Europa League players who could earn big transfers

Hello, fellow hipsters. While all the cool kids are watching the best players in the world compete in the UEFA Champions League, you know where the really interesting stuff is happening. It’s the UEFA Europa League, where you can spot up-and-coming players before any of your friends have heard of them. It’s like getting to say you saw Arctic Monkeys at The Grapes pub in Sheffield in 2003.

In all seriousness, the Europa League is a pretty important venue for players from leagues not in Europe’s top 5 to show off their skills. It’s often difficult to know how tape and stats from weaker leagues is going to translate to the Premier League, so scouts want to see these guys against stronger league opposition.

I’ve picked out 3 players I’ll be keeping an eye on to see if they can prove their games are going to translate to one of the best leagues in the world, plus a handful of honorable mentions. —KM

Mario Stroeykens — Anderlecht

Real mf prospect heads will already be familiar with Stroeykens, who already has nearly 100 professional appearances for Anderlecht. But his minutes, xA and progressive passes all took a nice jump last season, and they’re looking even better this campaign. This is a player who looks like he might be in the process of The Leap.

It’s not totally clear yet what Stroeykens’ best position is, but versatility is a good thing at his age. He’ll probably grow into a very attack-minded No. 8. I think my favorite thing about his game is how comfortable he is with both feet; he’s right-footed, but passes with his left 20% of the time and has scored some bangers with his weaker foot.

Anderlecht’s first big test is away to Real Sociedad on matchday 2, and they’ve also got Porto and Hoffenheim on the schedule.

Pavel Šulc — Viktoria Plzeň

Šulc is a little older than we’d expect a big prospect moving up from the Czech league to be, but his recent leap has been pretty ridiculous. He went from 5 goals in all competitions two seasons ago to 22 last season, and he’s got 5 goals in 8 games to start this campaign. He also scored a brace for Czechia against Ukraine during the last international break.

The knock on Šulc is that he might not be much more than a goal scorer from the attacking midfield spot, and those guys’ games usually do not translate that well at higher levels. But he’s creating more shots for teammates early this season.

Teams interested in Šulc are going to get to see him against some top notch competition. Viktoria Plzeň plays Eintracht Frankfurt this week, and gets Real Sociedad and Manchester United later in the league phase.

Alan Varela — FC Porto

The defensive midfielder market has gotten out of control over the last couple years. Scarcity of ready-made options for top teams has led to things like Chelsea paying £100m for Moisés Caicedo and Liverpool deciding to simply not sign one instead of overpaying for 2 windows in a row. That makes the progression of Alan Varela pretty interesting.

Varela was decent for Porto last year, but his ball-winning numbers have taken off in a small sample this year.

This is not enough information to know whether Varela is going to make a great defensive midfielder for a Premier League team, but it is enough to get me interested in watching his games. If he keeps winning tackles and creating value for his team with his ball-winning at this rate, he’s going to get a huge move.

Varela will be facing extra scrutiny in his matches against Manchester United, Hoffenheim, and Lazio.

And now for some honorable mentions.

Victor Osimhen — Galatasaray: He’s Victor Osimhen.

Jorrel Hato — Ajax: It’s a matter of when, not if. He’s been well-known as one of the most talented young left backs in the world for a couple years, and he’s an exceptional athlete. But he still needs to add shot creation to get the really rich teams excited.

Taras Mykhavo — Dynamo Kyiv: I have no idea how Ukranian league stats translate to anything given the current situation, which is why European games are disproportionately important for anyone from that league who would like to make a move. In any event, Mykhavo is a 19-year-old left-footed center back who carries forward a lot, so he’ll attract some eyeballs.

Giannis Konstantelias — PAOK: Took a big step forward last season from 3 to 14 goals in all competitions. He’s a fun tricky dribbler who likes to cut in from the left and shoot from the top of the box. Probably needs to start creating for teammates more to get big clubs interested.

Roger Fernandes — SC Braga: Had 2 goals and 7 assists in just 672 minutes at age 17 last year. Signature move is cutting back and hitting an inswinging diagonal, to repeated great success. He’s not off to a good start this season, but he’s a left-footed dribbling machine teenager, so everyone’s going to be interested to some degree.

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