Another Premier League weekend gets underway with a Friday Night Football this week which takes us down to the south coast as Brighton and Hove Albion play host to Southampton in a key game for both sides.
Brighton are going very well this season and have the chance to move into the top two ahead of the remainder of the matches this weekend. Southampton are rooted to the bottom and will be looking for a win which will latch them on to the team above them.
Where to watch
The match will be shown live and in full on the Friday Night Football show on Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League channels with the programme beginning at 7pm ahead of the kick off at 8pm.
Brighton and Hove Albion
I think it is fair to say that going into the season nobody was really sure what to expect from Brighton and Hove Albion. After a couple of very promising seasons which resulted in them playing European football last term, the domestic campaign of last season was disappointing and then they went into this one with a manager who was new to the Premier League. It looks like we are back to the Brighton of a couple of years ago in terms of their results and just two defeats in their opening 12 matches is a signal of how well they are going.
Brighton are unbeaten at home this season with three wins and three draws. Their last two wins were against Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City where they came from behind in both matches to claim the victory and I always think that is the sign of a confident side – to not know when they are beaten. If you are being critical, Brighton probably do still concede more goals than they would like but while there are goals in them that isn’t the problem it could be.
Southampton
This always looked like a tough campaign for Southampton before a ball was kicked in it. It always is for the team that comes up by winning the play-offs, and that trend certainly hasn’t been bucked in any way. Southampton have just four points from a possible 36 and if the magic number this season to survive is around that 35 point mark that it usually is then already they need to find more than one point per game on average to survive so a huge improvement is needed.
One problem Southampton are going to have is that they are clearly not going to change their style and they play a method that other teams play a whole lot better with better players than they have. The other issue that they have is even when they play well for periods of matches such as they have against Liverpool and Leicester recently, they are still not winning those games. They have lost all six road matches this term with just three goals in those games.
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Team News
Brighton and Hove Albion are expected to have Lewis Dunk and Tariq Lamptey back for this match having missed them for the last month. Carlos Baleba will miss this match after his controversial red card last weekend.
Former Brighton midfielder Adam Lallana is out injured so he will miss a return to the Amex Stadium but Paul Onuachu is hoping to be fit. Aaron Ramsdale, Will Smallbone, Jan Bednarek and Ross Stewart are among those who are out.
Betting
Brighton and Hove Albion have won six matches this season and five of them have had more than 2.5 goals in them so that feels like a positive bet here even though the price is nothing to write home about. It would be a huge surprise were a Brighton side in good form and yet to lose at home fail to win this match, particularly given the poor record that Southampton have on their travels but goals are likely to come naturally too.
Southampton have already conceded three goals six times this season while Wolves scored twice against them too and they were in desperate need of a win at the time so this Saints defence is leaking too much for comfort. That means Brighton could cover the 2.5 goals element of this bet on their own but to be fair to Southampton, they have scored against Liverpool and Arsenal this term and this Brighton defence is nothing like as tough as that one. Brighton and over 2.5 goals will do me here.
Tips
Back Brighton and Hove Albion to win and over 2.5 goals for a 3/10 stake at 1.75 with Betway
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