The Premier League transfer window has reopened for a month and players are already on the move up and down the country.
While our sister site, Fantasy Football Community, will cover all things speculative in the Rumour Mill, we will report only on the confirmed deals that go through.
More specifically, we’ll be asking what each transfer means from a Fantasy Premier League (FPL) perspective.
The most significant players on the move will be the subject of their own dedicated Scout Report but all the other transfers will be covered in summaries throughout January.
You’ll also find all the major deals in list form on our dedicated Transfers page.
LATEST FPL SCOUT REPORTS
- Mykhailo Mudryk (Shakhtar Donetsk to Chelsea, £88m)
- Georginio Rutter (Hoffenheim to Leeds United, £36m)
FPL TRANSFER ROUND-UP
Dango Ouattara (Lorient to Bournemouth, £20m)
Having lost eight of their previous nine league matches, injuries forced struggling Bournemouth into immediately starting their big-money signing in Gameweek 21, despite him only arriving on Thursday.
Yet it was a superb debut for 20-year-old Dango Ouattara (£5.0m), assisting the opening goal and generally terrorising Nottingham Forest until a late equaliser denied the Cherries all three points.
“I think he coped exceptionally well. He’s done one day training with the lads, doesn’t know anybody. He worked his socks off, looked a threat. I was pretty pleased with him.” – Gary O’Neil
Ouattara has been a star of Lorient’s lofty start to 2022/23, which saw them rise to third in Ligue 1 after 12 matches. His half-season there delivered six goals and six assists, with hard work and dribbling seeing him excel.
If it wasn’t for Bournemouth’s poor form and upcoming fixtures, Ouattara would be an intriguing cheap differential option – perhaps an exciting way to replace Miguel Almiron (£5.8m) or Andreas Pereira (£4.5m).
The Burkina Faso international also managed to impress during the 2021 African Cup of Nations, taking them to the semi-finals after his goal eliminated Tunisia.
Craig Dawson (West Ham United to Wolverhampton Wanderers, £3.3m)
Making a low-key domestic move is centre-back Craig Dawson (£4.8m), likely switching from West Ham’s bench to Wolves’. Although the 32-year-old played every minute of six consecutive matches between Gameweeks 14 and 19, it was amidst a defensive injury crisis.
Kurt Zouma (£4.4m), Angelo Ogbonna (£4.4m) and Nayef Aguerd (£4.8m) have all returned, so Dawson has been allowed to move on and challenge Max Kilman (£4.4m) and Nathan Collins (£4.4m).
Without a goal this season, he has netted at least twice in each of his previous seven campaigns, notching 19 alongside four assists.
Chris Wood (Newcastle United to Nottingham Forest, loan)
Another unglamorous Premier League switch takes forward Chris Wood (£5.6m) to Nottingham Forest on an initial loan, which becomes a £15m transfer should some fairly simple conditions be met.
He started at Bournemouth in the absence of Taiwo Awoniyi (£5.7m) and is around the same price as both the Nigerian and Brennan Johnson (£5.6m).
“For us, it was a no-brainer. We’re really pleased he’s got the first game out of the way, because he can’t play now for a couple of weeks, with being cup-tied. In the future, he will get a lot more balls, a lot more service and probably a lot more space.
“But what you saw is he occupies more than one defender, which then means the space opens up for the likes of Morgan and Brennan. That’s really important we’ve got that in our game, because we need to have a variety of attacks.” – Steve Cooper
Forest are on a good run, losing only one of their last seven league outings, with promising encounters versus Leeds (h), Fulham (a) and Everton (h) during their next five. As Wood proved his FPL reliability at Burnley, reaching a double-digit goal tally in four successive seasons, he could be similarly solid here.
But as we reported in our Scout Notes, Wood looked link-up targetman than goal poacher on his debut against Bournemouth, so the jury is out for now.
Victor Kristiansen (Copenhagen to Leicester City, £17m)
Ravaged with full-back injuries to James Justin (£4.2m), Ricardo Pereira (£4.3m) and Ryan Bertrand (£3.9m), Brendan Rodgers’ side have splashed out on 20-year-old Danish left-back Victor Kristiansen (£4.5m).
He’ll provide competition and perhaps immediately replace Luke Thomas (£4.2m), whose unconvincing stint in the first team has probably dragged on longer than Rodgers envisaged due to the aforementioned fitness issues.
The FC Kobenhavn youth product is highly rated and already has eight Champions League appearances under his belt. Although his 5’9″ height makes aerial duels difficult, he does like to get forward and could work well in tandem with Harvey Barnes (£6.7m).
The fixtures aren’t great for struggling Leicester and no clean sheets have been kept in their five post-World Cup matches, so Kristiansen is very much a wait-and-see FPL asset.
Pablo Sarabia (Paris Saint Germain to Wolverhampton Wanderers, £4.4m)
For their own basement battle, Wolves have decided to take the experienced route. 26-cap Spain international Pablo Sarabia (£5.5m) joins for a low fee from Paris Saint-Germain, after being restricted to mostly substitute appearances so far this season.
Five years at Getafe were followed by three at Sevilla before his 2019 move to the French capital. However, the 2021/22 loan move to Sporting CP brought his most productive campaign, with 15 league goals and eight assists from 29 matches.
A minutes-per-shot average of 30.3 was recorded during that campaign, and encouragingly nine of his 69 efforts came from inside the six-yard box – so he’s no long-distance speculator.
He created chances for others at a similar rate (one every 36 minutes), helped by a share of set-piece duties.
“He’s a player that I’ve known a long time. He can play in different positions; as a winger, as a number ten but above all, he’s a good player and the good players can adapt in every situation.” – Julen Lopetegui
Technically strong, Sarabia operates from attacking midfield or the right wing, which is where he was placed for Sunday’s second-half debut at Manchester City.
