displays earned him the Young Player of the Year accolade in each of his first two seasons at the Eagles and helped him break unto the England Under 19 set-up.
The 2010/11 campaign saw Clyne step up in performance; playing every one of Palace’s league games, he provided three assists from the right-back berth and this time received the club’s Player of the Year award. Despite turning out for the England U21s on a couple of occasions, his game time was somewhat curtailed last term, with knee and foot injuries limiting Clyne to 28 appearances, with a single assist returned.
The Prospects
At 4.0 in Fantasy Premier League (FPL) and a mere 3.7 in the Sky Sports game, Clyne is a real cut-price option for our Fantasy squads but, at present, it’s perhaps a little too early to say just where he stands in Adkins’ first-team thinking.
Last season, Richardson was the club’s main right-back but lost his place to Butterfield over the last five league matches of the 2011/12 campaign after the latter recovered from injury; while Clyne’s acquisition will certainly increase competition for the role, Fantasy managers will be intrigued to see that the new boy made his debut as a right winger last weekend.
While the Saints boss raved about Clyne’s 20 minute debut display against Évian Thonon Gaillard, with four pre-season games still left to play we’ll be keeping a keen eye on Adkins’ plans. The Southampton boss has been tinkering with a 4-3-2-1 formation recently and, if it transpires that he intends to utilise Clyne’s trickery in possession and blistering acceleration further up the pitch, there is the chance we could have a real bargain out-of-position prospect on our hands – hopefully next weekend’s friendly against Ajax will shed more light on the situation.
Looking at the fixture list, many will be tempted to avoid Southampton’s Fantasy assets over the first four Gameweeks at least; a horrendous opening run of matches, with trips to City and Arsenal as well as a home clash against United, are anything but enticing. The upside is we will have time to analyse Clyne’s impact on the Saints first-team, then, and assess his likely game time before deciding whether investment is worthwhile before their schedule take a turn for the good in Gameweek 5, with (AVL, FUL, whm, wba) to follow in the next six.
Further Reference
Nathaniel Clyne Wikipedia
Nathaniel Clyne Statistics
Nathaniel Clyne YouTube
