Low Cost Lucas Leiva

Liverpool recently signed ex-Roma midfielder Aquilani. Whilst he is a very good player, Aquilani has an infamous reputation for injuries, and at Roma he was cruelly labelled by fans as 'Swarovski' due to his constant physical problems. In the last three seasons Aquilani has made just 13, 21 and 14 league appearances respectively due mainly to injuries.

Currently recovering from his ankle surgery, Aquilani is said to be out "four to eight weeks," leaving Benitez to rely on the likes of Javier Mascherano and Lucas Leiva to deputise in midfield.

Whilst preseason matches are not the be-all and end-all of team starting indicators, in Liverpool's last 5 preseason games Lucas has started them all and played quite an advanced role - and performed well there. He scored against Athletico and made lots of incisive passes into the final third of the field; just the kind of pass that leads to assists.

Until Aquilani returns, Lucas is a likely starter in the Liverpool midfield. Assuming Aquilani takes 4 gameweeks to return (and it may be longer), that is plenty of time for other FF managers to notice that Lucas is a starting Liverpool midfielder at the low low price of £5.0m. Typically that will lead to many people transfering him in, so Lucas could represent a good price increase by the time Aquilani returns.

We recently covered cheap midfielders. There is obvious competition for the discount spots in the midfield, but all this potential good value should be helping EPL managers fit their expensive big name players into the squad.