Important events
4 minutes: Morgan Gibbs-White climbs well and appears to take a hit, but he is able to continue. A quick free kick sends Hudson-Odoi off the pitch. Too quickly: he was offside.
2 minutes: A weak corner is cleared but Brighton continue to press upfield. Forest are probably content to hold back. After all, it worked at Anfield.
Let’s get started with Amex
1 minute: Good noise from the Forest fans with Mull of Kintyre, also from the golden Cloughie era. Brighton force a corner though.
Nuno also speaks: “Anthony (Elanga) and Callum (Hudson-Odoi) – we will try to exploit their talent. The idea is to be compact and solid, exploit our talent, our space and our creativity – we have to play the game and compete very well.”
Fabian Hurzeler speaks, lots of praise for Forest: “I think they have great individual players. They have a good style of play. They are compact. They defend well. They have very good transition moments, so when they win the ball they move it quickly. They have made a great start to the Premier League and that doesn’t surprise me. It will be a big challenge for us.”
For Nottingham ForestIt was a weekend of remembrance. Brian Clough died 20 years ago on Friday.
Joao Pedro is in Brighton’s squad but sits on the benchand Callum Hudson-Odoi starts for Nottingham Forest after scoring the winning goal against Liverpool. Anthony Elanga is also in attack. Simon Adingra replaces Yankuba Minteh on the wing, in tandem with Kaoru Mitoma. Jack Hinshelwood moves from left-back to midfield – such a talent – while the mighty Pervis Estupinan makes his long-awaited return.
The starting teams
Brighton: Verbruggen, Veltman, Dunk, Van Hecke, Estupinan, Baleba, Hinshelwood, Rutter, Adingra, Mitoma, Welbeck. Subscriptions: Steele, Julio, Webster, Kadioglu, Wieffer, Minteh, Enciso, Pedro, Ferguson.
Nottingham Forest: Sels, Murillo, Anderson, Gibbs-White, Wood, Hudson-Odoi, Ward-Prowse, Moreno, Elanga, Milenkovic, Aina. Subscriptions: Miguel, Morato, Williams, Awoniyi, Dominguez, Da Silva Moreira, Jota, Yates, Sosa.
Final elimination for both teams.
Early team news
Joao Pedro remains a doubt – he has missed the last two games – and Hurzeler is struggling to score. Brajan Gruda, Solly March, James Milner and Matt O’Riley are all out for long periods.
Forest are expected to be missing Wily Boly and Ibrahim Sangare.
preamble
How can Nottingham Forest follow Anfield? The first win since 1969 has been the surprise of the season so far and it will take a pretty massive event to top that. Nuno is the Forest manager who many doubted and who many expected to be relegated. An unbeaten start to the season suggests otherwise.
Brighton, meanwhile, have made a brilliant start under Fabian Hurzeler and are also unbeaten. Their manager is 31, you know. Regardless, they have played good football, if a little lacking the cutting edge that Graham Potter and Roberto de Zerbi have often failed to find.
So it’s about unbeaten records. Should we call it a draw? No, this could be a good, educational game.
Kick-off is at 2pm UK time. Be there.
