The first gameweek of the season is always the noisiest, and this one gave us a decade’s worth of chaos in one weekend. Ten matches, three promoted sides, and a bonus-point system that was quietly rebuilt during the summer while nobody was looking. By Sunday night the message was unambiguous: the expensive “expected” stars blanked, and the cheap back-line army that the new rules were designed to reward came out swinging.
Let’s break down what actually happened — the shockers, the pattern underneath them, and who deserves to be shown the door before the Gameweek 2 deadline.
The shockers
Ten matches, and three of them upended the season’s assumptions before the opening weekend was even finished.
| Match | Result | Why it shocked |
|---|---|---|
| Hull City vs Man United | 2-0 | A promoted side just beat a team banking on the new-manager bounce |
| Brentford vs Tottenham | 3-0 | Spurs thumped by a side that finished mid-table last year |
| Brighton vs Aston Villa | 4-0 | A top-six team hammered by Brighton’s cheap new-look back line |
| Ipswich vs Sunderland | 2-1 | Another promoted win, and no fluke |
| Fulham vs Chelsea | 2-3 | A five-goal London derby, and Xabi Alonso’s Chelsea won it away |
The Man United result is the headline. Hull City spent last season in the Championship, and the FPL community had loaded up on United assets on the back of their kind opening fixtures — Hull away, Ipswich home, Everton away. That “kind opening” died inside ninety minutes. Every big-name Red Devil blanked: Bruno Fernandes returned 2 points, Mbeumo 2, Luke Shaw 1, Maguire 1. The 49.8% of managers who own Bruno and the 37.1% who picked up Mbeumo walked into Gameweek 2 already chasing.
Villa’s 4-0 drumming at Brighton is the quiet one. Aston Villa are a Champions League side, and their premium assets — Watkins, Bailey, the midfield — produced almost nothing while Brighton’s cheap defenders ran riot. And Tottenham’s 3-0 collapse at Brentford did a number on the 23.4% who’d backed Kinsky and the 10.2% on Van Hecke.
The cheap army rises
Here’s the number that should define your early-season thinking. Of the ten highest GW1 scores, seven came from players priced £6.0m or under, and the top three cost £4.5m, £6.0m and £4.0m. This is the new bonus-point system doing exactly what it was rebuilt to do — pushing points towards attacking full-backs, goalkeepers and the defensive assets that rack up clearances and tackles.
| Player | Club | Pos | Price | GW1 pts | Ownership |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| De Cuyper | BHA | DEF | £4.5m | 17 | 5.1% |
| Hinshelwood | BHA | MID | £6.0m | 16 | 1.6% |
| Mendy | HUL | DEF | £4.0m | 15 | 2.0% |
| Ajayi | HUL | DEF | £4.0m | 14 | 1.5% |
| M. Sangaré | BRE | MID | £5.5m | 14 | 5.9% |
| Kayode | BRE | DEF | £4.5m | 13 | 5.5% |
| Stach | LEE | MID | £6.0m | 13 | 1.5% |
And don’t miss the goalkeepers: Tzolakis (Hull, £4.5m) banked 10 points — a keeper returning double digits in a gameweek is a differential-level strike. The inflated striker-and-premium template, where Haaland at £15.5m plus a £12.0m Bruno swallowed a quarter of your budget, is suddenly being eaten alive by £4.0m defenders you can rotate off your bench.
The big names that blanked
The flip side of the cheap army. These are the players the community owned in huge numbers who returned next to nothing.
| Player | Club | Pos | Price | GW1 pts | Ownership |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Haaland | MCI | FWD | £15.5m | 2 | 68.6% |
| Bruno Fernandes | MUN | MID | £12.0m | 2 | 49.8% |
| Mbeumo | MUN | MID | £8.0m | 2 | 37.1% |
| Semenyo | MCI | MID | £8.5m | 2 | 25.3% |
| Calvert-Lewin | LEE | FWD | £6.0m | 1 | 29.8% |
| Thiago | BRE | FWD | £8.0m | 0 | 17.1% |
| Reece James | CHE | DEF | £5.5m | 0 | 10.2% |
Thiago is the one that stings most. He was the standout value forward of the xG ledger — 20.4 expected goals, 22 actual goals last season at £8.0m — and he posted 0 points while his own team won 3-0. Blanking while the team scores three is the biggest red flag in football: either he wasn’t involved in the attacking play, or something is off with his role under the new system.
