Salah or Haaland & what is the mystery chip? FPL 2024-25 tips

The Fantasy Premier League is back and there are just five days left until the first deadline of the season.

Not only is that five days to tinker with your FPL team, but also five days to delve into the biggest rule changes in the game’s history and how they could affect your approach.

Let’s answer some key questions, explain the new transfer rule and name some players to look out for.

What are the new FPL rules?

The biggest change this season concerns free transfers and how many you can collect in one go.

Previously, it was only possible to have two free transfer windows, which was quite restrictive if you wanted to make a major change to your squad – say, selling Erling Haaland to buy Mohamed Salah.

You can now bank five transfers at a time. And you can also keep these transfers if you play a chip, such as a wildcard or free hit.

Why is this a big deal? It gives you the chance to play multiple ‘mini wildcards’ throughout the season and gives you more creativity in how you use your chips.

You can be very aggressive in addressing changes in the match, dropping three or four players at once.

You could bring in a wildcard to create a bench and then quickly drop four or five of those players a few gameweeks later.

Here’s an example of how it might work early on:

• Game Week 1 – Pick a Team and Get Started

• Matchweek 4 – (three transfers on the bench) wildcard for a new team to target fixture changes – Brighton and Villa for example

• Gameweek 6 – you now have five transfers on the bench, a mini wildcard – you can still make a big change or save your powder for later.

There are other changes this season as well.

Bonus points have been adjusted. You could write a separate article about how this will affect you, but the simple explanation is that defenders will get bonus points less often and attackers who win fouls or shoot a lot on goal will get more.

And there’s a new chip, the Mystery Chip, which we’ll tell you more about later.

Salah or Haaland? Or can you afford both?

FPL have also done well in the trophies this season, with top midfielders such as Phil Foden, Cole Palmer and Bukayo Saka all earning £9.5m or more.

This forces you to make some tough choices, especially with the two giants in play, Salah and Haaland, costing £12.5m and £15m respectively (a £1m increase in price).

Can you fit them both into your team? Yes, you can, but you have to make sacrifices elsewhere and you can only lead one of them each week.

On average, you would be left with just over £5.5m for each of the remaining 13 players in your squad, meaning you would have to pick two or three budget midfielders or strikers. Very tricky.

The sacrifice is probably too big to try to get both Salah and Haaland in your team. So who should you pick?

The answer is Haaland. At least for the start of the season.

The Norwegian missed time last season and still managed 29 goals with eight assists. He will surely be a regular fixture and can you seriously go into week two without him as captain when Manchester City play newly promoted Ipswich at home?

I would take a wait and see approach with Salah, who has just had his worst FPL season as a Liverpool player, is a year older and has a new manager.

It remains to be seen how quickly Liverpool will coalesce under new boss Arne Slot. Would you be surprised if there were some teething problems?

There are also more alternatives to Salah in his position who can match his output. You can have Haaland and also stuff Saka and Palmer into your midfield for example.

Be patient with Liverpool, save up some free agents and you can always switch for Salah for Nottingham Forest and Bournemouth at home in weeks four and five.

FPL players to pick from – seven differences for £7m or less

No premium players here. Players like Saka, Palmer, Watkins and Isak are all great choices for your team, but you need some affordable differences too.

Here are seven players to choose from:

Marcus Rashford (Man Utd, £7m, midfielder) Despite a dreadful 2023-24, he is just one season removed from a 17-goal, 205-point FPL campaign. Erik ten Hag has spoken about trying to rebuild his confidence and there is a chance he could play in the middle at times with Rasmus Hojlund out injured.

Fulham, Brighton and Southampton are in the first four games and if Rashford fails to impress, £7m is an easy price to pay to get another midfielder in this price bracket.

Niclas Fullkrug (West Ham, £7m, striker) It may be a risk to pick players who are new to the Premier League from the start of the season, but Fullkrug could get straight to work. We’ve seen what he can do for Germany and Borussia Dortmund – he’s great in the air and wastes no time firing into the box. In short, he’s a handful.

At West Ham he will have players like Jarrod Bowen, Mohammed Kudus, Lucas Paqueta (for now) and Crysencio Summerville creating chances for him. Prediction – 20 goals.

Bryan Mbuemo (Brentford, £7m, midfielder) – There is a good chance that the Cameroonian striker would have scored 15 goals last season if he had not been injured. Mbuemo played only 22 games, but still delivered nine goals and seven assists.

He could take penalties if Ivan Toney leaves and will play home games against Crystal Palace, Southampton, West Ham and Wolves in the first seven matches.

Daniel Munoz (Crystal Palace, £5m, defender) – The Colombian full-back had a great end to last season as Palace became a much more attacking team under manager Oliver Glasner. In his last 11 games, Munoz has scored 47 FPL points, with four assists, 34 touches in the box and 1xG.

Those are sensational numbers for a defender who outscores Trent Alexander-Arnold, for example. Palace have had a decent run to start the season, but clean sheets aren’t the only way Munoz will score points this season.

Emile Smith Rowe (Fulham, £5.5m, midfielder) The former Arsenal man was a budget FPL darling in 2021-22 as he scored 10 goals in 21 starts. Such is the potential he possesses – it was injuries and Arsenal’s strong squad that held him back.

Given Fulham’s good start, it doesn’t seem like such a gamble to take a chance on ‘ESR’.

Christopher Nkunku (Chelsea, £6.5m, midfielder) The Frenchman was the Bundesliga’s top scorer three seasons ago. Injuries blighted his first season at Chelsea, which is probably why FPL have given him such an attractive price tag.

Nkunku has played a lot as a striker for Chelsea in pre-season and if that continues in the Premier League, he will be THE bargain of 2023-24. Even if he plays on the wing, £6.5m for a piece of an attack that really started to come into its own towards the end of last season is hard to pass up.

Chris Wood (Nottingham Forest, £6m, striker) The big forward averaged 5.7 fantasy points per game he started last season.

The problem has been that he hasn’t always been first choice, with Taiwo Awoniyi often starting for Forest. But it looks like Wood will be the man at the start of the season for his team’s juicy run of fixtures that begins with Bournemouth (home), Southampton (away), Wolves (home).

FPL’s Mystery Chip – What Could It Be?

FPL has announced a new Mystery Chip. It won’t be revealed until January.

What could it be? There was an All Out Attack chip before, which wasn’t that exciting since 3-5-2 is already a popular formation, so 2-5-3 isn’t much different.

Will it be a free hit with no budget? Could you have two captains? A free hit with no limit on the number of players on one team? Do the away points count double?

That’s anyone’s guess.

Three tips for 2024-25

Patience is important: There is a difference between spotting a bargain like Cole Palmer early in the season and impulsively signing a player into your team because he scored a hat-trick the week before. Patience, especially early in the season when you can collect transfers, is a virtue.

Plan ahead: Fixture swings and form are two important elements of FPL. Good fixtures can lead to good form. Have a good FPL planner and mark the fixture swings of teams to attack.

Be brave: No player is essential – even Haaland had a spell of just four goals in 12 games last season. You don’t always have to follow the crowd.

And finally…follow the BBC Sport League on BBC Sounds

You can listen to the Fantasy 606 podcast every game week on BBC Sounds, where Alistair Bruce-Ball, Statman Dave and Chris Sutton discuss and debate all things FPL, including the latest news from the BBC Sport League (which you can automatically join via the Fantasy Premier League website).