Dugout Discussion
23 August 2026 413 comments
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Three more Premier League matches take place on Sunday, with a double-header up first at 2pm BST.

Brighton and Hove Albion host Aston Villa on the south coast, while Manchester City meet Bournemouth at the Etihad Stadium.



TEAM NEWS

Man City boss Enzo Maresca makes two changes from last weekend’s Community Shield defeat by Arsenal.

Rico Lewis replaces the benched Mateo Kovacic, while the injured Jeremy Doku drops out for Marc Guehi.

Nico O’Reilly subsequently looks set to play in a more advanced role.

Erling Haaland unsurprisingly leads the line.

Alex Scott was suspended for Bournemouth’s final pre-season friendly. He’s the only change from that kickabout, with Alex Toth making way.

Finally, at the Amex, Fabian Hurzeler makes just one change from his final pre-seaason line-up: Lewis Dunk is in for Ferdi Kadioglu, who has a minor injury.

Maxim De Cuyper will likely play ‘out-of-position’ as a left winger.

There’s no Emiliano Martinez or Ollie Watkins in the Aston Villa squad due to ongoing transfer uncertainty.

New recruit Joao Gomes is fit to start for the visitors, however, while £4.5m midfielder George Hemmings is preferred to Alejandro Garnacho on the left flank.

Emiliano Buendia or Ross Barkley could lead the line in Watkins’ absence.

Other transfer window captures Zion Suzuki and Matteo Ruggeri are substitutes.

LINE-UPS

Brighton and Hove Albion XI: Verbruggen, Wieffer, Vuskovic, Dunk, Boscagli, Ayari, Gross, Gomez, Hinshelwood, De Cuyper, Rutter

Subs: Steele, Struijk, Promise, Osman, Kostoulas, Costinha, Svoboda, Yalcouye, Yohanna

Aston Villa XI: Bizot, Cash, Lindelof, Pau, Maatsen, Kamara, J Gomes, McGinn, Buendia, Hemmings, Barkley

Subs: Suzuki, Mings, Ruggeri, Garnacho, Bogarde, Rowe, Alysson, Burrowes, Lynch


Manchester City XI: Donnarumma, Khusanov, Dias, Guehi, Gvardiol, Lewis, Anderson, O’Reilly, Semenyo, Foden, Haaland

Subs: Rulli, Marmoush, Kovacic, Cherki, Nico, Grealish, Ait-Nouri, Reis, Nunes

Bournemouth XI: Petrovic, Smith, Hill, Silva, Truffert, Cook, Scott, Rayan, Kluivert, Tavernier, Evanilson

Subs: Dennis, Brooks, Gannon-Doak, Adams, Diakite, Juanlu, Toth, Jebbison, Rodriguez


LIVE GAMEWEEK PAGE + MATCH CENTRE

You can follow all the day’s action via the Live Gameweek page, which you can find in the all-new FPL Toolkit section.

Here you can follow the scores, watch the defensive contribution (DefCon) points roll in, see who the leading players are for xG and more as the games play out.

And there’s also the all-new Match Centre to explore.

A snapshot of this page can be seen below; it’s basically a condensed version of the one you can find in the Members Area.

debuts

FPL Stats Centre

413 Comments Login to Post a Comment
  1. Bobby Digital
    • 9 Years
    31 mins ago

    Do something, Haaland!

    1. Magic Zico
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 8 Years
      31 mins ago

      Yep please

  2. GENERATION X
    • 12 Years
    31 mins ago

    Res coming Villa

    1. GENERATION X
      • 12 Years
      27 mins ago

      Red

    2. FPL Blow-In
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 13 Years
      26 mins ago

      Some debut

      1. AC/DC AFC
        • Fantasy Football Scout Member
        • 11 Years
        25 mins ago

        I think I'm watching the wrong match

  3. TheBiffas
    • 5 Years
    30 mins ago

    A premium membership pop up every time you switch between comments pages is a little excessive no?

    1. CoracAld2831
      • 5 Years
      28 mins ago

      Yes.

