It would be fair to say that Ipswich Town have been one of the season’s surprise packages so far.
Kieran McKenna’s side may be down in 18th place at the moment, but their performances have been, on the whole, brilliant for a newly promoted side, and with draws against the likes of Manchester United and Brighton & Hove Albion and a win away to Tottenham Hotspur, we wouldn’t be surprised to see the Tractor Boys beat the drop come May.
It’s a cliché that’s been proven wrong in the past, but with stars like Liam Delap, Leif Davis, Sammie Szmodics, and Axel Tuanzebe, the Suffolk side have too much talent to go straight back down.
Ipswich Town midfielder Kalvin Phillips
Moreover, one of their summer signings is starting to prove his worth, and based on comparisons to similar top-flight stars, he could be worth a fortune in the years to come.
Ipswich’s star performers
Before we get to the player in question, let’s look at a couple of Ipswich’s other star performers from this season, starting with the obvious, Liam Delap.
The former Manchester City gem has been one of the most dangerous strikers in the league so far this season, and after just 12 appearances, he has already racked up six goals and provided one assist, which sees him sit alongside Danny Welbeck and Ollie Watkins on the scoring charts.
However, it’s not all been about attack for the Suffolk side, as following a testing start that saw him ship four goals away to City, fellow summer signing Arijanet Muric has been in impressive form.
aro-muric
For example, according to FBref, his 46 saves are the fourth most in the league, and he currently has a post-shot expected goals minus goals allowed figure of plus 0.6, which implies an above-average ability to stop shots.
This statistic, which is already impressive in isolation, is only made all the more impressive considering the players he has already faced this season.
muric-ipswich-town
However, while both of these summer signings are proving their worth for the Tractor Boys, another shone on Sunday and could be worth a lot of money in the future.
The Ipswich ace who could be worth a fortune
Now, while there are several other players who joined Ipswich in the summer, like Szmodics and Clarke, the young dynamo we are talking about is Omari Hutchinson.
The former Chelsea prospect initially joined the Tractor Boys on a season-long loan deal last summer, but it wasn’t until June this year that his move was made permanent with a club-record £20m purchase.
However, while the 21-year-old gem ended last season strongly with a tally of 11 goals and six assists in 50 appearances, he struggled somewhat at the start of this year, failing to register his first goal involvement until gameweek six.
Fortunately, he appears to be back on the right track now, and in attacking midfield, he is having more of an influence on games, including against Spurs before the international break, which was a performance that saw journalist Alex Jones award him a 9/10 and then against United on Sunday.
It was against the Red Devils that the “fantastic” talent, as dubbed by McKenna, opened his goalscoring account with a sublime curling effort from outside the penalty area, a distance that another Premier League star is known for scoring from, a star who has been compared to Hutchinson, Dominik Szoboszlai.
The comparison stems from FBref, which compares players in similar positions in the Premier League, then creates a list of the ten most comparable players for each one, and in this instance, has concluded that the Hungarian is the second most similar attacking midfielder or winger to the Englishman.
Now, to get a better idea of how this conclusion was reached, we can examine the underlying metrics in which the pair ranks most closely, metrics including but not limited to progressive carries, non-penalty goals plus assists, shots on target, goals per shot on target and tackles won, all per 90.
Hutchinson & Szoboszlai
Statistics per 90
Hutchinson
Szoboszlai
Progressive Carries
2.80
2.80
Actual Non-Penalty G+A
0.19
0.22
Shots on Target
0.56
0.54
Goals per Shot
0.06
0.06
Goals per Shot on Target
0.1L
While a comparison to an established international and a midfielder who’s part of the best team in the country is reason enough to celebrate, Ipswich should also be delighted about what this could mean for their midfield star’s future value.
For example, Transfermarkt values Szoboszlai at €75m, which is about £63m, and if the pair are so stylistically similar, why wouldn’t their values be similar?
Ultimately, Hutchinson has been an exceptional player for Ipswich over the last season and a bit, and if he can continue to perform as he has in the previous few games, then there’s no reason he couldn’t soon have a price tag like Szoboszlai.
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