Fantasy Premier League 2026/27: Top Gameweek 1 Picks
The deadline is looming on Friday at 18:30 BST, and the first big decision of the new Fantasy Premier League season is already here: who gives you that early jolt of momentum in Gameweek 1?
Four names stand out. Different positions, different price points, but all with the potential to blow open mini-leagues before they’ve even settled.
Alexander Isak (Liverpool) £9.0m
A cut-price gamble with elite upside
Twelve months ago, Alexander Isak was a £10.5m luxury. Now he’s a £9.0m temptation that’s very hard to ignore.
Injuries shredded his 2025/26 campaign, limiting him to just eight Premier League starts. The numbers from last season don’t tell his story. His body does now. Fit again, sharpened by a summer of World Cup minutes and a full pre-season, the Swedish forward looks ready to lead Liverpool’s new era.
The signs are already there. In his penultimate pre-season outing, Isak produced a goal and an assist against Monaco, the kind of all-round display that made him a Fantasy favourite at Newcastle United.
That last full season on Tyneside still looms large:
- 23 league goals
- 6 assists
- 211 FPL points
That is premium forward output, now available at a mid-premium price.
There’s another layer. Mohamed Salah is gone. With him go the guaranteed penalties. Liverpool’s new hierarchy from the spot isn’t confirmed, and Dominik Szoboszlai (£7.0m) will have his say, but Isak is firmly in that conversation. Even without spot-kicks, he has almost no competition for the central role. Hugo Ekitike (£7.5m) is sidelined with a long-term injury, leaving Isak as the clear first-choice striker.
The fixtures help, too. None of Liverpool’s opening five matches rates higher than three on the Fixture Difficulty Ratings scale. It’s a gentle ramp into the season for an attack that will revolve around him.
Gameweek 1 brings an immediate narrative twist: Liverpool against Newcastle. His old club. A Newcastle side in transition after the departure of Eddie Howe and the exit of several key players. It’s the kind of unstable opponent that a confident, central striker can punish.
Isak is cheaper, fit, and central to everything Liverpool want to be. That’s the profile of a Gameweek 1 pick that can explode.
Bryan Mbeumo (Man Utd) £8.0m
A midfielder playing up front against soft opposition
Manchester United have spent pre-season without Benjamin Sesko (£7.0m). His injury opened a door, and Bryan Mbeumo walked straight through it.
Listed as a midfielder in FPL, Mbeumo has spent most of the summer playing as United’s central forward. That “out of position” tag is gold dust in Fantasy terms, and he has backed it up with end product: three goals and an assist in his last three friendly starts.
He arrives fresh, too. Cameroon’s failure to qualify for the World Cup gave him a proper summer break and a full pre-season. No late returns, no managed minutes. He looks nailed for the opening weekend and beyond.
The schedule could hardly be kinder. In Gameweek 1, United host newly promoted Hull City. In Gameweek 2, they face another of the Premier League’s new arrivals, Ipswich Town.
Hull may have come up, but they did so with a leaky defence. They conceded 66 goals in the Championship last season; only three sides let in more. That kind of record usually gets exposed at the next level, especially away at Old Trafford.
For managers, it’s a simple equation: an advanced role, midfield classification, penalties not guaranteed but a major share of attacking responsibility, and back-to-back games against promoted sides. United’s attackers should enjoy their 2026/27 opener. Mbeumo looks the clearest way to tap into that.
Christos Tzolis (Arsenal) £6.5m
The new Arsenal spark at a mid-price
Arsenal’s new Greek winger has wasted no time announcing himself.
Christos Tzolis arrived from Club Brugge and immediately started shaping games in pre-season. One goal and six assists tell their own story. No Arsenal player could better his seven attacking returns over the summer.
Crucially, he has been around. While many of Arsenal’s internationals came back late from the FIFA World Cup, with their Gameweek 1 minutes under a cloud, Tzolis has been embedded in Mikel Arteta’s plans since July. He featured in all six of the Gunners’ pre-season matches, including the FA Community Shield.
On Sunday, he started in that 3-0 win and supplied an assist. Every time he has started for the reigning Premier League champions, he has produced at least one attacking return. That is the kind of immediate impact that Fantasy managers notice.
His track record in Belgium underlines that this isn’t a one-off hot streak. Last season in the Belgian top flight he delivered 17 goals and 23 assists. Those are elite creative and scoring numbers, now dropped into one of the league’s most dominant attacking sides.
Gameweek 1 gives him a soft landing: promoted Coventry City at home. With Arsenal likely to dominate the ball and territory, a £6.5m attacker with form, fitness and rhythm looks like a gift.
If you want a slice of the champions without paying premium prices, Tzolis is the obvious route.
Dan Ballard (Sunderland) £5.0m
A long-term defensive anchor, not just a one-week punt
Plenty of managers eyeing a Bench Boost in Gameweek 1 will have stumbled across Luke O’Nien (£4.0m) as the perfect fifth defender. The price is appealing. The minutes may not be.
With Omar Alderete (£5.0m) and Nordi Mukiele (£5.5m) expected back from injury soon, O’Nien’s place beyond the opening weekend is far from secure. Anyone planning for the long haul needs something sturdier.
Dan Ballard offers exactly that.
Across 2025/26, he averaged 10.9 defensive contributions per 90 minutes, hitting the required threshold in 58 per cent of his starts. Those underlying numbers point to steady, reliable returns in formats that reward defensive actions, and a solid base in standard FPL terms through clean-sheet potential.
He isn’t just a blocker, either. Ballard carries genuine threat from set pieces. Four attacking returns last season and a top-10 ranking among defenders for shots in the box (25, seventh overall) highlight a centre-back who attacks the ball aggressively in the opposition area.
Gameweek 1 hands him promoted Ipswich Town at home. On paper, it’s a strong platform for a clean sheet and maybe more.
There is a bump in the road in Gameweeks 4 and 5, when Sunderland’s fixtures turn tricky. Managers who can rotate him out during that spell – for example with a Leeds United defender, given their two home matches in that period – can then lean on Ballard right through to Gameweek 9.
If you want a defender you can pick now and barely think about for two months, Ballard is that “set-and-forget” option. The kind that quietly wins you points while everyone else scrambles for the next bandwagon.
