Liverpool FC 2025-26 Premier League Fixtures: Reds Face Tough Start to Season | OneFootball

Every summer, just as Premier League fans are starting to relax from the end of the season and accept that it is still a couple of months until proper football returns (because who really cares about internationals or the abysmal Club World Cup?), the fixtures for the following campaign are released.

It is a chance to get a sense of how the season might start off, when the league title might be secured, should Liverpool manage to secure back-to-back top-flight titles for the first time since 1984. They have just been released for the 2025-2026 campaign, so how do they look for the Reds?

The Fixtures

It is always worth taking the fixtures with a pinch of salt, given the fact that they can be moved around for the likes of cup competitions or because teams need them to be for some reason. Even so, they give you a good sense of how the season is likely to pan out and the following is the order of the 38 games that the defending Premier League champions will have to contend with, before television companies and the likes start to get involved:

If there is little point in putting the provisional date for fixtures, then there’s absolutely no point in putting in the times, given the manner in which they will be moved by Sky Sports and TNT Sports, but it is worth giving you some sense of when the Reds are likely to be playing the various teams that we will need to get past in order to defend our title. You can already tell the majority of the games that will be shifted by broadcasters, including all of those against the ‘traditional Big Six’ as well as the Merseyside derbies, plus some matches against the newly promoted teams.

A Tough First 12

There is little doubt that Liverpool’s start to the title defence is up there with the toughest of any team in the Premier League. Although the Reds defeated both home and away last season, Andoni Iraola is a smart manager and will doubtless have a plan for how to curtail our attack when they arrive at Anfield for the season opener. From there, a trip to St James’ Park to face a Saudi Arabian-owned Newcastle United for the first time since they beat us in the League Cup won’t be easy. After that, it is the small matter of an Arsenal side that will be desperate to prove they can mix it with the big boys.

Burnley should provide some slight relief before the first Merseyside derby of the season; then it’s down to London for back-to-back away fixtures against Crystal Palace and Chelsea. Given how atrocious they were last season, it is fair to say that Ruben Amorim will be working hard to get Manchester United in better nick for the 2025-2026 campaign and a game against them is never easy, nor is an away game against Brentford. Aston Villa will be looking to bounce back from missing out on the Champions League, but it is Manchester City away that could prove the sternest test before facing the only team that beat us at Anfield last time out.

Where do the Champions League Games Fit In?

When it comes to looking at the fixtures that a team has to play at the start of the season, it is difficult to see bogeymen behind every corner. Certainly, social media would suggest that Arsenal supporters feel as though there is some grand conspiracy against them thanks to the first few games that the Gunners have to play. Although we obviously don’t know whether Liverpool will make it through the expanded Champions League group stage yet, we can look to see roughly where the eight league games will fit into our calendar and it’s fair to say that they aren’t easy.

The Reds have to take on Everton before the first game, then will be in London both prior to and after the second Champions League match of next season. Man United at home comes before Champions League match day three, with Brentford after it, then it’s an Aston Villa – Manchester City sandwich either side of match day four. Our fifth game comes after Forest and before West Ham United, then it’s Leeds and Brighton that have match day six in between them.

Perhaps the only relief comes from match day seven standing between Burnley and Bournemouth, but match day eight then comes hot on the heels of our trip to the south coast and prior to a home game against Newcastle United.