      Very annoying when you are a mobile user.

    2. x.jim.x
      • 11 Years
      26 mins ago

      Don't you dare complain or you'll get called embarrassing and told to stop coming here by one of the mods

      1. Brosstan
        • 12 Years
        24 mins ago

        That really happened? Some other mod was giving people advice on how to block the ads lol

          1. TheBiffas
            • 5 Years
            18 mins ago

            So condescending hahaha

            1. x.jim.x
              • 11 Years
              9 mins ago

              Going mad on the least amount of power anybody in history has ever had

          2. Nightcrawler
            • 7 Years
            9 mins ago

            Made me chuckle at least. So bizzare

        1. THE Wild Rover
          • 16 Years
          17 mins ago

          Surprised you’re still here after emailgate 😆

          1. Brosstan
            • 12 Years
            1 min ago

            Me too tbh. They deleted a fair few of my comments but no ban 😀

  4. Warby84
    • 11 Years
    30 mins ago

    I only left Hinsh out due to transfer rumours

  5. Royal5
    • 15 Years
    30 mins ago

    Anderson awful so far

    1. el polako
      • 9 Years
      28 mins ago

      Kalvin Philips 2.0

      1. Royal5
        • 15 Years
        just now

        Could be

  6. tiger
    • Fantasy Football Scout Member
    • 14 Years
    30 mins ago

    Villa red card 😀
    Gomes

  7. TheTinman
    • 11 Years
    30 mins ago

    Oh my days Aston Villa wow

  8. City look scary going forward, you can tell none of this Pep shut up shop when 2-0 up will happen this season!

    1. Yeah but open to the counter too.
      Happy to have O’Reilly and Haaland. Looks like one can put it on a plate for the other.

  9. De cruyper punt paid off so far

    1. jacob1989
      • 4 Years
      17 mins ago

      Rank top 1000?

      1. Does it even matter at this srage?

  10. jacob1989
    • 4 Years
    30 mins ago

    What a shame i selected verbruggen and d gomes.

  11. Fifa las vegas
    • 14 Years
    29 mins ago

    Go hunt down that hattrick Hinshelwood

  12. Hinsh saving my gameweek

    1. jacob1989
      • 4 Years
      14 mins ago

      Saving? More like an absolute awesome gw for u

  13. Went Gomez over Gross near the end of last season, Gomez got injured first half. Went Gross over Gomez this season of course...

    1. Bucket Man
      • 8 Years
      just now

      Me to. This season starting off just as good as last season was 🙁

  14. Emery still the best manager in the League? Hahahahahahahahaha

    1. x.jim.x
      • 11 Years
      24 mins ago

      Man's boxing shadows bigtime

    2. FPL Blow-In
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 13 Years
      24 mins ago

      Not his fault

    3. FPL Scoop
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 9 Years
      23 mins ago

      Definitely his fault, this...

  15. JBG
    • 8 Years
    29 mins ago

    Villa RC.

    Cuntent Creators on twitter tried to steer people away from Brighton assets, saying Villa have a great record against Brighton, which is true... but massive context was missing. Villa are horrendous, specially after missing multiple key players.

    1. Zilla
      • 8 Years
      24 mins ago

      Didn't see that but also few pushed that Brighton won't be focusing on this game due to the European fixture.

    2. BobbyDoesNotLook
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 9 Years
      23 mins ago

      Main reason I dropped Gross and Gomez was that for some reason they played big minutes in Europe Mickey Mouse cup. Most of the other PL teams have played second tier players at this stage of the same Euro league.

    3. FPL Blow-In
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 13 Years
      22 mins ago

      People need to make their own decisions and not whinge because a decision they made was suggested by a content creator.

    4. Sun Jihai
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 14 Years
      22 mins ago

      The biggest content creator of them all went De Cuyper to be fair

      1. TyroneGAA
        • 9 Years
        11 mins ago

        Oh wow a 4.5m midfielder anyone who needs an enabler will have him

        1. FPL Blow-In
          • Fantasy Football Scout Member
          • 13 Years
          10 mins ago

          He’s a defender and many went with Shaw/Hume/Rodon etc

  16. TochanMama
    • 14 Years
    29 mins ago

    What a bad ebening for Villa

  17. Feanor
    • 17 Years
    29 mins ago

    Idiotic by Emery to leave Gomes out there after the yellow. He clearly had lost his rag.

