Match Preview: Brighton host big spending Chelsea in season opener
It only seems like yesterday that the Albion were winning their final game of the 2019-20 season away at Burnley. And now here we are, writing a match preview for the opening game of the 2020-21 campaign as Brighton host big spending Chelsea.
Graham Potter and his players could hardly have been given a tougher task. With the money that Frank Lampard has flaunted, the Blues should be challenging for the Premier League title this year – and if they are to do that, then they have to win at places like Brighton.
Which should lead to an interesting evening. Lampard has significantly strengthened his attack in a bold move and with the Albion always looking to try and play football – sometimes to their cost – the watching world should at least get plenty of entertainment from whatever occurs in an empty Amex Stadium.
Chelsea this season
Now, you might think that a very obvious place to start improving a team who conceded 54 times in 2019-20 – the same number as the Albion – would be the defence.
Lampard however has very clearly thought sod that and instead lavished nearly £200 million on attacking reinforcements. Timo Werner, Hakim Ziyech and Kai Havertz have all arrived and even the one defender Chelsea have gone big on – left back Ben Chilwell from Leicester City – is better known for what he brings going forward than his ability at the back.
The Blues’ approach in 2020-21 looks very much like “you score four, we score five”. That may produce plenty of entertainment, but title winning teams are built on defences. It is why Liverpool only got over the line once they had acquired Virgil van Dijk and Allison.
Given the money that Lampard has spent, he surely needs to at least be challenging Liverpool and Manchester City. Maurizio Sarri and Antonio Conte were both sacked from Stamford Bridge despite winning trophies a few weeks prior to their firings.
Lampard may have plenty of credit in the bank from his playing career, but a second season without any silverware or being 30 points adrift of the champions would be unacceptable, especially given the amount of Roman Abramovich’s roubles he has spent.
Recent form
The Blues’ 2019-20 campaign ended with something of a whimper as they won three and lost three of their last six. We would never be ones to use a match preview to give you false hope, so we will add that those Chelsea defeats came against Arsenal, Liverpool and Bayern Munich – three opponents who are slightly better than Brighton.
You can see from those matches though why many people are surprised that Lampard has done little to strengthen his back line and goalkeeper.
They conceded 12 times, which should give the Albion hope of at least scoring at the Amex – even if we only have two strikers on the books, one of whom could not manage more than three goals last season.
Brighton meanwhile played their best football and picked up some of their most impressive results in the nine games post-lockdown. Players such as Yves Bissouma, Tariq Lamptey and Adam Webster suddenly looked genuine Premier League quality and the challenge now is for Potter to have them replicating that form over an entire 38 game campaign.
Brighton v Chelsea Head-to-Head
Brighton’s record against Chelsea does not make for pretty reading. The clubs did not cross swords in a league game until the 1983-84 season, since when the Albion have lost nine and drawn once against the Blues.
We have only managed to breach a Chelsea defence three times; Alan Young in September 1983 when 8,000 visiting fans rioted at the final whistle at the Goldstone; Solly March in December 2018 and Alireza Jahanbakhsh on New Year’s Day with THAT overhead kick – a goal so good it saw him voted our WeAreBrighton.com Player of the Month for January 2020.
There have been four further FA Cup matches with Brighton winning one, drawing one and losing two. That only competitive victory came as long ago as 1933 when goals from Arthur Attwood and Tug Wilson gave the Albion a shock 2-1 win over their top tier visitors in the third round of the competition.
Overall, Brighton have faced Chelsea on 14 occasions, winning one, drawing two and losing 11. Six goals have been scored against the Blues with 28 conceded. It is probably the worst head-to-head record that the Albion have against opponents, which should put you in a confident mood.
Brighton & Hove Albion’s Head-to-Head record with Chelsea
Last six meetings between Brighton and Chelsea
• Brighton 1-1 Chelsea (Premier League, 01/01/20)
• Chelsea 2-0 Brighton (Premier League, 28/09/19)
• Chelsea 3-0 Brighton (Premier League, 03/04/19)
• Brighton 1-2 Chelsea (Premier League, 16/12/18)
• Brighton 0-4 Chelsea (Premier League, 20/01/18)
• Chelsea 2-0 Brighton (Premier League, 26/12/17)
As a already noted, the New Year’s Day draw remains the only league point the Albion have ever taken from the Blues. Not included in this list are the friendly held between the clubs three weeks ago, which ended in a 1-1 draw at the Amex.
