Key events
13 min: Big chance for Brighton! Welbeck pounces on a loose ball and races through on goal, albeit from an acute angle. Just as the striker is shaping to shoot, Caicedo makes a huge sliding tackle to send the ball behind for a Brighton corner.
10 min: Cucurella upends Minteh and is perhaps a little lucky to escape a booking. The home crowd are not best pleased.
8 min: Chelsea have not carved out an obvious chance but they are obviously in the mood. Palme, Madueke and Gusto have already created plenty of promising openings without creating a golden chance. But it feels like a matter of time at the moment.
6 min: Palmer finds another pocket of space, this time on the right wing, turning Webster inside out but his cross is intercepted and cleared by the very talented Baleba, who surely already has this chant at Brighton?
4 min: A brilliant counter-attack from Chelsea! Chalobah is pinned right as Brighton attempt a high-press but Chelsea find their way out of it as Madueke backheels cleverly to release Gusto. The French full-back canters 60 yards up the right full-back, with Hinshelwood unable to keep up, before a cut-back finds Palmer in oceans of space on the edge of Brighton’s area … the shot flies over.
2 min: Another former Brighton player in Chelsea’s all-black away kit tonight, Marc Cucurella, is roundly booed by the home fans whenever he touches the ball. There are also some choice words directed at the Spaniard as he goes to take a throw-in, that I won’t repeat here.
Peeeeeeeeeep!
We’re underway at the Amex!
Former Brighton midfielder Moisés Caicedo is quietly having an absolutely barnstorming season for Chelsea. He has made more tackles and interceptions combined than any other midfielder in the Premier League, completed more passes into the final third than any other player, won the third-most duels of any player.
These are the highlights from last Saturday’s FA Cup clash.
Danny Welbeck is Brighton’s captain tonight. What a player he is, seemingly getting better with age.
Brighton manager Fabian Hürzeler speaks to the cameras:
Welbeck is a role model for the young players and everyone at the club. He has a good feeling for intensity and he is a great player on the pitch.
Ed Aarons
It may have taken Brighton’s record signing a few months to settle in but the performance of Georginio Rutter in their thrilling FA Cup victory over Chelsea showed that the Frenchman was worth the £40m they paid Leeds in the summer. A brilliant header to equalise before setting up Kaoru Mitoma’s winner gave Fabian Hürzeler’s side the confidence boost they needed after their 7-0 mauling at Nottingham Forest, with Rutter justifying his manager’s decision to leave João Pedro on the bench. Rutter – who has seven goals in all competitions – did not start a Premier League game in January after struggling with a hamstring problem and Hürzeler has been mindful of protecting the 22-year-old, although he will be itching to face Enzo Maresca’s side for the second time in six days. “There were a lot of personal duels and he proved that he can win the majority of them, and that’s why I’m happy with him,” said Hürzeler.
Further to those Chelsea points, here’s Jacob Steinberg.
So Brighton captain Lewis Dunk is not fit, as expected. Adam Webster comes in alongside Van Hecke. Joao Pedro is again on the bench, and Wieffer is also among the subs after a nine-game absence.
From that squad, Chelsea really do not have a wealth of attacking options. Nkunku really struggled in the FA Cup last weekend against Brighton, but Maresca persists/has no choice here. The only senior ‘attacker’ on Chelsea’s bench is Jadon Sancho and he is of course a wide man.
Interesting that Chalobah gets the nod ahead of Tosin Adarabioyo in central defence. It seems mad that Chelsea’s squad feels light after £1bn over spending since the Boehly era began.
The teams!
Brighton: Verbruggen, Veltman, Van Hecke, Webster, Lamptey, Baleba, Hinshelwood, Minteh, Rutter, Mitoma, Welbeck.
Subs: Rushworth, Gruda, Joao Pedro, Adingra, Cashin, Gomez, Ayari, Wieffer, O’Riley.
Chelsea: Jorgensen, Gusto, Chalobah, Colwill, Cucurella, Caicedo, Fernandez, Madueke, Palmer, Pedro Neto, Nkunku.
Subs: Sanchez, Adarabioyo, Sancho, Dewsbury-Hall, James, Anselmino, George, Acheampong, Amougou.
Referee: Christopher Kavanagh
Preamble
Hello world! Brighton host Chelsea in the first of this weekend’s Premier League fixtures, and also a repeat of the two sides’ FA Cup fourth-round tie on Saturday, won by Brighton.
A chance, then, for Chelsea to get some immediate revenge in the league, as the fourth-placed Blues look to put further distance between themselves and the rest of the Champions League-chasing pack. Just three points separate themselves and seventh-placed Bournemouth.
One change we know that Enzo Maresca will make from the team that lost at the Amex last weekend is in goal. Chelsea’s manager confirmed on Thursday that Filip Jorgensen has replaced Robert Sanchez as Chelsea’s first-choice goalkeeper. The Blues are facing a crisis in attack after discovering that Nicolas Jackson will be out until April with a hamstring injury. Marc Guiu is also sidelined and João Félix has been loaned to Milan. That leaves Maresca to choose between persisting with Christopher Nkunku as a striker – the Frenchman struggled against Brighton – or using Cole Palmer as a false No 9.
Brighton’s league season is meandering, somewhat. Recent wins away at Ipswich and Manchester United have been punctuated a home defeat to Everton and a 7-0 shellacking at Nottingham Forest. European qualification is certainly not beyond this very talented squad, but their best chance of GLORY this season remains in the FA Cup. The Seagulls have a tasty fifth-round tie away at Newcastle.
Brighton captain Lewis Dunk is a major doubt after injuring a rib during the FA Cup clash but in better news, Mats Wieffer could be involved after nine games out.
Kick-off: 8pm GMT.
