Image Source (+ Lots of Photoshop)

On 31st May 2022, Ivan Perišić signed for Tottenham Hotspur from Inter Milan on a Free Transfer following the expiry of the player's contract. He's signed a 2 year deal, keeping him at the Premier League side until the end of the 2023/24 season.

Having played under Antonio Conte at Inter, he'll rejoin his previous manager which bodes well for his FPL prospects.

Position

Despite being best known as a Left Winger (where he continues to play for Croatia), in the 2020/21 season, Conte converted Perišić into an attacking Wing Back which was his starting position for 34 of his 35 starts for Inter Milan last season. Conte seemed to lack confidence in Sergio Reguilon and Ryan Sessegnon last season so we're expecting Perišić to become a first team regular fairly quickly in this position.

The Stats

A nice point for comparison is the Italian equivalent to FPL - FantLiveSerieA which has the same points scoring system as FPL.

Listed as a Midfielder, Perišić was priced at £7.5m and accumulated 8 goals and 7 assists for a total score of 167 points - 5th best amongst Inter's players and the 8th highest scoring Midfielder. For comparison, this puts him in the same points scoring ball park as Mason Mount (169).

We're not expecting Perišić to be listed as a Midfielder though given that he's predominantly been playing as a Wing Back in recent seasons. If you include the 17 Clean Sheets that Inter achieved, this would have pushed Perišić's scored up to a massive 235 points and would have made him FantLiveSerieA's top points scorer.

Over the last 2 seasons, Perišić has an expected goal involvement (xGI) per 90 minutes of 0.41 (last season) and 0.46 (the season before, under Conte) - these are impressive numbers but it's worth noting that last season, Tottenham's other Full Back (Matt Doherty) had an xGI per 90 of 0.53. (Trent Alexander-Arnold had an xGI of 0.47.)

It's also worth noting that Perišić significantly overperformed his expected goals (xG) data and underperformed his expected assists (xA) (xG of 4.65 and xA of 9.09) whereas he'd usually perform much closer to his expected data.

Is Perišić a Viable FPL Option?

Given his performance in Serie A's FPL equivalent, we believe that Perišić needs to be taken seriously and is likely to go on our pre-season watchlist (if he can establish himself in Conte's starting XI). The appeal will greatly lie in the expectation that he's listed as a defender and the hope that he'll be priced similarly to Sergio Reguilon last season (£5.0m). It wouldn't be wise to look at Perišić in isolation though...

Matt Doherty on the right of defence is perhaps a safer option given that he's played in the Premier League for a long time and thrived under Conte before his season ended early through injury. If Doherty retains his place in the starting XI at the beginning of the season and him and Perišić are similarly priced, we feel that Doherty is probably the better option.

📣 Join The Conversation 📣

We love hearing from the FPL community so please share your thoughts with us in the comments below. If you're new to Blurt, please read this article to get started and we recommend setting up an account with ionomy for you to buy some blurt and start interacting.

You can also follow us on Twitter - @ BlurtFPL.