Gameweek 26 is the gameweek of the top-half-of-the-table clashes. The main course, obviously, is the visit of leaders Liverpool to Manchester City’s Etihad Stadium on Sunday, but that’s not the only high-profile game on this weekend. Current number three Nottingham Forest have a visit to 7th placed Newcastle, while 6th placed Chelsea visit Villa Park on Saturday. In theory, GW26 therefore looks like the perfect opportunity for 2nd placed Arsenal and surprise number five Bournemouth to do damage, as they face West Ham and Wolves respectively.
As a result of the above, Gameweek 26 might end up being a little harder to predict in terms of FPL returns than many other gameweeks. Then again, the Arsenal and Bournemouth games are very appealing, and there are more fixtures who deserve fantasy managers’ attention. The GW26 opener between Leicester City and Brentford, for example, with particular focus on the visiting side, or Fulham’s home game against Crystal Palace. The same goes for Brighton’s visit to Southampton and to a lesser extent (due to their unreliable form) for Spurs’ visit to Ipswich Town.
Don’t forget, the deadline for gameweek 26 is set at 18h30 (UK time) on Friday, February 21st, 2025. The free to play FPL or pay to play season/weekend/daily games like FanTeam are ideal ways of following the Premier League action.
Most transferred in/transferred out players (as per February 19th, 2025)
| TRANSFERS OUT | TRANSFERS IN | POSSIBLE REASONS | |
| GK | Sanchez (CHE), Sels (NFO), Martinez (AST) | Raya (ARS), Flekken (BRE), Pickford (EVE) | Sanchez bench |
| DEF | Hall (NEW), Aina (NFO), Konsa (AST) | Kerkez (BOU), Gabriel (ARS), Gvardiol (MCI) | Bournemouth form + fixtures, Konsa injury doubt |
| MID | Amad (MUN), Palmer (CHE), Rogers (AST) | Kluivert (BOU), Mitoma (BRI), Nwaneri (ARS) | Bournemouth form + fixtures, Amad injured |
| FOR | Gakpo (LIV), Jackson (CHE), Ndiaye (EVE) | Marmoush (MCI), Cunha (WOL), Wood (NFO) | Cunha form + fixtures, Jackson + Ndiaye injured, Gakpo injury doubt |
Premium pick
Seeing as we have defined a premium fantasy asset to be a player who, in the official fantasy game, is priced at £10m or higher. Considering the fixtures in Gameweek 26, the few true premium fantasy assets in FPL are all either facing each other or other considerable opposition, which complicated our pick for this gameweek. We were tending towards Erling Haaland for City’s home game against Liverpool, as he has found back his scoring boots, but then due to injury he missed the CL loss at Real Madrid and we saw their run of fixtures on the longer run (hint: it’s not an appealing run on paper). With Bakayo Saka injury, Heung-Min Son flagged and Cole Palmer playing Aston Villa away, we were again left with Mohamed Salah (£13.7m) for the visit to Man City on Sunday. And then we thought to ourselves, how did we not start with this guy in the first place? If any player in the entire league has proven to be fixture-proof, it’s Salah, and that statement is supported by numbers: 23 goals and 14 assists from 25 league starts. It’ll be an interesting encounter between leaders Liverpool who have seemed a bit wobbly at times lately and reigning champions Manchester City, who are 16 points behind the Reds but who seem to be getting some of their form back but defensively are erratic.
Oh, and unlike City, Liverpool had no European football this week.
Non-premium pick
You might feel the need to rub your eyes a few times when you look at the current Premier League top six. Nottingham Forest have been in there since practically the start of the season and they are currently in third place, but for a few weeks, Bournemouth have joined the battle for Europe as well. The Cherries currently find themselves in an impressive fifth place with 43 points and a good run of fixtures coming up. Therefore, our non-premium fantasy pick for Gameweek 26 is Justin Kluivert (£6.0m), who has been one of the key drivers behind Bournemouth’s recent success. The winger, who has been classified as a midfielder by FPL, already has 11 goals and 5 assists from 20 league starts to his name, and 5 of those goals and 3 of those assists were recorded over the last five gameweeks. Not bad for an out-of-position midfielder who is a key cog in his manager’s plans and who, on top of that, has a very affordable price tag and is on penalties. With a home game against Wolves coming up on Saturday, followed by a schedule that includes home games against Brentford, Ipswich, Fulham and Manchester United plus visits to Spurs and West Ham over the next eight gameweeks, we can easily see Kluivert building on his current stats for a while still. If you already have Kluivert then consider Dango Ouattara (£5.1m) who plays as a forward but is listed as a midfielder as we highlight in the differential section below.
The budget enabler
We don’t often include goalkeepers in our Gameweek Previews, but then again, it’s not every week that we have the chance to get in very early on a £4.2m goalie in the Chelsea goal. We know the Blues have not been the most reliable team in the league this season, but they are still battling for a top-six finish and they have shown quality at times as well. And now goalkeeper Robert Sanchez has been replaced by Filip Jorgensen (£4.2m). The Danish youth international was bought from Villareal for about £21 million in the summer, but he had only featured in two league games so far. That is, until manager Enzo Maresca decided to give him a chance as a starter in Gameweek 24 for the home game against West Ham United. Jorgensen has now started two league games in a row, in which he unfortunately conceded five goals, but we believe better times might be ahead for this absolute budget enabler. After Chelsea’s visit to Aston Villa this weekend, they have consecutive home games against Southampton and Leicester City, two of the lowest-scoring teams in the league. This, in combination with this £4.2m price tag, makes Jorgensen a very interesting route to freeing up a bit of budget, which can then be invested elsewhere in your squad.
The differential
With Bournemouth currently in fifth place, it was always likely that our differential fantasy pick for Gameweek 26 would be from the Cherries roster as well. We already mentioned Justin Kluivert earlier and we were considering the talented Antoine Semenyo, but his ownership has already risen to 8.6% at the moment of writing. Fortunately, Dango Ouattara (£5.1m) has over the past few months been emerging as an interesting Cherry asset as well. The Burkina Faso international, who plays as a forward/winger but is listed as a midfielder in FPL, conquered his spot in the starting spot back in Gameweek 15 and he has not looked back since. Now, 6 goals and 3 assists later (he has got 7 goals and 4 assists in total), Ouattara is our differential fantasy pick for GW26. He scored a hattrick against Nottingham Forest in Gameweek 23, a week after providing an assist versus Newcastle, and he was good for a goal against Southampton last weekend. That’s 4 goals and an assist over his last four league starts, and the Cherries have now got Wolves coming up next. On top of that, Bournemouth have got a decent fixture schedule after that, which makes Ouattara a potential longer-term hold as well, provided he delivers this weekend.
The (vice-)captaincy
The armband discussion is a real one this week, with many traditional prime candidates facing formidable opposition in Gameweek 26. We are nevertheless going with Mohamed Salah for Liverpool’s visit to the Etihad. In times of uncertainty, go with the best and well… Salah is the best this season.
Not convinced by our argument for Salah this weekend? Erling Haaland at home to Liverpool is, of course, interesting as well, especially now that he has scored 6 goals and given 2 assists over his last seven league games. Besides the two usual suspects, we are also liking the looks of Kaoru Mitoma away at Southampton, Bryan Mbeumo away at Leicester City and Justin Kluivert for his home game against Wolves.
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