Mohamed Salah and Trent Alexander-Arnold are no longer Liverpool players. Salah has departed the Premier League, and Trent Alexander-Arnold has joined Real Madrid. The two most-owned, most-captained, most template-defining Liverpool assets of the last decade are gone in the same window — and with them, the "Salah-and-TAA double-up" that has anchored FPL squads since 2017/18.

For 2026/27, every existing Liverpool template article is out of date. Owning Salah at £14m and TAA at £7m is no longer an option. The Onside model has re-cast Liverpool as a value-tier proposition for the first time in years: no individual asset priced above the £8m bracket commands premium-status confidence, and the route to Liverpool exposure now runs through 3–4 cheaper picks rather than 1–2 marquee names.

Andoni Iraola arrives from Bournemouth, where his pressing system produced one of the league's most consistent attacking-output overperformances relative to wage bill in 2025/26. The system: aggressive front-foot press, vertical transitions, wide men cutting inside, set-piece-heavy goal share.

For FPL, the Iraola change shifts Liverpool's points distribution away from the lone-star template (where Salah hoarded returns) toward a more even spread across the front three and inside-forwards. The downside: clean sheets are less predictable in pressing systems than in Slot's possession-based 25/26 setup. The upside: assists and goal involvements get distributed across more players, which means the right cheap Liverpool pick can deliver template-beating returns at sub-£7m.

Liverpool's reported summer-2026 marquee signing is Florian Wirtz, the German playmaker who led the Bundesliga in chance creation in 25/26. If the deal completes (rumoured but not yet officially confirmed at time of writing), Wirtz becomes the most credible Liverpool premium pick — but at what price is the open question.

If FPL prices Wirtz at the £9.0–9.5m bracket he occupied under price-prediction modelling, he is a clear template alternative to Bruno Fernandes or Cole Palmer. If he comes in at £8.0m or below — possible given his lack of Premier League track record — he becomes the most-owned mid-priced midfielder of the season. Either way, Wirtz is the single Liverpool name most likely to define your 26/27 mid-block.

Ekitike is OUT — Achilles injury, no return date. Do not pick him for GW1. What follows is the case for him once he is fit.

With Salah gone, Liverpool's central scoring threat shifts to Hugo Ekitike, the French striker signed from Eintracht Frankfurt for £69m. Ekitike's underlying numbers from the Bundesliga — 0.52 xG per 90, 0.38 xA per 90 across 25/26 — suggest a 12–16 goal Premier League season at his ceiling. That puts him in the £7.5–8.5m striker bracket where João Pedro, Wood, and Cunha live.

The questions for FPL managers: (1) Is he on penalties? (likely yes — Liverpool's previous taker, Salah, is gone, and Mac Allister is the other candidate; both are open in early reporting). (2) Is he starting from GW1? Pre-season tour minutes will tell. (3) Does Iraola's system support a fixed #9? Iraola's Bournemouth ran a centre-forward rotation in 25/26, which is the single biggest Ekitike risk to monitor. If he locks down the role once the Achilles heals, he's the value-tier striker of the season — but that is a second-half-of-the-season bet now, not a GW1 one.

Virgil van Dijk remains at Liverpool and remains the cornerstone of any FPL Liverpool defensive structure. At £6.5m, he is the most reliable clean-sheet anchor in the £5.5–6.5m bracket, with the bonus of being Liverpool's set-piece target and a recurring goal threat. Even in Liverpool's 5th-place 25/26 season, Van Dijk returned consistent clean-sheet stretches and was the most-owned non-Arsenal premium defender by the season's end.

For 26/27, Van Dijk's case strengthens: with Trent gone, Liverpool's defensive system simplifies — fewer attacking-FB risks, more central-defensive solidity. He does not take the corners himself — Szoboszlai is first on corners, penalties and direct free-kicks, with Gakpo and Wirtz behind him — but he is the man those deliveries are aimed at, and he is Liverpool's captain. He is the safest Liverpool pick of the season.

Below the premium bracket, the two Liverpool midfielders best positioned to take the points share Salah no longer absorbs are Dominik Szoboszlai (£6.5–7.0m projected) and Alexis Mac Allister (£6.0–6.5m projected). Both played 30+ league games in 25/26; both featured on set-piece duty; both saw their xGI per 90 rise as Salah's minutes managed down.

Szoboszlai is the more direct attacking threat — he takes free kicks from range and runs the inside-right channel. Mac Allister is the deeper-lying pen-taker candidate and the more bonus-friendly option (his BPS-tackle-pass profile is elite for a #8). One of these is in most top-1k Liverpool exposures for 26/27; the value pick of the two depends on which gets the penalty duty in pre-season.

For the first season since 2017/18, the honest answer is "probably not." The Onside model rates Liverpool 5th-best premium-bracket attacking returns for 26/27 behind Manchester City, Arsenal, Manchester United (Bruno-led), and Aston Villa. The £15.5m slot belongs to Haaland; the elite-midfielder slot belongs to Bruno Fernandes / Saka / Palmer.

The smart Liverpool exposure for 26/27 is 3–4 picks: Van Dijk at £6.5m, Wirtz (£7.4m) or Szoboszlai (£7.0m), Isak at £9.0m leading the line while Ekitike is out with an Achilles injury (no return date), and optionally Mac Allister at £6m if he gets pens. That spread captures Liverpool's distributed scoring profile under Iraola without the all-eggs-in-Salah-basket risk that defined every previous FPL season.