Haaland's price tag of £14.0m for the 2023/24 Fantasy Premier League (FPL) season has FPL managers scratching their heads as to how to include Salah alongside the Norwegian international. In this blog, we find out how to accommodate both Premium Assets in a balanced FPL squad.

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Optimise your squad using FPL Artificial Intelligence.

The Fix Assistant Manager tool can be very useful in building a Gameweek 1 squad and is completely customisable, as the above image shows. You can choose any Gameweek horizon, depending on when you might want to use your wildcard, and you can specify which players have to be included such as Haaland, Salah and Saka in the above image.

The Assistant Manager tool has selected the above squad as the best combination of options, this is based on maximum points projections which includes the trio of Haaland, Salah and Saka. It also includes the second-most popular forward Jesus, and two of the more popular defensive options Estupinan and Gabriel. The main sacrifice here appears to be in defence, with the third and fourth defenders (Henry and Cash) rotating with Willian (£5.5m) as the budget enabler. The above squad was generated with a 20% emphasis on substitutes customisation, so let's have a look what rotation the Algorithm suggests.

The goalkeepers from Fulham and Brentford rotate to provide a fixture run of EVE (A), EVE (H), BUR (A), BOU (H) and LUT (H), an excellent run of games. Flekken is likely to replace Raya between the sticks, so by making that transfer £0.5m can be saved and invested elsewhere. The Algorithm also suggests playing Cash for when Mbeumo, Willian and Estupinan have tricky fixtures.

What can be achieved with more investment in the Starting XI?

Shaving some money off the bench allows the popular options of Onana and Mitoma to make the Starting XI, the £7.5m slot can be Maddison, Grealish, Richarlison etc. A weakness in this draft is having to play Henry every week, but with £0.5m left over that can be invested in a rotation option with the fourth defender. The main compromise with having both Premium assets alongside Saka is the lack of Rashford, otherwise the squad looks very strong.

Best Rotation Options

Use Artificial Intelligence to find the optimum team rotations.

A look at the above image from our Rotation Planner feature shows that a rotation of two £4.5m defenders from Brentford and Villa, such as Henry and Cash gives an excellent run of games which includes five home matches with the away games against Burnely, Forest and Wolves. Going this route also provides managers with a nailed on first sub option, if anyone from their Starting XI is to miss out.

What are the Elite Team Reveal Managers doing?

One of Fix's Elite Managers, Matt Corbidge, with five top 5k finishes has got Salah in his squad alongside Foden, Haaland and Saka. He's also opted for a forward with just 2.5% ownership. To see who else makes his squad, click HERE.

You can check out the Elite XI: Team Reveal tool by clicking HERE.