Julie Dufour
Exciting news this morning as it was announced that Angel City has signed Julie Dufour from Paris FC for an undisclosed transfer fee. I’ll admit, this was a player that was not on my radar, as I rarely watch Paris FC. But there are several details that I find interesting. She plays primarily as a Left Wing, but has also had time at Right Wing and Attacking Midfielder. Since we currently don’t have a coach, it’s hard to say where they envision her playing. But signing another winger, when you already have Alyssa Thompson, Emslie, and Endo under contract is interesting, especially with negotiations still ongoing with Christen Press. I also think that this move does effectively remove Angel City from making a run at Midge Purce or Kerolin.
Dufour has 6 Goals from 3.7 xG and 5 Assists from 3.6 xAG from 11 gams (9 starts) and 756 minutes this year.. She is 2nd on Paris FC in Goals and tied for the team lead in Assists. And Paris FC currently sits in third place in the Premiére Ligue. In my league comparison, I found that France has the highest xG and xGA of any of the top leagues; there is a lot of attacking there. So while Dufour’s number look very good, I think that we have to take them with a grain of salt. In fact, her npxG and Goals are both in the 56th percentile compared to other French Wingers/Attacking Midfielders. Her npxG per shot is 69th percentile (.13), which would put her right in the same range as Emslie and Alyssa (.14 and .12 respectively), while her xAG (3.6) is 81st percentile. I like that she scores and assists in almost equal measure; last year she had 7G + 5A in 1,093 minutes.
I won’t go into all her statistics, though they generally look good, but not great. One that does stand out is Crosses into the Penalty Area (1.07, 94th percentile). Miscontrols also looks really good (1.31, 94th percentile) and is much better than any winger on Angel City in 2024 (Alyssa was the best with 2.14). I wanted to look a little bit closer at which games Dufour was scoring, however, and all of her Goal Contributions have come against teams in the bottom half of the Premiére Ligue table in terms of xGA, except for 1 Goal against Stade de Reim who just make it into the top half in 6th. Last year, though, she did score against Lyon (albeit in a game they lost 6-1), and in the Champions League, she scored home and away against Wolfsburg, as well as against Real Madrid and BK Häcken, plus she also had an assist against Arsenal. I’m already a fan if she’s helping to score against the Gunners.
The thing that I like the most about this deal is the profile of player that Dufour is. She’s 23, but has been playing professionally since she was 16. So she has experience, but you’d also expect her to continue to improve. This is a big change from most of our recent acquisitions that are either over 30 or just beginning their careers. She is also signed for three seasons, which keeps her under contract beyond Alyssa or Emslie. Not that I’m looking for either of them to move (I’m definitely not!), but I don’t think that a club wants to be in a spot where multiple players in the same position are all having their contracts expire at the same time. I’m also intrigued about who actually brought Dufour in, since we don’t have a General Manager right now. Matt Wade is acting as an interim right now, but he’s only been at the club for a few months. He was in Europe at Feyenoord previously, so perhaps he’d already identified her as a target. Or it could have been the Technical Director, Mark Wilson. However it happened, this seems like a different recruiting strategy to what we’ve seen, and I’m intrigued.
I’m predicting that Dufour is going to be more of a bench player next year, although with some starts, while she adjusts to the league. Plus, I just can’t see her taking Alyssa’s spot at Left Wing. Perhaps she could take over the No 10 role? But I think that she should provide good depth in the present and hopefully will become a real quality starter in the future. So without knowing the money details, I’ll just say that I like this deal, and I’m looking forward to seeing Dufour at BMO. But I’m very interested to see which dominoes fall as a result of this deal.
All stats are from FBref.
My position group analyses is still ongoing. Central midfielders is coming up next.