Darren Bent, Dark Horse

Robbie Keane has completed his move from Tottenham to Liverpool, much to the dismay of Spurs fans. His move now pushes Darren Bent back into contention as a starter alongside Berbatov, and at £7.5 million he looks promising for another large season.

Whilst pre-season games are not always a true indicator of who will make the starting line-ups come August 16th, Darren Bent has had a successful run so far and is in the kind of form that will make the coach pay attention. Bent scored in their Spanish training match against Hercules CF, and netted four against Norwich on the day Keane's transfer was finalised. Hardly top notch opposition, but definately the right time to show the gaffer you are keen to reclaim the starting spot.

The bookies have picked up on this as well; Bent's odds of becoming the leagues top scorer have been shortening across most outlets. He is now ranked between 12th and 19th favorite player in the league to win Golden Boot; favoured ahead of Fabregas, Shevchenko, Ashton and Gerrard, and with similar odds to Roque Santa Cruz and Peter Crouch.

Tottenham's opening three fixtures are a mixed bag: Middlesborough away, Sunderland at home and then Chelsea away. Although they are not likely to bag too many goals at Stanford Bridge, the opening two fixtures have Goalfest written all over them.

But Bent's forthcoming glory season is not quite guarenteed just yet - Tottenham are rumoured to be interested in acquiring Russian striker Andrei Arshavin. If that occurs then Bent's likelihood of being a regular starts becomes somewhat reduced, and for around the same price other strikers like Ashton, Crouch or Yakubu become more attractive.

This is certainly the view adopted by most other Fantasy Football players so far. Only 1% of teams have Bent in the squad. This low number means his price will go up quickly once others start buying him; but at the same time he is immune to price drops since there will not be enough managers selling him to negatively impact on his price.

The same cannot be said for Defoe (20% of teams have him). Portsmouth have a horror opening 3 matches, against Chelsea and Everton away, and Man United at home. If another striker scores a few goals in the opening weeks, owners of Defoe will be moving away from him quickly if he doesnt score any himself. His price will plummet as thousands transfer him out - this cannot happen with Bent who is only owned by a few. Bent's risk of price movement against the chance of high returns is far better than several other, more popular, attackers.

Darren Bent is having a cracking preseason, and if he can bag a starting spot he could be good as a dark horse worth a lot of points this season.