The fixtures for the 2024/25 Premier League season have been released this morning.
We’ll soon be bringing you a two-part Frisking the Fixtures article looking at the best and worst runs in the opening six Gameweeks.
In the meantime, we’ll be giving an initial live reaction to the 9am BST fixture release.
SEASON TICKER NOW LIVE
Our Season Ticker has been updated both on the sidebar and in our Premium Members Area.
The Premium Members ticker is the only one that is customisable.
You can sort by difficulty, rotation pairings and ‘relative’ difficulty (something that factors in the strength of the team), while you can also remove clubs and Gameweeks from the outlook, add your own difficulty ratings, sort by home/away matches and filter by attack/defence.
It’s one of the many benefits available to subscribers – make sure you sign up before the 2024/25 season to give yourself all the tools you need for a successful FPL campaign.
KICK-OFF AT OLD TRAFFORD
The season will, as has become tradition, get underway on a Friday night.
Manchester United will host Fulham on August 16, with Gameweek 1 spread over four days as has become the norm.
FAVOURABLE START FOR LIVERPOOL
One schedule that jumps out is that of Liverpool, who begin life without Jurgen Klopp with a favourable run of games.
Arne Slot has been dealt a fairly kind hand, with only Manchester United – fresh from their worst-ever Premier League finish – of the ‘big six’ awaiting in the first seven Gameweeks.
Newly promoted Ipswich Town provide the opposition on the first weekend before a sequence of three home matches in four.
- Gameweek 1: Ipswich Town (a)
- Gameweek 2: Brentford (h)
- Gameweek 3: Manchester United (a)
- Gameweek 4: Nottingham Forest (h)
- Gameweek 5: Bournemouth (h)
- Gameweek 6: Wolverhampton Wanderers (a)
- Gameweek 7: Crystal Palace (a)
TRICKIER START FOR ARSENAL
Arsenal, by contrast, could have wished for an easier start.
Their first three away matches, all in the first five Gameweeks, are against Aston Villa, Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City.
The reigning champions themselves have a mixed bag of opening fixtures. It’s Chelsea away on the opening weekend before clashes with Newcastle United and Arsenal in Gameweeks 5 and 6.
In general, though, it’s a mostly good run for City in Gameweeks 1-11.
IPSWICH IN AT THE DEEP END
It doesn’t get much tougher than Ipswich Town’s opening two fixtures: Liverpool at home and Manchester City away.
Leicester City don’t have it easy either, with Spurs, Villa and Arsenal in the first six Gameweeks.
The newly promoted side with arguably the best opening run is Southampton.
The Saints face Nottingham Forest, Brentford, Ipswich and Bournemouth in their opening half-dozen, although are away at Newcastle in Gameweek 1.
INTERNATIONAL BREAKS BUT NO WINTER BREAK
We’ll get a total of three Gameweeks before our first international break in September.
Further international fortnights will follow after Gameweeks 7, 11 and 29.
There will be no winter break this season, however.
FESTIVE FIXTURES
There are four Gameweeks (17-20) over the festive period but more spaced out to avoid the 48-hour turnarounds we’ve encountered in previous years.
The shortest recovery times look set to be between Gameweek 18 (the Boxing Day round) and Gameweek 19 (starting on December 29).
MIDWEEK GAMEWEEKS
Our first midweek round of matches is Gameweek 14, which takes place on December 3-4.
There will be four midweek Gameweeks in all, the other three following in 2025.
FEWER BLANKS/DOUBLES
As we learned earlier this year, there will be fewer Blank and Double Gameweeks in 2024/25.
FA Cup fifth rounds are moving back to weekends, so we expect the only minor fixture clashes to take place with the EFL Cup final, FA Cup semi-finals and FA Cup final.
There’ll likely be blanks in Gameweeks 29 (EFL Cup final) and 34 (FA Cup semi-finals), with potential doubles in Gameweeks 33 and 36 as these avoid a clash with European fixtures.
SELECTED GAMEWEEKS
GAMEWEEK 1
GAMEWEEK 2
GAMEWEEK 3
GAMEWEEK 4
GAMEWEEK 5
GAMEWEEK 6
GAMEWEEK 18 (BOXING DAY)
GAMEWEEK 38
