Brentford vs. Brighton Betting Tips: Two bets for the Friday night match

This weekend's Premier League action commences in the capital as Brentford host Brighton on Friday evening at 20:00 live on Sky Sports. 

Brighton are two games into the new Roberto De Zerbi era, and it has been a tough start for the Italian boss. His side were scintillating against Liverpool in Merseyside, and perhaps were unfortunate to only come away with a point. That clash was a shootout, a thrilling match of pressing and possession played at a high intensity, ultimately boiling down to who could take their chances. 

De Zerbi’s next game against Tottenham represented an entirely different challenge. Antonio Conte has built a side all about patterns of play, breaking lines quickly, and with the North London club taking the lead early, they were happy to contain and counter. 

At 7/5, the Seagulls head back to London as favourites, for the first time of De Zerbi’s reign, a dynamic that could suit the visitors possession oriented style. 

Brentford do not come into this in the best form, only picking one point up from a possible nine, against Bournemouth. The Bees have only scored once over that three game period, conceding eight.

De Zerbi has an outstanding record at getting his number nines fit and firing. 

At Shakhtar Donetsk, his previous club, his frontman Tete scored nine times in 17 appearances. Domenico Berardi at Sassuolo is the prime example of this though. In the three seasons prior to De Zerbi’s arrival, he averaged 0.20 goals per game in 81 appearances. In the three seasons under his compatriots tutelage, Berardi’s goals per game averaged doubled to 0.40.

This will be welcome news for the Seagulls spearhead, Danny Welbeck, who is yet to open his EPL account for the campaign. 

The new supremo is an admirer of the former Manchester United man though and has made it clear that he is part of his plans on the south coast, so much so that he wants to get Welbeck on the plane to Qatar. Whilst it may be too late to reignite his international career, it is not too late to galvanise his goals tally.

Playing under De Zerbi has already seen an increase in the amount of chances that fall the way of Welbeck. He had three shots in BHA last game v Spurs, taking his xG for the season up to 2.16. At Anfield, he registered an assist, creating two big chances and missed two big chances. 

Playing in a system more suited to creating chances for the striker, Welbeck will continue to rack up the shots and it seems like a matter of time that Welbeck will get his first league goal of the season. 

He has hit William Hill’s line of three, three times this season, two of which coming in his last three starts. 

Creating chances and scoring goals are ethos central to De Zerbi’s possession based style, transitioning, slightly, away from his predecessor Graham Potter’s more controlled approach. 

The first game of the Italian's tenure was a prime example of this: 21 shots, 11 on target, a combined xG of 3.2 and six goals scored. Do not let the xG fool you though, because this clash could have seen even more goals with 11 big chances created, six of which missed. 

Tottenham took an early lead in the Seagulls last game, and this gamestate skewed the statistics with Conte’s side very much happy to protect this lead. This affected BHA’s ability to calve Spurs open, that being said they still hit an xG of one. 

I do not think Brighton’s return to the big smoke to Brentford will follow this same script. The Bees have been pretty obliging on the goals front this campaign with their games averaging 3.66 goals per game and BTTS clicking in two thirds of those.

Combining this with a Welbeck goal is worth a small punt here, as I expect the Seagulls frontman to come into form. 

Best of luck if you are backing this selection and please remember to gamble responsibly.