Brighton announce glamorous pre season schedule
Whilst other Premier League clubs announce exciting pre season tours to exotic destinations, Brighton and Hove Albion have confirmed they’ll be taking in the sights and sounds of Crawley and Aldershot ahead of the 2019-20 season.
In fact, the Albion’s friendly schedule under Graham Potter looks pretty much exactly the same as did it under Chris Hughton.
There’s a trip to Austria. That’s followed by games against lower league English opponents. A home friendly against a European club will then round things off.
Potter and his side will jet off for a week long training camp on Sunday 7th July, presumably at the same sort of Alpine base which the club have used for the past two seasons.
They will complete their time in Austria with a friendly on Saturday 13th July against opponents who are yet to be named at a venue which is yet to be announced. Handy if you fancied planning a summer break around watching the Albion.
If we had to take a guess, we’d probably say it will be a similar arrangement to two seasons ago. Chris Hughton’s side took on top flight European opponents who were also training in the area, beating Fortuna Dusseldorf 2-0 at Sportplatz Bischofshofen, a small ground a short hop from the Albion’s training camp near Salzburg.
Potter’s first game as Brighton manager on English soil will be against Crawley Town at the wonderfully named People’s Pension Stadium on Friday 19th July with a 7.45pm kick-off.
The following day the action moves to Aldershot where the EBB Stadium will host Brighton against Fulham at 3pm.
It remains to be seen whether the Crawley game features largely Under 23 players or if Potter will split his first team squad for the two fixture.
Either way, the chance of visiting both Crawley and Aldershot in the space of 24 hours is nearly as appealing as the Stevenage-Luton double header that the Albion treated us to in 2016.
A week later and it’s a trip to the Trillion Trophy Stadium which is apparently what St Andrews is now known as to face Birmingham City.
It was at the same venue against the same opponents almost a year to the date that Yves Bissouma announced himself with a brilliant free kick as the Albion and the Blues shared a 1-1 draw.
There is however unlikely to be a reunion with former goalkeeper David Stockdale who remains out of favour at St Andre… sorry, the Trillion Trophy Stadium.
He spent last season out on loan with the likes of Wycombe Wanderers and Southend United, which just goes to show that turning down a contract with a Premier League club in favour of chasing the pound signs waved at you by ‘Arry Redknapp isn’t always the most sensible move to make.
Potter’s first taste of the Amex will come in the Albion’s final friendly on Friday 2nd August and again the opponents are yet to be announced.
The club are probably quite wary of revealing who will be visiting after last year’s fantastic cock up.
They announced Sporting Lisbon amongst great fanfare, only to have to cancel the game when half of Sporting’s squad cancelled their contracts after being physically attacked by THEIR own supporters for failing to qualify for the Champions League.
French side Nantes ended up taking Sporting’s place. That was a bit of a downgrade from the likes of Atletico Madrid, Lazio and Sevilla who have all visited over the last four years.
