Mark Mansfield is no ordinary Fantasy Premier League (FPL) manager. With an eye-watering seven top 10k finishes, five top 5k finishes, and two inside the top 1k — including a personal best of 227th — he’s one of the most consistent FPL minds in the game. That’s why his early thoughts on the 2025/26 Fantasy Premier League season matter.
We caught up with Mark as part of our Elite XI: Team Reveal series to discuss his first draft — and it’s fair to say it’s turning heads.
“Salah isn't in there but it’s quite easy to adjust at the expense of Haaland, or with some skimping on my premium defenders and mid-priced attackers.”
Mark’s left the door open — but for now, he’s prioritising balance and flexibility over forcing in the Egyptian King.
Salah averaged an incredible 9.1 FPL points per game during his record-breaking 344-point season, as highlighted in the Opta Heatmaps tool.
But Mark appears to believe a repeat of those numbers is unlikely in 2025/26 — though he’s clearly open to including him in future drafts if needed.
“In this first draft I've found the lure of a lesser selected Haaland hard to ignore. City have a nice initial run of fixtures…”
While some managers are questioning his early-season value, Mark is more than happy to build around the Norwegian forward.
According to the Insight Live tool, Haaland is currently selected by just 17.8% of managers, making him only the fourth most-picked forward — a surprisingly low figure for a player of his calibre.
James Maddison features for now — but he may not stay long.
“It won't take much in preseason for me to slot Foden in for Maddison.”
Expect this slot to be one of the most hotly debated in the run-up to Gameweek 1.
Mark’s gone early on a couple of exciting names in midfield:
“There are some nice punty budget mids in Georginio and Ndiaye – probably both is a little much but both are exciting budget picks.”
If either impresses in pre-season, they could become popular enablers.
Dominic Solanke has also earned a place up front:
“I like Solanke a lot.”
With favourable early fixtures and the potential for penalty duties — especially if Son leaves Spurs or sees reduced minutes — the Spurs striker could offer great value.
Mark shared more on why he rates him in yesterday’s article: FPL Bargains, Nailed Picks & Price Traps: Elite Managers Reveal All, where he and two other Elite XI managers revealed their top picks for the season.
This isn’t Mark’s final squad — not by a long shot!
You can get free push notifications or email alerts every time he makes a change to his draft via the Elite XI: Team Reveal tool.
Follow along as one of FPL’s most elite managers fine-tunes his strategy in the build-up to Gameweek 1.
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