Following the release of the 2025/26 fixtures, The Scout highlights the clubs and players to target for the opening Gameweeks in Fantasy Premier League.
Nottingham Forest
Nuno Espirito Santo’s regulars have the schedule to make an immediate impact on the new Fantasy campaign.
Back-to-back matches with Burnley and Sunderland in Gameweeks 5 and 6 means that Nottingham Forest are the ONLY side who will face two promoted opponents in the first six rounds of matches.
According to the Fixture Difficulty Ratings (FDR) - where the easiest possible matches are ranked as No 1 and the hardest are ranked as No 5 – as many as THREE of Forest’s first six matches score only two.
Home matches with Brentford and West Ham United, allied with a visit to Crystal Palace, means that Forest’s trip to Arsenal in Gameweek 4 is their only match which scores more than three in the FDR across that spell.
Nottingham Forest's first six fixtures
| GW | Opponent | FDR* |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brentford (H) | 3 |
| 2 | Crystal Palace (A) | 3 |
| 3 | West Ham (H) | 2 |
| 4 | Arsenal (A) | 4 |
| 5 | Burnley (A) | 2 |
| 6 | Sunderland (H) | 2 |
*1 = easiest, 5 = hardest
After making a big impact at both ends of the pitch last season, there’s no doubt that a host of Forest players will increase in price in 2025/26 Fantasy.
At the back, their total of 13 clean sheets was bettered only by the 14 of Liverpool and level with Arsenal, Manchester City and Newcastle United.
The resilience of Nuno’s side is further highlighted by the underlying statistics. They conceded just 72 big chances – situations where the player is expected to score – which placed them second only to the 58 of Arsenal.
It's fair to say, then, that Forest’s main options at the back such as goalkeeper Matz Sels and centre-back Nikola Milenkovic - who both started last season at £4.5m - will no longer remain in the budget bracket this time around.
If the Forest rearguard regulars are identically-priced this season, Sels and Milenkovic are the standout picks due to their many routes to returns.
Sels earned 27 of his 150 points through saves, while 11 came from bonus points.
Milenkovic’s attacking threat from set-pieces is evidenced by his five goals and two assists. His 21 headed shots were joint-top with Virgil van Dijk among defenders.
In attack, you can also expect midfielders Morgan Gibbs-White and Anthony Elanga, along with forward Chris Wood, to climb in cost after all three recorded their best-ever Fantasy campaigns in 2024/25.
Gibbs-White is certainly the more secure of the midfield pair – all 34 of his outings were as a starter, compared with 31 of Elanga’s 38. Yet just a single point separated them overall, with the former pipping his team -mate by 154 points to 153.
It does remain to be seen if either will still be a Forest player by the start of the season, though, as both have been the subject of media reports linking them with a possible move away during the summer transfer window.
Wood will surely be the most expensive Forest pick after finishing as the second top-scoring forward last season on 200 points. Among team-mates, that was 46 points ahead of his nearest challenger, Gibbs-White.
Wood’s total of 28 big chances was at least THREE times more than any other Forest player, showing his role as the focal point of their attack.
Nonetheless, there’s no doubt Wood's own appeal could be diluted if one or both of Gibbs-White and Elanga departed, as such a scenario would make the Forest attack very much a work-in-progress at the start of 2025/26.
