  We study the interpretation of Lattice data about the thermodynamics of the
deconfinement phase of SU(3) Yang-Mills theory, in terms of gluon
quasiparticles propagating in a background of a Polyakov loop. A potential for
the Polyakov loop, inspired by the strong coupling expansion of the QCD action,
is introduced; the Polyakov loop is coupled to tranverse gluon quasiparticles
by means of a gas-like effective potential. This study is useful to identify
the effective degrees of freedom propagating in the gluon medium above the
critical temperature. A main general finding is that a dominant part of the
phase transition dynamics is accounted for by the Polyakov loop dynamics, hence
the thermodynamics can be described without the need for diverging or
exponentially increasing quasiparticle masses as $T \rightarrow T_c$, at
variance respect to standard quasiparticle models.
