Brighton vs Southampton Prediction

Two sides at either end of the Premier League table meet on Friday night. We look ahead to this south-coast clash with our Brighton vs Southampton prediction and preview.

Brighton vs Southampton: The Key Insights

• Brighton triumphed in 63.7% of pre-match simulations by the Opta supercomputer.
• The Seagulls have won three of their last five Premier League games against Southampton (D2).
• João Pedro has been involved in six goals in his last five league appearances, scoring four and assisting two.

Brighton will be looking for a third successive victory when they host bottom side Southampton at the Amex Stadium on Friday night.

Fabian Hürzeler’s team came from behind to defeat Manchester City 2-1 before overcoming Bournemouth by the same scoreline last Saturday. Brighton are the only team to remain unbeaten when conceding the first goal this Premier League campaign (W2 D2).

João Pedro scored one and set up another for Kaoru Mitoma last time out at the Vitality Stadium. That moved the Brazilian onto six goal involvements in his last five top-flight appearances, scoring four and assisting two.

He also scored and created another in the win over Man City, meaning he is the first Brighton player to both score and assist a goal in consecutive Premier League matches.

Carlos Baleba will miss this clash after being sent off for two cautions against Andoni Iraola’s side, though Hürzeler will expect to capitalise on home comforts once more even without the impressive midfielder.

Brighton are looking to win three home Premier League matches in a row for the first time since September 2023, while they are unbeaten in all six such fixtures this campaign (W3 D3). That is their longest such run from the start of a campaign since 2015-16 (10 in the Championship).

The Seagulls are fifth and level on 22 points with both Chelsea and Arsenal, knowing a victory would – at least temporarily – see them climb to second in the table above Man City, who they trail by just one point.

In stark contrast, Southampton have lost their last nine Premier League away games and could suffer 10 straight top-flight away defeats for just the second time (also December 1973 to April 1974).

They have also gone on to lose all eight games in which they’ve conceded first, with only Nottingham Forest having another 100% loss rate (2/2). Russell Martin’s side scored first through Adam Armstrong’s rebound off his own saved penalty against Liverpool on Sunday, but still went on to lose 3-2 thanks to Mohamed Salah’s second-half brace.

The visitors may still hold out some hope of turning things around here. Saints have lost just one of their last seven Premier League games played on a Friday (W4 D2), going down 1-0 at Aston Villa in September 2022.

That impressive streak followed a run of four straight defeats in Friday matches, a run which culminated in a 9-0 home loss to Leicester City in October 2019, and Martin may be concerned about the tools at his disposal ahead of this next task.

Southampton will be without Adam Lallana, Will Smallbone, Ross Stewart, Jan Bednarek, Aaron Ramsdale and Gavin Bazunu, but Paul Onuachu may be available depending on a late fitness test. As for Brighton’s team news, Lewis Dunk, Adam Webster, Tariq Lamptey, Jack Hinshelwood and Ferdi Kadioglu will all be assessed, though Solly March and James Milner are out injured.

Brighton vs Southampton Head-to-Head

Brighton have won three of their last five meetings with Southampton in this competition (D2) after going winless in their first seven clashes with them before that (D4 L3).

However, Southampton have scored in all 12 of their Premier League games against Brighton. That is the most they’ve faced an opponent while scoring every time in the competition, while the Seagulls have only met Man City (15) more without keeping a clean sheet.

Southampton have also lost just one of their last seven top-flight visits to Brighton (W3 D2). That defeat did come on their last such trip, though, thanks to Evan Ferguson’s brace in a 3-1 victory in May 2023.

Brighton vs Southampton Prediction

The Opta supercomputer struggled to see past a home win here – Brighton won a massive 63.7% of 10,000 pre-match simulations.

Southampton only managed victory in 17.1% of the same data-led sims, with the draw more likely in 19.2% of scenarios.

Brighton vs Southampton Predicted Lineups

Opta Power Rankings

The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system. They assign an ability score to over 13,000 domestic football teams. This score is on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.

Ahead of kick-off this weekend, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.

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