Who to transfer out
Here’s where it gets tactical, and where the panic-sellers will lose their season. The knee-jerk move after a brutal weekend is to dump Haaland, Bruno and the whole expensive crew. That is a mistake — because most of them have a winnable Gameweek 2 sitting right in front of them.
Hold — do NOT sell before GW2:
| Player | Why hold |
|---|---|
| Haaland (£15.5m) | City away to Palace (FDR 3). He historically explodes across GW1-6. One blank isn’t a signal. |
| Bruno Fernandes (£12.0m) | Man United host promoted Ipswich (FDR 2). A home game against a promoted side is the definition of a bounce-back fixture. |
| Mbeumo (£8.0m) | Same fixture. Selling him now is selling him into his easiest game of the month. |
| Isak / Wirtz (LIV) | Liverpool host Forest (FDR 3). Wait for the Forest fixture before you judge Liverpool’s attack. |
The honest read on Haaland is the season’s defining debate. He’s 68.6% owned at a record £15.5m, and he blanked. But the counter is real: he has the cheapest run of fixtures in the league across the first six gameweeks. If you sell him now and he does his GW1-6 thing, you’ve given 30-40 points to every Haaland owner in your mini-league. The balanced play is to hold through GW2 and re-evaluate — if he’s blanked again away to Palace and the cheap army keeps hauling, then you free up that £15.5m with a clear conscience.
Sell — genuine transfer-out candidates:
| Player | Why sell |
|---|---|
| Semenyo (£8.5m) | Expensive Man City midfielder, blanked, and he’s a rotation risk. You can upgrade the same slot cheaper. |
| Reece James (£5.5m) | Chelsea defender, 0 points, away to Brighton in GW2, and the injury history is a permanent flag. |
| Calvert-Lewin (£6.0m) | 29.8% owned and returned 1 point. Leeds scraped a 1-0 at Forest and he wasn’t involved. Sell if you need the funds. |
And the wildcard: Thiago (£8.0m). He’s not a panic sell because Brentford’s entire attack funnels through him — but an £8.0m forward who just returned 0 while his team scored three is a lot of dead budget. If you need the money to buy into the cheap army’s momentum, he’s the highest-value forward to release.
What to bring in instead
If you’re selling, the GW1 data points you in a clear direction: the money should flow into the in-form, cheap assets who are already hauling under the new bonus rules.
- Ødegaard (ARS, £6.5m) — 11 points, and the champions won 3-0. Cheap, fixture-proof, effective.
- Cole Palmer (CHE, £9.5m) — a goal and an assist as Xabi Alonso’s Chelsea won a five-goal derby away. The premium-adjacent mid who actually delivered.
- Gakpo (LIV, £7.0m) — 12 points at a value price, with a generous home fixture to come.
- M. Sangaré (BRE, £5.5m) — two assists as Brentford battered Spurs. The £5.5m midfield differential.
- De Cuyper (BHA, £4.5m) — the single best score of GW1, a goal and an assist, from a £4.5m defender. He’s the BPS poster child.
- Ben White (ARS, £5.5m) — a clean sheet, an assist and 11 points. Arsenal’s defence is for real.
The takeaway
Gameweek 1 told us two things. First, the new bonus-point system is not a footnote — it’s a structural shift. Cheap defenders, attacking full-backs and goalkeepers are now the most productive assets in the game, and that changes how you spend your £100m. Second, panic is the enemy. The big names blanked, but most of them have the fixture schedule to recover, so don’t trade your season on a single weekend of noise. Sell the genuinely-flagged assets, buy the cheap army, hold the superstars a week, and let Gameweek 2 separate the signal from the noise.
That’s the way the commentary desk calls it.
Methodology & credit: All fixtures, player points, prices and ownership figures are from the official FPL API (bootstrap-static and event/1/live), snapshot 25 August 2026 after Gameweek 1 lockdown. Fixture difficulty ratings reflect the FPL official 1-5 teams difficulty values for Gameweek 2. Ownership and price data are verified against the official API and not estimated.