Official Rating Reveal for Liverpool Players on EAFC25 – Who Should You Include in Your EAFC25 Ultimate Team?

Liverpool FC’s premier stars Alisson, Virgil van Dijk, and Mohamed Salah have had their ratings for EAFC25 released ahead of the game’s full release at the end of September. All three are rated 89 – placing behind Manchester City’s Rodri, Erling Braut Haaland, and Kevin De Bruyne, and level with Arsenal’s Martin Odegaard in the Premier League, while, across the world, they are below Kylian Mbappé, Aitana Bonmatí, and Harry Kane.

EAFC25’s rating systems are hard to parse. A lot of it has to do with reputation, influenced by what league they’re in, what team they’re playing for, and their performances in the season before. All three Liverpool players held their ratings from EAFC24 – meaning EA felt they were neither better nor worse than 2022/23, despite last season’s hard-fought push for a Premier League in Klopp’s final season at Anfield’s helm. 

Is that really fair?

The Game World

EAFC is not real football. Despite a player being rated 89, they may ‘feel’ worse to play with than an 83-rated player. Things like body style, weak foot, skill moves, and hidden attributes all contribute to the final ‘feel’ of a player. At the start of the game, when players are figuring out what works best for that season’s meta-game, it’s a fairly level playing field, and speed runs king. But, also, this is the beginning of the game, and EA is very aware that each game needs longevity. A player’s rating must be fair at the game’s launch, but, also, leave the developers room to allow that player to be rewarded with special cards based on real-life performances that don’t simply make them way, way, way too powerful early on.

The Meta - Skill, Luck, and Learning from JohnSlots

The in-game meta is all-powerful. What it is is the way to play the game that take advantage of the in-game mechanics and engine. People are always finding the best ways to win – the ones that guarantee advantages and upper hand. Despite the developers tunneling the freedom of real-life football into the game world, there are a few very specific tactics and gameplay strategies that work.

Competitive online multiplayer games sit in this funny space where skill and luck meet head-on. Players cannot account for everything that happens in a game. It’s chaos! There has to be a certain degree of luck. iGaming fans will understand this the most. While they can employ strategies when playing online slots, for instance, naturally the game revolves (pun intended!) around luck. That being said, sites like Johnslots detail RTP, which tells a player how likely it is for them to win. Expert reviews write JohnSlots reviews knowing full well that RTP is an essential component of what gamers want to know – so that the strategies the player implements is used on margins that aren’t overwhelmingly favoring the house.

FIFA players, while not having access to such discrete numbers like RTP, want to ensure that the odds aren’t stacked in favor of the opposition, so will use the game’s mechanics against itself to overwhelm both the game and the opposition. Will Alisson, Virg, and Salah be key to that?

The Players

Alisson will be good. At 89-rated he stands toe-to-toe with Gianluigi Donnarumma, Thibaut Courtois, and Marc-André ter Stegen, and one point ahead of Ederson, Jan Oblak, and Christiane Endler. He will be – as he has been on previous iterations of the game – one of the best goalkeepers to have in your EAFC Ultimate Team from the beginning to the mid-point of the season when those special cards drop.

Virg will be the same. He’s a dominant, dominant force. With Mapi León, he is the best center-back in the game – with great speed and intelligent defending. His standing will be great, again, until the mid-point when those special cards start to steepen the power curve.

Salah is a unique one. Despite his excellent finishing, speed, dribbling ability, and four-star skill moves, his three-star weak foot does and will hold him back versus the likes of Caroline Graham Hansen (90) and Kadidiatou Diani (88) – who have what Salah has but with a stronger weak foot. That being said, Salah has started the season in incredibly fine form – three games, three goals, and three assists – meaning that, shortly, and possibly when the game arrives, he’ll have special cards ready to go. 

The Real World

Did Alisson, Virg, and Salah really do nothing to warrant a higher rating during the 23/24 season?

Let’s start with Mo. He had thirty-six goal involvements in the forty-one games he played across the Premier League and Europa League campaigns. By his standards, that’s a relatively normal year. His stature as a player didn’t really lift off or decline as a result. While his ability to beat a player 1-v-1 has diminished, it is beginning to show itself massively or even began last season. He’s been beating his opposite defender less and less for a couple of years now – and that’s the only real sign of his age. Salah is still a prolific goalscorer but is now balancing that responsibility with being an excellent chance creator. So, in short, 23/24 told us nothing new about Salah.

Alisson had a big chunk of the season around Christmas time out injured, allowing Caoimhin Kelleher to shine as a number-one goalie. Before and after his injury, though, he showed his usual signs of talent: supreme with his hands and supreme with his feet.

Virg remained rock-steady. Post-ACL, many expected his performances to dip and his speed and physicality to wane. That hasn’t happened. He was, though, in a Liverpool side that struggled to keep teams away from their goal. Klopp’s final season was often spent 0-1 down. With that, Virg’s acumen as a defender responsible for a collective defensive performance could’ve been questioned. Invariably, it was – but his performances as an individual defender are so good, how could EA drop his rating?

A Changing of the Guard

All of these big hitters for the Reds are aging. Virg and Salah are firmly in their twilight years. They still have plenty to give this season and probably next, but after that – who knows? The club definitely wants them to sign new deals, but getting that done on terms that the club and the player are happy with is the obstacle. Alisson is a different case, but Liverpool has just signed Giorgi Mamardashvili to compete with Alisson for the number-one spot at some point in the future. The Brazilian is still at the top of his game – as evidenced by his rating.

That all being said, world football has felt a shift. Mbappé’s move to Madrid has cemented this new era with Messi and Ronaldo firmly beyond the scope of European football now. Mbappé joins Bellingham at Madrid and Bellingham joins Mbappé in the 90-rated club – also finding himself there with Haaland (91). Rodri, too – following his impressive exploits with Man City and at the Euros with Spain – has broken into the upper echelon of football.

What Alisson, Virg, and Salah may have fallen victim to is simply that they are neither new faces nor noticeably old, but they do remain categorically good, and, arguably, the ratings are fair.

Written by Alan Spencer