Following Issa Diop (£4.0m) from Fulham to Ipswich Town is central midfielder Sasa Lukic (£5.0m), in a deal worth around £9 million.
As mentioned in our recent Florentino Luis (£5.0m) assessment, it’s been a busy few weeks at Ipswich, but there was still a lightness in central midfield due to Azor Matusiwa (£5.0m) and Jack Taylor‘s (£4.5m) end-of-season surgeries, plus a couple of expired loan spells.
- READ MORE: O’Neil to lead Ipswich on top-flight return
- READ MORE: Who appeals in Ipswich’s defence?
BRIEF HISTORY
| SEASON | CLUB | DIVISION | STARTS (SUB) | GOALS | ASSISTS | FPL POINTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025/26 | Fulham | Premier League | 20 (6) | 1 | 4 | 67 |
| 2024/25 | Fulham | Premier League | 28 (2) | 0 | 2 | 56 |
| 2023/24 | Fulham | Premier League | 13 (11) | 1 | 0 | 43 |
| 2022/23 | Fulham | Premier League | 4 (8) | 0 | 0 | 15 |
| 2022/23 | Torino | Serie A | 13 (3) | 2 | 0 | – |
| 2021/22 | Torino | Serie A | 34 (1) | 5 | 4 | – |
| 2020/21 | Torino | Serie A | 24 (8) | 3 | 0 | – |
| 2019/20 | Torino | Serie A | 20 (10) | 1 | 1 | – |
The Serbian began his career in Belgrade with Partizan, joining Torino in time for 2016/17. His six-and-a-half years there included an early loan spell at Levante, coming back to Serie A ready to step up.
Lukic bagged five goals and four assists during his best season but, since moving to Fulham halfway through 2022/23, he’s lacked attacking threat. Then again, he only regularly started during 2024/25.
About to turn 30, both he and incoming head coach Alvaro Arbeloa probably felt it was time for a change.
DEFCON DATA
Have his three full Premier League campaigns been good for defensive contribution (DefCon) points?
| SEASON | STARTS | MINS | CBIRT | CBIRT PER 90 | REACHED DEFCON | RATE OF STARTS | BEST CBIRT TOTALS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025/26 | 20 | 1,734 | 183 | 9.50 | 3 | 15.00% | 15, 13, 12 |
| 2024/25 | 28 | 2,337 | 244 | 9.40 | 5 | 17.86% | 16, 13, 13, 13 |
| 2023/24 | 13 | 1,185 | 137 | 10.41 | 1 | 7.69% | 16 |
In a word, no. The numbers are a bit underwhelming.
Lukic only reached the 12-action midfield threshold three times in its debut season, averaging 9.50 clearances, blocks, interceptions, recoveries and tackles (CBIRT) per 90 minutes.
Had DefCon been around for 2024/25 and 2023/24, he still wouldn’t have been good at it.
In fact, the best seasonal average for actions (10.41) actually coincided with his worst rate of successful starts (7.69%).
ANY FPL INTEREST?
Ipswich’s early fixtures are decent. While there are some tests to avoid during the opening 10 Gameweeks, there are seven alright matches in that period. The colour-coded difficulty ratings below come from our Fixture Ticker:
However, Lukic is low on attacking threat, poor at DefCon, and has accumulated 21 yellow cards over the latest two campaigns.
Even at the limited £5.0m midfield price point, FPL managers are likelier to prefer Florentino, Christian Norgaard, Jacob Ramsey or Diego Gomez.