Brighton did well to cause Chelsea problems that afternoon, which does at least inject a little optimism into our match preview.
Team news
Brighton have a couple of injury problems with Potter suggesting that Davy Propper would miss out alongside Christian Walton. Walton’s absence could prove particularly troubling as with David Button sold to West Bromwich Albion, one of Jason Steele or Robert Sanchez will be sat on the bench.
Imagine an evening in which misfortune strikes Maty Ryan in the warm up or five minutes in. Werner, Havertz et all facing Steele, a man whose life for the past year has involved drinking in Hove and playing golf every day is a thought more frightening than a pool party at Michael Barrymore’s house.
Ben White seems likely to start, giving us our first glimpse of how he copes with the sizeable gap between Championship and Premier League. Lots of Albion fans spent Saturday night mocking The Leeds United after the wonderfully named Robin Koch endured something of a nightmare debut against Liverpool with the basic line of attack being “WE HAVE BEN WHITE LOLOLOLOLOLOL.”
It seems a little too early to be gloating yet, especially as White will take some time to adapt to the top flight. He could not have asked for a harder test to start with.
For Chelsea, Ziyech and Chilwell are both injured and Christian Pulisic is also a doubt. More good news for Albion fans reading our Brighton versus Chelsea preview.
Chelsea’s danger men
Take your pick from those new signings. Werner looks oven ready for the Premier League and Havertz is a class act. If Pulisic is passed fit, then Brighton will have a serious headache on their hands given that he had stepped into the shoes of Eden Hazard seamlessly by the end of last season.
Chelsea’s weak link
Chelsea’s defensive issues have been well documented elsewhere in our preview and there is one specific area in which they struggle – set pieces – as Brighton saw last season at the Amex.
Jahanbakhsh scoring THAT goal came about because the Blues were unable to clear their lines effectively from a corner. If the Albion can get their delivery right with the aerial threat provided by Lewis Dunk and Webster from corners and free kicks, then that could be one very profitable route to goal.
The betting value for Brighton v Chelsea
Both teams to score seems an obvious place to start given Chelsea’s defensive deficiencies and the fact that it has paid out on the two previous clashes at the Amex. You can pick that up for 5/6 in places.
Dunk and Webster are also worth a look for anytime goalscorer, available at best prices of 12/1 and 20/1 respectively. Those odds are made even better when you consider that Florin Andone is 11/4.
It seems unlikely that a bloke who a snapped ligament who said he hoped he never played for Brighton again will be banging one past Chelsea anytime soon, so we can probably rule out advising a couple of quid on that in our match preview.
An interesting subplot
Lamptey faces his former club for the first time. We know that Chelsea were reluctant to sell but with Lamptey refusing to sign a new contract in favour of finding first team football elsewhere, their hand was forced as otherwise they would have seen him leave on a free.
The Albion were the ones to take advantage, swooping in with a £4 million offer. That already looks like an incredible piece of business and Lamptey will no doubt be eager to impress against the club who developed him, especially coming a week after he made his England Under 21 debut.
A good WeAreBrighton.com memory of Brighton v Chelsea
The Jahanbakhsh overhead. Never before has anything so surprising happened to me in my life than witnessing that. And I once saw Alan Titchmarsh in a petrol station in Haywards Heath.
A bad WeAreBrighton.com memory of Brighton v Chelsea
Remember in our first season in the Premier League when those signs held up by Brighton ‘supporters’ asking for opposition player’s shirts began appearing?
The most infamous was the “Hazard, can I have your shirt” sign. Shamefully, it bloody worked as well as the Belgian superstar handed it over to an excited child and a group of adults wearing Brighton merchandise all clapping and cheering.
Hazard had just single handedly destroyed us and here were a load of Brighton fans swooning over him. They looked happier than a man who has just turned up to a blind date to find Jennifer Lawrence waiting for him.
Behaviour like that is the reason we are known as plastics. He should have been getting flicked the V sign for the way in which he had just tormented the Albion defence.
Chelsea’s most famous fan
David Mellor was sacked as a Member of Parliament for having an affair in which he apparently made love to an actress while wearing a full Chelsea kit.
Little did Mr Mellor know at the time, but if he had jumped in his car, driven 300 miles from London to Durham to test his eyesight during a national lockdown and then made love to the actress while dressed as Dennis Wise, he would have been fine.
Prediction
Chelsea just look too strong going forward for Brighton, which is why we are kicking off our first match preview with prediction of a defeat. 3-1 to the Blues.
