Brentford play the second of three Premier League Summer Series fixtures against Brighton and Hove Albion at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Atlanta.
Get all the build-up to Wednesday’s game below, including analysis with The Athletic’s Andy Naylor.
The Opposition
Brighton bolster squad ahead of first Europa League campaign
Ever since they were promoted to the Premier League for the first time in 2017, Brighton have rapidly grown in stature as a football club.
For the past four seasons in succession, the Seagulls have shown marked improvements in numerous areas, whether that has been in terms of league position, goals scored, goals conceded, wins or whatever else. They have flourished year on year when some might have expected them to sink like a stone.
The way they performed throughout the 2022/23 campaign was something few will have foreseen, particularly as, after four wins in the opening six games of the season, head coach Graham Potter opted to jump ship and join Chelsea as a replacement for Thomas Tuchel. Brighton’s campaign could have unravelled there and then.
Yet Roberto De Zerbi arrived less than two weeks later and, after getting his bearings with a five-game winless streak in the league, went on to mastermind arguably the best season in the club’s 122-year history.
The Seagulls posted their highest-ever finish after ending the season in sixth-place with the fourth-best away record in the division, qualified for Europe for the first time ever and set top flight personal bests for most wins (18), fewest draws (8), most goals scored (72) and most points (62), not to mention reaching the FA Cup semi-final for the second time in five seasons.
“We played with honour, with respect for our fans, our shirt and ourselves,” De Zerbi told Match of the Day after his side’s 2-1 defeat to Aston Villa on the final day.
“Alexis Mac Allister and Moises Caicedo have both been incredible people, incredible players. I am really sorry for them if they leave, but they deserve to play at another level. We have to find other big players. It will be very difficult to find players with the same quality and levels, but it is our policy. We are not a big, big team and we improve and sell the best players.”
With Brighton following a model much like Brentford’s, the departure of the pair seemed inevitable this summer and, in June, Mac Allister joined Liverpool. His tears at Villa Park showed the writing was already on the wall. Caicedo has been long admired by Premier League rivals, but, at the time of writing, Chelsea have just seen a £70m bid for the Ecuadorian turned down, meaning the long battle for his signature goes on.
Aware of the demands European football will put on the squad, Brighton have strengthened proactively. Bart Verbruggen will offer competition in goal, James Milner and Mahmoud Dahoud have boosted midfield options and if Joao Pedro takes to the Premier League the way he did the Championship with Watford, he could prove to be a handful.
This season, Brighton will take a new step into the unknown, where challenges will undoubtedly arise on the path ahead. But the journey they have been on to get to this point has been littered with far, far less enticing prospects. A new chapter is about to be written.
In the Dugout
Roberto De Zerbi
Roberto De Zerbi – the Premier League’s sixth-youngest head coach – spent his first few years in management in the lower leagues of Italian football after retiring at the conclusion of a short spell at Serie D side Trento in 2013.
He started out at Darfo Boario, then spent two years with Foggia – where he had spent his most fruitful spell as a player – guiding Satanellito glory in the Coppa Italia Serie C in 2015/16.
Those two jobs preceded his first taste of Serie A action from the dugout with Palermo. However, he lasted only 13 games and less than three months in charge before being sacked on 30 November 2016.
Just shy of a year later, he returned to Serie A with newly promoted Benevento and, despite relegation, his methods earned praise and he was soon on the move again, this time to Sassuolo. Neroverdi had only been a top-flight club for five years by this point, but in his three seasons in charge, De Zerbi guided the club to two of its three top-half finishes in history by that point.
In the summer of 2021, the Italian departed Mapei Stadium. “I believe I have done everything possible and I hope my successor does the best for Sassuolo. I’ll always be grateful for everyone for helping me reach my peak,” he said before the penultimate match of the 2020/21 campaign.”
The 44-year-old moved to Shakhtar Donetsk shortly afterwards, where he won the Ukrainian Super Cup in only his ninth match in charge. He guided the club to 15 league wins in his first 18 matches, which took them to the top of the Ukrainian Premier League, but the season was curtailed after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
He remained in charge as Shakhtar played friendlies – primarily in Turkey – from January to May 2022, but departed last July, before being appointed as Graham Potter’s successor in east Sussex on 18 September, having signed a four-year deal.
