Chelsea vs Brighton – Team News: Maresca picks dynamic attack but frustrates fans in defence | OneFootball

Chelsea face Brighton at Stamford Bridge in just over an hour, and the teams are in!

There are a growing number of injuries in the Chelsea squad, and manager Enzo Maresca is doing his best to cope with them.

The first big question mark was at the back, where Wesley Fofana and Tosin Adarabioyo were this week added to the injury list. We thought that Josh Acheampong would be the one picked to play alongside Trevoh Chalobah at the back, but instead Maresca has gone for Jorrel Hato.

This is just immensely frustrating – Maresca constantly talks about how much he rates the Cobham produced potential star but then never seems to trust him in a proper game unless he’s forced to. Hato has looked shaky as hell in his minutes in his natural position at left back so far. Why is he the one getting a chance in the middle?

Of course it may be that the coach doesn’t think that Acheampong is fully fit after missing the midweek game with flu – but in that case, why even put him on the bench?

Here are the full team line-ups for Chelsea vs Brighton (kick off at 15:00 GMT)

CHELSEA:

Chelsea’s team to face Brighton.

Chelsea add double Brazilian to attack

The other area of interest in the team is in attack, with Cole Palmer also out injured.

As we predicted in our predicted XI today, Maresca has pushed Enzo Fernandez forward to take Palmer’s place, and has put Brazilian central midfielder Andrey Santos into Enzo’s usual role.

On the right wing, Estevao Willian gets the start he deserves after being cruelly subbed off after 5 minutes last week following Robert Sanchez’s red card against Manchester United. We’re really excited to see what he can do, and the team will need him now their main creative force is missing.