Leicester team news: Welbeck and Veltman in contention to face the Foxes

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Albion head to the King Power Stadium on Sunday.

BHAFC

2024-12-08T08:30+00:00

Albion are back in Premier League action on Sunday when we play Leicester City at the King Power Stadium, kick off 2pm.

Team news

At his pre-match press conference on Friday, Fabian Hurzeler said: “Danny Welbeck trained outside today, I think he will be available for Sunday – but I will sit with the medical team and make a decision. Joel Veltman might be an option too.

Fabian's thoughts

On the busy fixture schedule… “In some ways it’s not good having so many games coming so quickly because of recovery and regeneration, but also it’s good because you can immediately try to improve and get the points back.

“We have two days to prepare and I’m sure we’ll be ready to face Leicester. Today the players know what they need to do to get themselves ready to go again. We have big trust in them.”

On Facundo Buonanotte, who is on loan from Albion at Leicester but unavailable to face his parent club… “Facundo is doing a great job with Leicester, he is developing well. We are happy he’s performing and playing so many good games with them. He’s a very good guy. He is very humble and he works hard. He has big potential.

“It’s important young players get game time and can develop. That’s the idea of loaning him. If he continues this development, he will have a bright future here in Brighton.”

On Leicester… “Leicester have quality and played good football even before they got Ruud van Nistelrooy as coach. They played well against West Ham and were very effective. They scored some good goals. It will be interesting to see how ready they are, van Nistelrooy made a great start.

On serving his touchline ban against Fulham… “It was a long way from the pitch! I had great staff around me and the view was nice, but it’s not the best place to be when you want to feel with your team, suffer with your team and support your team. It wasn’t the best situation.

“I have to learn from this so the team doesn’t suffer. I have to improve myself so I can be available on the sideline every game.”

Stats and facts

Having won six of their first eight Premier League meetings with Brighton (D2), Leicester are now winless in their last four against Albion. (D2 L2).

Having won six of their first eight Premier League meetings with Brighton (D2), Leicester are now winless in their last four against the Seagulls (D2 L2).

Albion have won none of their six Premier League away games against Leicester (D3 L3), with their last league victory at the King Power Stadium coming in the Championship in April 2014 (4-1).

Five of Albion's last seven Premier League games against promoted sides have been drawn (W1 L1), including each of the last three in a row. The last team to draw four consecutive such games were Newcastle in the 2021-22 campaign.

Leicester have only lost one of their last 10 Premier League home games played on a Sunday (W6 D3), going down 2-1 against Everton in May 2022.

Brighton have lost five of their last six Premier League away games played on a Sunday, as many as in their previous 16 such games (W7 D4). The only exception in this current run was a 5-0 win at Sheffield United in February.

Leicester had seven big chances in their 3-1 win over West Ham last time out, in their first game under Ruud van Nistelrooy. It’s the joint-most big chances on record (since 2010-11) a team has had in their first Premier League match under a new manager, level with Manuel Pellegrini’s Man City against Newcastle (August 2013).

Ruud van Nistelrooy’s Leicester faced 31 shots in their 3-1 win against West Ham last time out. It’s the joint-most shots a team has faced on record (since 2003-04) in their first Premier League match under a new manager, level with Dean Smith’s Aston Villa against Spurs (August 2019) and Ricky Sbragia’s Sunderland against Manchester United (December 2008).

Ruud van Nistelrooy won his first Premier League match in charge of Leicester 3-1 against West Ham – only Claudio Ranieri (first two) and Craig Shakespeare (first five) have won their first two in charge of the Foxes in the competition.

Leicester City’s Jamie Vardy has scored 11 goals in his last 14 league appearances against teams with Albion in their name, most recently netting against West Bromwich Albion in April this year in the Championship.

Danny Welbeck has scored four goals in 11 Premier League appearances against Leicester, with these strikes being worth seven points to his respective sides.

Match officials