Brighton & Hove Albion v West Ham United
Premier League, American Express Community Stadium, Saturday 4 March 2023, 3pm GMT
West Ham United hit the road again on Saturday, when David Moyes, his players and 3,000 fans hit the south coast resort of Brighton and Hove.
There, the Hammers will take on Albion in the Premier League, seeking a first victory over the Seagulls at the 12th attempt.
The Irons, who will be playing away from home for the eighth time in eleven matches in 2023, have won just one of 12 top-flight games on their travels this season, at Aston Villa in late August, but have taken eight points from the last five Premier League fixtures overall.
Moyes’ men lost late on at Manchester United in the Emirates FA Cup fifth round in midweek, while Roberto De Zerbi’s Brighton won through to the quarter-finals with a 1-0 win at Stoke City.
Brighton have seemingly made a seamless transition from former head coach Graham Potter to De Zerbi, who coached West Ham striker Gianluca Scamacca and former Hammers midfielder Pedro Obiang during three successful years with Italian Serie A club Sassuolo, and arrived in Sussex via a successful 2021/22 season with Ukrainian Premier League club Shakhtar Donetsk.
Tickets...
The first 90% of tickets sold out to Bondholders and Season Ticket Holders with 34+ Loyalty Points. The remaining 10% (300 tickets) were then made available to Season Ticket Holders who had yet to purchase for this fixture by a ballot process. This ballot closed at 12pm on Wednesday 1 February.
For information about official coach travel, click here.
Tickets are available now for our home Premier League fixtures with Aston Villa, Southampton, Newcastle United and Arsenal, as well as our UEFA Europa Conference League round of 16 second leg tie with AEK Larnaca of Cyprus. Click here to secure your seats now!
Travel...
The Amex Stadium is easily reachable by public transport, as it is just two minutes’ walk from Falmer station, itself a nine-minute ride from Brighton station.
Trains depart regularly from London Bridge and Victoria, with a journey time of around an hour to Brighton, and do so in the opposite direction after the game.
What’s more, train and bus travel within the local area is free of charge to ticket holders between 11.30am-9pm on matchday.
If you’d like to drive, Brighton has excellent car parking facilities available to both home and away supporters over two easy-to-access, nearby sites. Spaces must be pre-booked in advance of the match, priced £15 per car, from BrightonAndHoveAlbion.com/tickets
The Seagulls also offer two park and ride sites around the city: Mill Road (BN1 8ZF – 450 spaces) and Brighton Racecourse (BN2 9XZ – 700 spaces).
Free motorbike parking is available on-site at the Amex Stadium.
Click here to plan your journey on the Transport for London network, or here for National Rail services.
How to Follow...
Saturday's game will not be broadcast live on television in the UK, but will be shown across the world by the Premier League's international broadcast partners.
You can listen to commentary in the UK on BBC Radio London 94.9FM and worldwide on whufc.com and our official app.
If you live outside the UK, click here for details of listings in your territory..
You can also follow the action via our live blog on whufc.com and our app and across our social media channels. We will also have highlights and exclusive reaction for you after the final whistle.
Team News...
West Ham United quartet Kurt Zouma (hip), Maxwel Cornet (calf/illness), Łukasz Fabiański (eye socket) and Vladimír Coufal (heel) all missed the midweek Emirates FA Cup fifth-round defeat at Manchester United.
For Brighton & Hove Albion, Jakub Moder (knee), Levi Colwill (knock), Billy Gilmour (muscle injury), Pervis Estupinan (thigh), Solly March (knock) and Adam Lallana (thigh) were not involved in the FA Cup win at Stoke City on Tuesday.
Opposition...
Brighton & Hove Albion supporters could be forgiven for being a bit pessimistic when the club sold Player of the Year Marc Cucurella and fellow starters Leandro Trossard and Yves Bissouma last summer, then lost head coach Graham Potter to Chelsea in September and promising midfielder Enoch Mwepu to a career-ending heart condition in October.
That pessimism would have been misplaced, as Potter’s replacement Roberto De Zerbi and the players brought into the team to replace those departed have helped the Seagulls fly even higher.
Buoyed by a fervent home support at their smart American Express Community Stadium, Brighton have won credit from across the country for their possession and pressing-based style of play.
The Sussex side are through to the FA Cup quarter-finals for the third time in six seasons and, with just over a third of the Premier League season to play, have a real chance of bringing European football to the south coast for the first time ever.
Previous Meetings...
As mentioned, this will be the 12th Premier League meeting between the two clubs and West Ham United have not tasted victory in any of the previous eleven.
We have been to the Amex Stadium six times previously, once in the EFL Championship and five times in the Premier League.
The first visit, on 24 October 2011, ended in a 1-0 victory courtesy of Kevin Nolan’s opportunistic winning goal. Nolan also scored in the reverse fixture at the Boleyn Ground on 14 April 2012, when Ricardo Vaz Tê scored a hat-trick in a 6-0 home win.
Since then, however, we have not beaten Brighton again.
We have yet to win at the Amex in any of our Premier League trips there, losing twice before drawing 1-1 in both 2019/20 and 2020/21 courtesy of goals from Chicharito and Saïd Benrahma respectively.
Last season’s visit was best forgotten as Michail Antonio’s first-half goal put the Hammers in front, only for three strikes after the break to deny the visitors a second consecutive sixth-place Premier League finish.
Match Officials...
Referee: Stuart Attwell
Assistant Referees: Darren Cann & James Mainwaring
Fourth Official: Geoff Eltringham
VAR: Peter Bankes
Assistant VAR: Nick Hopton
Stuart Attwell began refereeing seriously following his graduation from Stafford University and worked his way up through the West Midlands League and National League before joining the Football League list of referees in 2007.
Attwell was fast-tracked, becoming the youngest-ever referee to control a Premier League fixture when he officiated Blackburn Rovers’ 1-1 draw with Hull City on 23 August 2008, and being added to the FIFA List later the same year at the age of just 26.
In 2010, Attwell officiated in the Japanese J. League as part of a referee exchange programme, and he has since refereed matches in the UEFA Champions League, Europa League and Europa Conference League, Premier League, EFL and UEFA age-group tournaments.
Overall, the 40-year-old has refereed West Ham United 19 times in total since April 2008, with his last assignment coming in our 2-0 home Premier League win over Everton in January 2023.
