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We’d like to deny the rumour that this week’s preview was written by Nicklas Fullkrug. We couldn’t afford him. As ever Preview Percy was the limit of our budget. So here’s his thoughts on this weekend’s trip to the south coast...

Next up we zoom down the M23 towards the town of Falmer where we will be hosted by Brighton And Hove Actually Albion. Kick-off is at the right and proper time of 3pm on a Saturday. If you are going by train there doesn’t appear to be any engineering works on the list so enjoy. Kippers for breakfast in the dining car is the order of the day I’d say.




So Brighton and Hove etc. It’s been a bit of a meh season for them really. Every so often there’d be a glimpse of a potential European slot only for the next few games to go a bit Tottenham with the only beaches in sight being those shingle ones with the remnants of a defunct pier sitting a few yards offshore.

Their recent form has been a case in point. Cast your mind back to March where, on the 8th of that month, they completed a 2-1 home win over Fulham. That win was their 4th in a row and left them risking a walk to the end of the pier that remains to look hopefully in the direction of le continent. I say pier, it’s not exactly Southend in length is it?

However, since then things have been a bit wobbly. A 2-2 draw away at Man City was creditable enough. However they were swatted away 3-0 at home by Villa. They followed this up by losing 2-1 at Palace, which would have caused upset to those who take their made-up rivalry that seriously.

They then returned to Falmer where they drew 2-2 with Leicester, conceding the first two goals that Leicester had scored in something like 13 hours. Then last week they went down 4-2 away to a Brentford side on a three-match winless streak and who hadn’t taken three points at home since the start of December. The way things are going they may well usurp our reputation for being the team you need to play should you have a sequence that requires busting.

All of that has seen them drift from seventh to 10th with 48 points from the 33 games so far. That’s three places and nine points shy of Aston Villa who currently occupy the seventh spot that is likely to constitute the final European qualification place, though it should be said that the Seagulls do have a game in hand over the Villains, though both Fulham and Bournemouth are filling the gap above Brighton.

As you might expect from a club which has a quasi-mathematical algorithm-based transfer policy they did dip a toe into the market during the January window. Daisy informs me that the first arrival was Paraguayan midfielder Diego Gomez. Gomez arrived from the ludicrously-named Inter Miami for a fee of some £14m. He’s been capped 13 times by the Paraguayan national squad and his first goal at that level was one to tell the kids about, being as it was the only goal of the game as they beat Brazil in a World Cup qualifier.

Next to arrive was central defender Erin Cashin who arrived from Derby for a reported fee of £9m as Derby sought to, er, Cashin on the 23 year-old. Er, sorry about that. He was Derby’s Young Player of the Year in each of the last two seasons and also made the PFA Team of the Season for League One last season. Cashin has been capped at age level by Ireland, qualifying in the usual manner through an Irish-born grandmother.




We won’t be seeing the final signing they made. 19 year-old Greek Under 21 international striker Stefanos Tzimas was on loan from PAOK to Nurnburg in the second division of the Bundesliga. Nurnburg exercised their option to take over the economic rights to the player, then immediately sold him to Brighton who then immediately loaned him back to Nurnburg. So in the space of a few minutes the player had been on the books of three different clubs without actually moving an inch.

On we move then to the Wild and Wacky World Of Association Football. And supporters up and down the country were hit with a state of high confusion as Arsenal shot themselves In the foot again to confirm what the rest of the world had worked out ages ago, namely that their title challenge was but a figment of their imagination.

The confusion arose due to the fact that, hilarious as their capitulation to Palace was, it did effectively hand the title to Liverpool whose title ratification at Tottenham will be accompanied by a request for another 20 medals to distribute to the PGMOL officials who have assisted them so much this season. In other words nobody knew whether to laugh or cry.

Me? I sat back and watched Burnley beating Sheffield United with the blades taking their failure to gain automatic promotion with their usual sporting good grace, players having to be dragged off the pitch at Turf Moor at the end. Now THAT was funny.

And so to us. There has been much comment in the media over the comments made by the BFG post-match after the debacle that was the Southampton match last weekend. Depressingly and predictably certain sections of the media came at the story from a predictable angle trying to throw in an element to the debate that simply didn’t exist.

Sky in particular were jumping on the bandwagon, holding a poll with the clear intention of publishing a headline along the lines of “Hammers fans slam Fullkrug” once the dust had settled. Things were primed with a couple of third-rate pundits in the form of Jay Bothroyd and Jamie O’Hara whose own playing careers can best be described as “journeymen who lucked-out”.

They got all angry on our behalf suggesting that the BFG wasn’t entitled to an opinion on the grounds that he hasn’t had much of a season (largely ignoring the part that major injuries had played in that state of affairs). Then they released the poll. Only we didn’t play ball did we.




I think it was 91% of those responding agreed with Fullkrug. I mean who’d have thought that the opinions of people who go week-in-week-out might be informed on the basis of what they see every week? Better informed one might say than the ramblings of two ex-players whose punditry makes their playing careers look glittering.

The fact is that, unhelpful as Mr Potter found the public nature of the outburst, Fullkrug’s comments were as accurate as they were honest. Indeed, what the BFG said was pretty much word for word what I had in mind for this part of this week’s preview, albeit with a slightly less Teutonic accent in mind when reading it out into this dictation machine contraption.

In any situation where something isn’t right within a group sometimes it needs the new boy to come in and point things out that the wider group haven’t considered and that’s precisely what has happened here. The fact that, largely through no fault of his own, he has not been able to set the world on fire, doesn’t invalidate his opinion on what he has seen any more than the opinions of those of us who watch the same thing would be invalid.

I’d certainly value that opinion over those of a couple of players whose sole insight seems to have been bobbing around the Championship and appearances on Celebrity Big Brother, a programme I understand that is aimed primarily at the hard of thinking.

For this week we are likely to see the return of Aaron Wan-Bissaka whose toe should have recovered by the weekend. Michail Antonio and Crysencio Summerville will of course be out of action and the game is a week or two too early for Aaron Cresswell to be considered. Evan Ferguson will be unable to face his parent squad whilst Edson Alvarez will also be missing, a back injury being the official reason for his absence.

So the prediction then. They’re out of form. We are rarely in form at the moment. Looks like a draw to me. So the £2.50 I was going to spend on a leaving present for Jamie Vardy (I suspect it will all go on legal bills anyway) will instead be wagered on a scoreline of 2-2.

Enjoy the game!




When Last We met At The Credit Card Stadium: Won 1-3 (Premier League August 2023)

It’s odd how sometimes one can remember the dullest of games in vivid detail whilst others make no impression on the synapses. I mean I know I was there – I had to drive down due to there being no trains from London so I was sober throughout. I can remember spending some splendid time before the game in the company of Brian Williams, whose excellent books on the subject of our club make ideal Christmas gifts. However, try as I might I have no memory of the game itself which was won courtesy of goals from Ward-Prowse, Bowen and Antonio; Gross picking up a late consolation for the home side. Funny that.

Referee: Darren England

5Last seen ignoring a foul on Bowen that would have earned us a point at home to Brentford had he had the slightest knowledge of the laws of the game

Danger Man: Danny Welbeck

Old and past his prime but still has that certain je ne sais quoi that strikers often retain well into their football dotage.

Percy and Daisy’s Brighton Fact Of The Week Type Thing

If you needed a reason to detest Brighton consider this: Brighton was the venue for ABBA’s Eurovision Win in 1974, responsible for forcing a lifetime of dreadful formulaic pop songs on the world that end up being forced into my brain every time I use Pudding Mill Lane DLR.

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