Brighton and Hove Albion will look to continue their perfect start to the Premier League season on Saturday when they host a West Ham United side coming off one of its better league wins in recent memory.
Brighton (2-0-0, 6 points) has kept up its reputation as one of the EPL’s smartest and most innovative clubs after last year’s sixth-place finish by beginning the current campaign with 4-1 wins at home to Luton Town and away to Wolverhampton Wanderers.
The Seagulls have done so despite seeing defensive midfielders Moises Caicedo and Alexis Mac Allister depart this summer.
But Brighton manager Roberto De Zerbi suggested it’s critical his club doesn’t get caught up in their early lofty position at the top of the league table, where they are ahead of last year’s top two, Manchester City and Arsenal, on goal difference.
“We need to keep playing well,” he said this week. “Our record this season is not ‘real.’ We could score more, we can improve more.”
De Zerbi also confirmed teenage striker Julio Enciso will be out for an extended period with a knee injury. His replacement Saturday will be another teen, Evan Ferguson, who scored six times last season in 19 appearances and had one goal as a late sub over Luton in the opener.
The club has won its last three over West Ham (1-0-1, 4 points) in the league, all coming by multiple goals. And given the Seagulls’ long absence from the top flight prior to their most recent promotion in 2017, the Hammers’ last league win over Brighton came way back in 1983.
But a 3-1 home win over Chelsea last weekend, in which West Ham played the final 23 minutes down a man, could be the start of a much more comfortable league campaign after much of the previous domestic season was spent fighting relegation.
Hammers manager David Moyes has hailed a productive transfer window, with dead-ball specialist James Ward-Prowse already contributing since his arrival from Southampton with an assist on the opening goal against Chelsea.
And there’s perhaps more confidence than is typical of a bottom-half finisher, given West Ham’s run to the UEFA Europa Conference league title last spring.
“They’re difficult opponents and they are arguably as difficult as they have ever been,” Moyes said of Brighton. “They are showing that by their league position. But I am looking forward to it. We have had a great start and it gives us flexibility and the ability to change things to try and have a go at Brighton and beat them.”
–Field Level Media