    1. FPL Scoop
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 9 Years
      9 mins ago

      Can't disagree with that; should arguably have had a second yellow already anyway.

  18. Ninja Škrtel
    • 12 Years
    28 mins ago

    Cherki is City's best player and biggest enabler for Haaland. Maresca must play him.

  19. Zilla
    • 8 Years
    28 mins ago

    This is gross.

    1. JBG
      • 8 Years
      4 mins ago

      Sure is for his owners

  20. FPL Scoop
    • Fantasy Football Scout Member
    • 9 Years
    28 mins ago

    Joao Gomes with one of the worst debuts I remember seeing.

    1. el polako
      • 9 Years
      25 mins ago

      Ali Dia did better

  21. jacob1989
    • 4 Years
    28 mins ago

    Brighton should be winning 8-0 atleast. 4 vs 11 men and now vs 10 men

    1. TochanMama
      • 14 Years
      just now

      It's looking like a preseason game against a lower league club

  22. Feanor
    • 17 Years
    26 mins ago

    De Kuyper just missed

    1. Feanor
      • 17 Years
      22 mins ago

      A few feet wide but great chance

    2. FPL Blow-In
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 13 Years
      21 mins ago

      Straight at De Cuyper?

  23. City look vulnerable at the back

    1. Nomar
      • 16 Years
      21 mins ago

      Very much so

  24. FPL Blow-In
    • Fantasy Football Scout Member
    • 13 Years
    26 mins ago

    De Cuyper could have a hattrick.

  25. FPL Scoop
    • Fantasy Football Scout Member
    • 9 Years
    26 mins ago

    This could end 10-0 at this rate... big result if Villa can keep it to 5/6!

  26. Fifa las vegas
    • 14 Years
    26 mins ago

    Massive regret not getting De Cuyper. Had Kadioglu in my head as more secured long term, went neither in the end!

    1. TochanMama
      • 14 Years
      12 mins ago

      Same, has cold feet with them both, even had Hinshelwood in a couple of early drafts.
      By the looks of it, more goals are coming.

    2. Bleh
      • 9 Years
      12 mins ago

      Hopefully you went with someone not injured at least.

      1. Fifa las vegas
        • 14 Years
        10 mins ago

        Maguire 😆

        1. Fifa las vegas
          • 14 Years
          10 mins ago

          A clean sweep of disaster barring Calafiori

    3. Brosstan
      • 12 Years
      10 mins ago

      At least you didn't go Kadioglu who isnt even playing. 4 points all out on BB...

      1. Fifa las vegas
        • 14 Years
        9 mins ago

        Not much better here, unless Verbruggen can hold onto the CS

        1. Brosstan
          • 12 Years
          just now

          He obviously will against 10 man villa who have already capitulated

  27. Bleh
    • 9 Years
    25 mins ago

    Going Kadioglu over De Cuyper really bit me.

  28. AC/DC AFC
    • Fantasy Football Scout Member
    • 11 Years
    25 mins ago

    It's like a training ground exercise of attack v defense

    Brighton have had 4 chances to score a 5th in the last few mins

    1. tiger
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 14 Years
      just now

      Maybe nobody told Villa that this isn't a pre-season friendly

  29. Feanor
    • 17 Years
    24 mins ago

    Wonder if Brighton sub some guys at halftime with their European match coming up

    1. Gross 0 pointer feels inevitable

      1. He could be subbed. Game in bag, captain, old = save for important Euro second leg that is still open.

    2. BobbyDoesNotLook
      • Fantasy Football Scout Member
      • 9 Years
      2 mins ago

      Very likely.

  30. Mother Farke
    • 2 Years
    22 mins ago

    Will Ayari get the most recent assist? FotMob says it's his.