Fixture swings for the opening six gameweeks
Fixture difficulty is the one piece of Gameweek 1 planning that's already fully live - no prediction needed, just the calendar. Pulling the numbers straight from this site's own Fixtures model for the opening six gameweeks turns up a clearer picture than "check the colours and squint."
The kindest runs
Four teams are tied at the top on average difficulty for their first six:
- Liverpool (avg 2.83): NEW (A), NFO (H), IPS (A), FUL (H), BOU (A), MCI (H)
- Man Utd (avg 2.83): HUL (A), IPS (H), EVE (A), MCI (H), FUL (A), TOT (H)
- Newcastle (avg 2.83): LIV (H), TOT (A), BOU (H), LEE (A), HUL (H), COV (A)
- Everton (avg 2.83): CRY (H), BOU (A), MUN (H), TOT (A), IPS (H), HUL (A)
Worth noting straight away: Liverpool and Newcastle play each other in Gameweek 1, and Man Utd and Everton meet in Gameweek 3 - two of these four "easy runs" partly cancel each other out, which the average alone doesn't tell you. Man Utd's run is the standout on closer inspection: four of their first six are against sides currently projected in the bottom half, with the only real tests (Man City, Spurs) both at home.
The tough end
Bournemouth sits alone at the bottom (avg 3.67): MCI (A), EVE (H), NEW (A), BRE (H), LIV (H), CHE (A). Three of the league's stronger sides in their first six, two of them away, is a genuinely rough draw to build around - it's not a reason to avoid Bournemouth's better players outright, but it's a reason to expect a slow start from their defence in particular.
Fulham (avg 3.33), and a cluster of Coventry, Brentford, Leeds, and Hull (all avg 3.17), round out the harder end. The promoted sides among them (Coventry, Hull) facing a tough run on top of the step up in quality is worth weighing carefully - see our promoted-teams piece for more on that.
How to actually use this
Fixture difficulty on its own is a blunt instrument - it doesn't know a team just sold its best striker, or that a "hard" fixture is away at a side missing three defenders to injury. It's one input, not the answer. The Outlook page combines this same fixture data with the site's points model to rank actual transfer targets over a chosen window, which is the more useful next step once you've got a shortlist of teams worth targeting from the run-down above.
Sources: Premier League - fixture list, 2026/27 (dates and opponents cross-checked against this site's own live fixture feed).