Best team I saw play live last season and Brighton might just be the most exciting team in football! Their recruitment is of another level and via Star Lizard analysts they claim to watch every professional game played in the world! They have sold Alexis Mac Allister to Liverpool, but it hardly matters, he follows White/Cucurella/Bissoma/Trossard and head coach Graham Potter and most of his staff who all departed and they have just got stronger! Not sure who else might leave, 21 yo Moises Caicedo seems very likely, but the 21 yo who played 37 EPL games last season and impressed everyone who saw him, will cost some £100m.

 

They have already signed CF Joao Pedro (Watford) , GK Bart Verbruggen (Anderlecht) and CB Igor of Fiorentina for circa £60m and James Milner from Liverpool for free and his experience and the example he sets on the training ground and with his mental strength, will be priceless. Simon Adinga has just returned from a full season in Belgium, where he played 50+ games for another Tony Bloom owned club and both scored and assisted 15 goals, he is just 21yo and looked insanely good last night in the Summer Series in the US. Karou Mitoma is much admired , but it is the teenagers that astound. Facundo Buonanotte, Julio Encicsco and Evan Ferguson are all either 18 or 19 years old, each already full internationals and blooded in the EPL and goodness knows how much they will have come on since last season. Ferguson is not 19 for another three months, he has 10 goals and four assists in 1,430 minutes of play for the club and has limitless striking ability.

 

The Seagulls had both the most attempts on goal and most on target in the EPL.

 

 

 

Bees third season in the EPL, they were 13th (46 points) in 21/22 and 9th (59 points) in 22/23 and were judged better by xP in both. They were an Aston Villa late equaliser in their penultimate home game away from a European spot and that is just incredible! We will be talking about them plenty in the coming weeks , so, briefly for now.... Striker Ivan Toney will be absent until January and goalkeeper David Raya will almost certainly be sold this window, I cannot pretend they are not big losses, but we have been here before, Bees "will be no good without" ....... Maupay, Watkins, Benrahma, Eriksen and others before them, but they always are and continue to improve.

 

They were fine without Ivan last season, beating Liverpool, West Ham, Tottenham and Man City in his absence and Raya has already been replaced by Netherlands international Mark Flekken (£11m). They also first made the (already agreed ) loan signing of Kevin Schade permanent (£22m) and then added CB Nathan Collins from Wolves (£23m) both breaking the Bees record transfer fee paid. They have already made an offer for another player well in excess of that and have money to spend on the right deal. They are full of pace Henry, Mbeumo, Schade would all probably be the quickest player at almost any other club and they are looking to add more and the plan is to play even more offensively this season and press even harder and they already do this really well and in big numbers. They should be fun to watch!

 

The most missed BC's in the EPL came from the top 6 teams and Brentford, and only Newcastle had had more attempts inside the 6 yard box than the West Londoners, on the road, the Bees were #1 in this category. Brentford are very good from set plays and transition ( conceding NONE and scoring seven).

 

 

 

Palace decided to sack Patrick Vieira and call upon favourite son Roy Hodgson to "save" them with 11 games remaining, he did so winning five of those , whilst thrilling and scoring a lot of goals in his first games in charge, which caught everyone by surprise. However, those last 11 games were easy fixtures if such a thing exists in the EPL and Vieira might have done equally as well, the wins came against the three relegated teams, plus Bournemouth and West Ham. Hodgson, who will turn 76 years of age before the new season starts was rewarded with a new one year contract. Palace have lost Wilfied Zaha and are facing interest in Michael Olise (which is going to leave them in big trouble on the right flank) and Cheick Doucoure and they can ill afford to be without either. In the last three seasons, they have posted just one win in 21 starts against non relegated teams when Zaha has been absent, failing to score in ten. They scored 40 goals last season, which was a ten goal fall off from 2021/22 and they "overachieved" to score than many , their three main scorers all produced well above "expected" levels and they missed the fewest BC's in the top flight and it is all too easy to see a further drop off in goals. 

 

 

Good luck!