There was once a time in the landscape of Fantasy Premier League when new drafts at the start of the season would mean selecting Mo Salah, and then the rest of the team.
He was the best asset in the game, and you wouldn’t be betting the captain’s armband against his smiling face after running down the wing.
The Egyptian king as they say has lost parts of his empire’s control with the inclusion and arrival of a certain Norwegian.
It is the circle of life the former empire will have to cede control to the new kings of newer generations. In the English Premier League outside of the custom battles of winning titles, there will be another battle of new and former glories gunning for supremacy.
Reasons & History & Right Now
Erling Haaland’s £14.0m pricing, has inevitably made it hard for Fantasy managers to include Salah priced at £12.5m in their drafts. Liverpool had a torrid time last season finishing outside of the UEFA Champions League places. Their poor showing prompted Mo to apologize to the fans on social media. Since then, the landscape in the middle of the park for Scousers has changed much.
Team captain Jordan Henderson has left for Saudi, a move that didn’t go well with the minority section of the club’s fans. He was followed by Fabinho with Milner joining Seagulls in between. Liverpool’s old architects of midfield were gone. They are now replaced by an ever-influential Mac Allister along with Dominic Szoboszlai.
Caicedo too seems to be hours away at the time of writing from joining the midfield duo to complete the pack. After Jurgen Klopp’s most poor showing in the past half a decade, he will be itching to battle toe to toe with his Spanish counterpart once again. For now, Salah’s ownership numbers remain much below the expected standards.
Pre-Season
For Fantasy managers betting against Mo Salah at the start of the campaign, pre-season numbers won’t make their choice any bit easier.
Salah has two goals and seven assists in pre-season, with goal involvement every 30 minutes, the highest amongst all the players in the league.
Jota finds himself in the second position with seven attacking outputs with a goal involvement every 34.3 minutes. That’s not what non-owners would want to hear.
If the Caicedo deal does go through, Liverpool will be the prime favorite alongside Arsenal to challenge City for the spot at the helm.
Klopp’s side has always been front-footed in their tactical approach with Salah as the main 90-minute operating man.
Mo finished with 240 FPL points for a struggling Liverpool side the previous season. He is simply by some distance the best midfielder in the game.
The likes of Saka and Rashford will have to play out of their skin to garner the points Mo has acquired while missing penalties against Bournemouth.
Formations
Most template formations have involved mainly Bruno Fernandes with Odegaard or Watkins as the primary candidates taking up the budget and the place of the Egyptian.
The sacrifices are too many to make to have Salah in the draft are the usual potent narratives doing the rounds in the corners of engaged managers and most content creators.
There is a counterargument to this. Manchester United last season scored 58 goals throughout the campaign. Bruno Fernandes sits overall 61st on the table for goal involvement for his side with a 30% involvement percentage. Odegaard fall even further back.
Despite last season proving to be such illustrious for the Gunners captain and it was, there is no argument for that. From an attacking Fantasy perspective, Odegaard had a goal involvement of only 28% sitting in 63rd on the goal involvement table.
As far as Watkins is concerned, yes, Aston Villa is a good side, in fact outside the traditional big six, they are the team expected to give most teams a run for their money.
Their schedule at the start of the campaign is a mixed bag at best. It is from game week 9 that their fixtures become interesting. Again, a counter argument can be placed, Emery does play an incredibly high line and there is every chance owing to Villa’s style of play. It can be a prime Salah fixture.
Fixtures & Flexibility & Escape Routes
It is not only game week 2 at home to Bournemouth that should be seen as a great fixture for Liverpool at macro and Salah in micro. Opening day fixture against can serve well for the Reds as well. The Blues have a new manager in place, they have lost their main forward in Nkunku, and their defense hasn’t completely settled in as evidenced in pre-season.
All in all, Liverpool will be going into the match as a simply more settled side. It might be very well the case Liverpool’s assets will be sitting on the top of the Fantasy points charts after two game weeks.
Counter-arguments against Mo is the lack of flexibility that will be incurred by having the Egyptian in drafts, but is that really what is happening? At £12.5m, yes, there will be player positions where money will be very tight. There might not be much flexibility to jump to higher-priced assets.
A nuanced approach to this dilemma can be resolved through perceptions. Salah from the start should be seen from a viability perspective over a certain period.
The Egyptian may not be lock hold over the complete course of the season but rather before the emergence and assurance of starts and playing style of players like Maddison, Salah serves as simply the best option in the game, if not anything a placeholder for the mid-priced best assets. His 12.5m price point provides the opportunity to downgrade to every midfielder in the game in one move.
At the same time, if Mo does have a potentially great start to the season with the likes of Odegaard or Bruno, or even Maddison struggling to keep up, practically it will be difficult for managers to get to Salah in one move.
There at least will need to be two or three moves to make the transfer to Salah happen, and depending on how high the ceiling gets for the Egyptian, fear of missing out and knee-jerk reactions may likely prompt hits.
Other Liverpool Assets
Jota might be considered as the closest to having a Liverpool attacker not named Mo Salah, but the Portugal international’s minutes are anything but secured.
Last season’s statistics do not hold well for Jota in terms of minutes. He completed 90 minutes only twice, getting subbed off in 83.3% of the games having an average playing time when he started of 72.6 minutes. He had twelve starts and ten from off the bench.
Klopp seems to be really in favor of Gakpo but his role in the team is similar to the beloved Brazilian in Merseyside, Roberto Firmino. Klopp has deployed Gakpo even as number 8 in pre-season. If Gakpo was enlisted as a midfielder in the game, perhaps he would have been worthy of consideration but as a forward, he is not probably worth the value.
Similar to Jota, Luis Diaz has too many others vying for his place in the team. Darwin Nunez needs to have some really good showing off the bench to start consistently in the starting eleven perhaps. The Uruguayan though will be probably expected to line up against Bournemouth from minute one.
All in all, Mo Salah remains Liverpool’s best attacking asset in the game, and probably the best midfielder in the game as well.