Pre-match analysis
Richard Cole, Playmaker Stats: Clash of styles makes for fascinating encounter at Mercedes-Benz Stadium
Brentford’s second Premier League Summer Series clash promises to be a cracker - if the Bees’ last meeting with Brighton is anything to go by.
Flashback to 1 April of this year when the two sides, both chasing European football, played out a thrilling 3-3 draw.
Eventually, the Seagulls finished in a European spot ahead of the Bees but it shows how both clubs have grown rapidly in a near-simultaneous manner.
Both teams have made a name for themselves for their canny recruitment of young players with high potential combined with managers who have helped teams with relatively low Premier League budgets massively over perform. The jobs that Roberto De Zerbi (plus Graham Potter before him) and Thomas Frank have done are to be commended – both have their own philosophies that you can see reflected on the pitch.
And going back to that dramatic 3-3 game – it was a great example of the differences between both sides. Brighton had plenty of attempts that day (33 shots in total compared to the Bees’ seven) but Brentford were far more clinical with their chances.
Looking back at the stats for the full campaign that pattern remains the same. No team had more shots per game in the 2022/23 Premier League season than Brighton who averaged 16.2 efforts per game. Surprisingly, Brentford had the 18th lowest shots per game with just 10.7 – ahead of only Nottingham Forest and Bournemouth.
It’s a similar tale when it comes to possession with Brighton averaging 60.5 per cent of the ball (behind only Manchester City and Liverpool) while the Bees made the most of just 43.4 per cent of possession.
Brentford pick their battles well and it really underlines that despite some similarity between the two clubs off the pitch, on the pitch things are different. No team won as many aerial duels per game as Brentford with 17.6 duels won on average – a stat that saw Brighton second from bottom with just 11.7 duels won.
Of the two teams, Brighton are far more prone to getting stuck into a game with the Seagulls averaging 11.2 fouls per game – one of the highest in the league – while Brentford are practically saints in comparison. Brentford committed the second fewest fouls last season with 9.3 per game.
Brighton do have a few more seasons in the top flight under their belt, having finished 15th, 17th, 15th, 19th, 9th and 6th in their Premier League campaigns so far. By comparison, the Bees have been moving up the table more quickly – finishing 13th in 2021/22 before ending 9th last term.
Clearly, De Zerbi-ball is very different from the style of football Thomas Frank opts to play, which may explain why games between the two sides turn out to be such a fascinating clash of styles.
The Gameplan
With The Athletic’s Andy Naylor
In Hot off the Press, The Athletic’s Andy Naylor provides an update on the Seagulls' pre-season preparations, their high-profile transfers, and what to expect from Roberto De Zerbi's side.
“For the majority of last season, De Zerbi’s go-to formation was a 4-2-3-1 but, within that, the no.9 does not really operate as a traditional no.9 and tends to operate as a false nine, dropping in, linking up with the midfielders.
“In terms of style, they play out from the back, but in a way that nobody else does, really, in terms of precision and the goalkeeper being the starting point in that process.
“Playing out from the back is not new, but De Zerbi has taken it on another step from the way they were playing under Graham Potter.”
Last Meeting
Brighton and Hove Albion 3 Brentford 3 (Premier League, 1 April 2023)
Pontus Jansson scored on his first start in six months as Brentford were denied all three points against Brighton and Hove Albion by Alexis Mac Allister’s last-minute penalty.
The clash between two sides chasing a place in Europe didn’t disappoint with Thomas Frank’s Bees taking the lead three times only to be pegged back on each occasion.
Jansson nodded home after 10 minutes; a goal which was cancelled out 11 minutes later by Kaoru Mitoma’s neat lob.
That kicked off a spell of three goals in seven minutes which saw Ivan Toney restore the Bees’ advantage before Danny Welbeck’s close-range leveller.
Ethan Pinnock put Brentford back ahead at the start of the second half; a lead which lasted until Mac Allister’s spot-kick in the final minute of normal time.