With just over a week to go until the 2021/22 Fantasy Bundesliga season kicks off, our series of preview articles continues with a look at the best defenders from the German top flight.
If you’re new to the game or just need a reminder of the rules, check out our ‘how to play’ guide below.
It was recently announced that this season will have five unlimited transfers, or Wildcard periods, with the first arriving on August 29, which follows Matchday 3 and precedes the first international break of the campaign.
This means we’ll only be looking at the opening three fixtures in this article, in an attempt to maximise points from the get-go.
Alongside this, every team needs some good budget defenders, as the substitution system means that you can sub players in and out throughout each Matchday.
So, let’s get started.
Sign up to Fantasy Bundesliga and pick a team here
HOW DEFENDERS SCORE POINTS
Picking defenders in Fantasy Bundesliga is very different to Fantasy Premier League (FPL).
Defenders pick up three points, rather than four, for a clean sheet and the emphasis is placed on their personal performance rather than that of the whole team.
Going forward, they pick up six points for a goal, five points for an assist, three points for every two passes leading to a shot and four points for having two shots in a game.
Defensively, they get two points for every five duels won, lose a point for every goal conceded and a point for a yellow card. They also lose four points for every own goal and two points for conceding a penalty.
As with all players, they gain one point for a team win and lose one point if their team loses.
THE BEST BUNDESLIGA DEFENDERS
Fundamentally, Fantasy Bundesliga rewards defenders who are heavily involved at both ends of the pitch.
With only one additional point given for goals than assists, it also doesn’t really matter how the player is contributing offensively, as long as they are involved.
The highest scorers in 2020/21 were RB Leipzig’s Angeliño (14.0m) and Borussia Dortmund’s Raphaël Guerreiro (14.0m). The two most expensive defenders in the game this season, their 293 and 282 points respectively were 38 points more than Mats Hummels (12.0m) managed. This is all the more impressive when you consider they only played 26 and 27 games of the 34 possible.
Angeliño looks set to play as a left-back, rather than wing-back, under Jesse Marsch, which could seriously limit his attacking threat. He also hasn’t scored a Bundesliga goal since Matchday 9 of last season. However, the former Manchester City man has strong opening fixtures against Mainz, VfB Stuttgart and a VfL Wolfsburg side who are still getting used to life under Mark van Bommel.
Guerreiro perhaps presents a safer option. Although Dortmund’s opening fixture against Eintracht Frankfurt isn’t easy, it’s hard to know what to expect under a much more defensive coach like Oliver Glasner. He managed five goals and ten assists last term, adding to his eight goals and three assists from the 2019/20 season. Guerreiro proved his attacking credentials from left-back under Edin Terzić and will likely play a similar roll in Marco Rose’s Dortmund side.
As the most expensive defenders in the game, Guerreiro seems to present a much safer option than Angeliño from Matchday 1.
There are only two other options above 10.0m who stand out.
The first is Guerreiro’s teammate, and third highest-scoring defender from last season, Hummels. The veteran centre-back’s five goals made him joint top-scoring defender in the Bundesliga last season and he also won the fifth most duels of any defender, starting 32 games.
Although he offers less going forward than Guerreiro, he’s almost certain to play 90 minutes week-in, week-out. Given Marco Rose’s emphasis on set-pieces at Borussia Mönchengladbach, there’s potential for Hummels to add even more goals to his game this season.
The other option is Borna Sosa (11.0m).
His nine Bundesliga assists last season was second only to Guerreiro, but he’s part of a much weaker defence at Stuttgart. His opening fixture at home to Greuther Fürth is probably their easiest in the calendar, but the news that towering striker Sasa Kalajdzic (12.0m), the main target for Sosa’s wicked left-foot, has tested positive with COVID-19 and will likely miss the first game is a worry for the Croatian full-back.
There are some great mid-price options available at the back, especially over the first few Matchdays.
While they’re unlikely to be long-term starters, Omar Richards (8.0m) and Jérôme Roussillon (7.0m) look to have nailed down their spots due to injuries elsewhere.
Richards looks set to play left wing-back in Julian Nagelsmann’s new-look Bayern Munich side, playing a similar role to the one that made Angeliño the highest-scoring defender last season. The plum Matchday 2 and 3 fixtures at home to Köln and Hertha Berlin will likely come too early for the return of Alphonso Davies (13.0m), so Richards could be a great early differential.
Roussillon will fill in for the spot opened up by Paulo Otávio’s (11.0m) injury in pre-season. Wolfsburg had the second-best defence in the Bundesliga last season and start their season at home to newly-promoted Bochum and a defensively suspect Hertha Berlin side. For his price, he’s a very cheap route into a strong defensive side and also offers some attacking threat.
Union Berlin also offer some decent mid-price options. Although their opening fixtures against Bayer Leverkusen, Hoffenheim and Gladbach aren’t perfect, last season’s surprise package conceded the fourth-fewest goals in the league.
Christopher Trimmel (10.0m) and Marvin Friedrich (9.0m) ended last season as the joint-sixth highest scoring defenders in the game thanks to Trimmel’s nine assists and Friedrich’s five goals. Alongside these two, new signing Tymoteusz Puchasz (7.0m) offers a cheaper, but still attacking, option in this strong defensive unit.
Alongside Angeliño, Leipzig (last season’s strongest Bundesliga defence) also have some cheaper starting options. Nordi Mukiele (10.0m) and new signing Mohamed Simakan (9.0m) both look set to start for Jesse Marsch’s side in their strong set of opening fixtures against Mainz and Stuttgart.
Some team’s options are ruled out due to fixtures over the opening three Matchdays, with Gladbach and Augsburg prime examples of that.
The best budget option in the game looks to come from Oliver Glasner’s new Frankfurt side.
Back from a successful six-month loan with Mainz, Danny da Costa (5.0m) looks to have wrestled the starting right-back spot from Erik Durm (8.0m). A renowned attacking defender in the Bundesliga, da Costa is a true steal at that price in a strong Frankfurt side that has great Matchday 2 and 3 fixtures.
The cheapest starting defender in the game looks set to be Atakan Karazor at a meagre 3.0m. The Stuttgart right-back has capitalised on injuries to nail down that starting place early on. For that price, with Stuttgart’s good opening fixtures, Karazor looks a safe option to start off your season with.
Freiburg are another established Bundesliga side with some strong budget options. Although they host Dortmund in Matchday 2, their other opening games against Bielefeld and Stuttgart are good for defensive points. This should benefit Philipp Lienhart (5.0m) and Manuel Gulde (4.0m). Lienhart managed four goals for Freiburg last season from centre-back and could be a real steal if he continues to add to those this season.
The final defensive options are both from newly-promoted sides.
Bochum’s Danilo Soares (6.0m) grabbed two goals and two assists from left-back last season but does now have Konstantinos Stafylidis (4.0m) as competition for that spot.
Fürth’s cheapest starter is Freiburg loanee Luca Itter (4.0m). He’s got big shoes to fill after the departure of young star David Raum (9.0m) to Hoffenheim, but Fürth’s opening fixtures are incredibly kind and Stefan Leitl used that left-back spot as his chief creative outlet last season.
HOW TO JOIN OUR FANTASY BUNDESLIGA MINI-LEAGUE
We’ve launched our very own mini-league, which we are delighted to announce will offer prizes to the manager of the month and overall winner and runner-up.
Click on this link here to sign up to our Fantasy Bundesliga mini-league. No password or pin is required.
