It’s Champions League this week and that’s important for fantasy managers to take into account. Since the introduction of the new format, no less than six Premier League teams are active in Europe’s highest division: Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Newcastle United and Tottenham Hotspur. We will provide an overview of their schedules below:
Already played as we write this (on Thursday, September 18th)
| HOME TEAM | AWAY TEAM | RESULT |
| Bayern Munich | Chelsea | 3-1 |
| Liverpool | Atletico Madrid | 3-2 |
| Spurs | Villareal | 1-0 |
| Athletic Club | Arsenal | 0-2 |
To be played still
| HOME TEAM | AWAY TEAM |
| Manchester City | Napoli |
| Newcastle | FC Barcelona |
Seeing as these six teams contain more than a few popular FPL picks, the Champions League games will surely have an impact on this weekend’s Premier League action in terms of fatigue and injuries, and therefore rotation. As usual, we recommend waiting with decisions on your potential Gameweek 5 transfers until at least after Thursday night’s Champions League fixtures, which finish around 22h00 UK time.
Don’t forget, the deadline for Gameweek 5 is set at 11h00 (UK time) on Saturday, September 20th, 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 September 18th, 2025)
| TRANSFERS OUT | TRANSFERS IN | POSSIBLE REASONS | |
| GK | Sanchez (CHE), Sels (NFO), Raya (ARS) | Vicario (TOT), Donnarumma (MCI), Raya (ARS) | |
| DEF | Aït-Nouri (MCI), Aina (NFO), Saliba (ARS) | Van de Ven (TOT), Guéhi (CRY), Timber (ARS) | Van de Ven form + fixtures, Aït-Nouri injury doubt, Aina injury |
| MID | Wirtz (LIV), Fernandes (MUN), Reijnders (MCI) | Semenyo (BOU), Palmer (CHE), Caicedo (CHE) | Semenyo form, Palmer return to fitness |
| FOR | Ekitiké (LIV), Wood (NFO), Richarlison (TOT) | Haaland (MCI), Woltemade (NEW), Pedro (CHE) | Haaland + Pedro form |
Premium pick
At the moment of writing, FPL features four players who are priced £10m or higher. One of them is facing Arsenal away on Sunday (Haaland) and one of them is travelling to Old Trafford a day earlier (Palmer), while two of them are opening Gameweek 5 at home against Everton. Those two are Alexander Isak and Mohamed Salah (£14.5m), and considering form and match-ups, we are once again going with the latter as our stand-out premium fantasy pick. The Egyptian delivered in the dying minutes against Burnley in Gameweek 4, converting a penalty and racking up 9 FPL points in the process. He then continued his good form against Atletico Madrid in the Champions League on Wednesday by scoring a goal and giving an assist. The Reds are now getting ready for the Merseyside Derby against arch-rivals Everton at Anfield and despite the visitors’ good form, we think a comfortable victory is on the cards here. Liverpool seem to be unbeatable at the moment as they have gotten off to literally a perfect start of the 2025 – 2026 season: 5 official games, 5 victories. Sure, some of those victories were secured well into added time, but they were still secured. We consider them heavy favourites against Everton and Mo Salah is captaincy material, as far as we are concerned.
Non-premium pick
Joao Pedro (£7.8m) is currently one of the best value-for-money players in the entire official fantasy game. The Chelsea forward, who started the season at £7.5m, spearheads one of the best attacks in the league so far, which has resulted in 2 goals and 3 assists in four starts. The Blues are travelling to Old Trafford this weekend, which once upon a time was a dreaded fixture for teams all over England and Europe. The stadium’s aura of invincibility has notably faded over the past few season as Manchester United are once again looking to a struggling side this season. They have one just one of their first four league games and currently find themselves in 14th place. That’s just one spot above their place at the end of last season, by the way. They have also conceded 7 goals over that same run of four games, which makes us think that Chelsea’s Joao Pedro is actually a good shout as non-premium fantasy pick for Gameweek 5. Remember though, that the Brazilian played 90 minutes against Bayern Munich in the Champions League this week, so he carries a somewhat elevated rotation risk. Keep an eye on Chelsea team news in the build-up to Saturday morning’s Gameweek 5 deadline.
The budget enabler
For our Gameweek 5 budget enabler we are looking at Turf Moor, where Jaidon Anthony (£5.5m) has had a great start on his return to the Premier League. The winger, who is listed as a midfielder in the official fantasy game, played an integral role in Burnley’s success in the Championship last season, which eventually ended with promotion to the Prem. Anthony played 43 games for the Clarets over that impressive run, scoring 8 goals and providing 7 assists. And now, in the Premier League, he looks like he is dead set on delivering similar numbers. Anthony has started each of Burnley’s four league games so far and with good reason, because he scored and gave an assist in the win over Sunderland in GW2 and scored another goal at Old Trafford in GW3. This has resulted in 24 FPL points, which is an excellent return for a €5.5m midfielder and more could be on the way as Burnley host Nottingham Forest on Saturday. The Tricky Trees rather surprisingly sacked success coach Nuno Espirito Santo right after the summer transfer window and replaced him with former Spurs manager Ange Postecoglou. Amid the unrest, Forest have lost their last two league games (0-3 against West Ham and 3-0 against Arsenal) and we can honestly see it becoming three consecutive losses for them when they visit Turf Moor this weekend. Postecoglou is not known for his defensive prowess and we feel that a player with the qualities and good form of Jaidon Anthony can really hurt them right now.
The differential
Brighton are not having the best of starts, at least not in terms of what we have come to expect from them over the past few seasons. The Seagulls have won just one of their first four league games so far and they have not yet managed to record a clean sheet. Spurs, on the other hand, have hit the ground running under new manager Thomas Franke with three victories in their first four league games, plus a 1-0 win over Villareal in the Champions League this week. As the two sides are facing each other this weekend at the AmEx Stadium with the home side having displayed a clear vulnerability on their right side so this season, we are taking the opportunity to include Xavi Simons (£7.0m, 2.7% owned) as our differential fantasy pick for Gameweek 5. The Dutchman joined Spurs at the very end of the summer transfer window for around £52 million and has made an excellent first impression in North London. He made his debut against West Ham last weekend, as a starter who remained on the pitch for 70 minutes and grabbed an assist for 6 FPL points. It looks like Simons has slotted straight into Frank’s starting eleven and with clean sheet-less Brighton having conceded almost twice as many chances from their right flank as from the left, we are *secretly* hoping for another attacking return (or two) from the Dutchman is his second Premier League game this weekend.
The (vice-)captaincy
We already said it in our premium fantasy pick segment, but the armband is once again going to Mohamed Salah. He is about as “set-and-forget” as they come for us and with a home game against Everton up next, coming off a thriller of a victory over Atletico Madrid, we are hoping for yet another haul from him.
There are a few good alternatives on offer in Gameweek 5 as well, including Ollie Watkins for Aston Villa’s visit to Sunderland and the in-form Antoine Semenyo for Bournemouth’s home game against Newcastle. The same goes for Tottenham’s Mohamed Kudus away at Brighton and Liverpool’s Cody Gakpo at home to Everton.
For further discussions have a look at FISO’s FPL forum where you can also see the FPL mini-leagues and FPL side-games available.