The Christmas programme is a key period of the season for Brighton & Hove Albion.
Nine points are at stake from Sunderland’s visit on Saturday, the trip to Arsenal on December 27 and another away day in London just over 72 hours later to face West Ham United. The festive fixtures will have a major bearing on where Fabian Hurzeler’s sit in the table when the January transfer window opens.
There is a different look to the Premier League schedule this year. Only one match takes place on Boxing Day (Manchester United vs Newcastle) and there is a clash with the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON), which is taking place between December 21 and January 18. Most clubs will be weakened, to varying degrees, as players join up with their national teams in Morocco.
Here, The Athletic looks at the impact the tournament will have on Brighton and their upcoming opponents…
No Carlos Baleba
The Cameroon midfielder is the only player Hurzeler loses to AFCON. It could be argued that he is no great loss, since Baleba has been well below his best since Manchester United’s interest in signing the 21-year-old during the summer transfer window.
But there have been signs recently that Baleba is getting closer to rediscovering his form, especially in the 4-3 home defeat against Aston Villa at the end of November. The midfielder’s absence also compounds Diego Gomez’s suspension for the Sunderland game. He will serve a one-match ban after collecting his fifth yellow card of the campaign in Saturday’s 2-0 defeat at Liverpool (captain Lewis Dunk is also ruled out for the same reason).
Carlos Baleba in action for Brighton at Anfield on Saturday (Steven Halliwell/Getty Images)
How many games Baleba misses depends on how far Cameroon go in the tournament. They have group fixtures against Gabon on December 24, Ivory Coast on December 28 and Mozambique on December 31, so he will definitely miss the Arsenal and West Ham games.
What happens from there depends on Cameroon’s results. If they make it through to the final, he would miss further matches at home to Burnley on January 3, Manchester City (a) on January 7, Manchester United (a) in the third round of the FA Cup on January 11 and Bournemouth (h) on January 19.
It could have been worse for Hurzeler. He could also have been without Yankuba Minteh, one of his top performers this season. The Gambia right-winger is one of only three players to have started all 16 league games (along with Dutch duo Bart Verbruggen and Jan Paul van Hecke). Minteh has contributed a goal and four assists in those games, but Gambia failed to qualify for AFCON.
Sunderland hit hard
Hands up who had Sunderland nailed on for relegation straight back to the Championship following their promotion via the play-offs?
Tommy Watson scored the 95th-minute winner against Sheffield United at Wembley before joining Brighton in the summer, but his former side have been the Premier League’s surprise packages. They head for the Amex Stadium three points above Hurzeler’s 10th-placed team in the top half of the table. Hurzeler’s need to reshuffle pales in comparison to his counterpart, Regis Le Bris. The Frenchman loses six players to AFCON, double the next highest in the division (Burnley, Fulham and Manchester United, all with three), though Habib Diarra could feature against Brighton this weekend, before heading off to play for Senegal.
It could have been seven for Sunderland, but Simon Adingra was a surprise omission from the Ivory Coast squad. Another former Brighton winger, Adingra was given a hero’s welcome when he returned to the Amex after helping the host nation win the previous AFCON in 2024. He scored a 90th-minute equaliser in an eventual 2-1 win for Ivory Coast in the quarter-finals against Mali. Adingra went on to provide two assists and was named man of the match in the 2-1 victory in the final against Nigeria.
The impressive Noah Sadiki will be missing for Sunderland (Steve Welsh/Getty Images)
Watson and Adingra could be looking across at one another from the respective benches following their summer switch of clubs. Watson has yet to start a league game, a combination of adaptation and injury problems limiting the involvement of the 19-year-old since his £10million ($13m) move. Adingra, sold in a deal worth up to £21m, made the last of four starts in a 2-0 defeat at Manchester United at the start of October.
Most of Sunderland’s AFCON call-ups have been regular starters. Noah Sadiki’s absence, in particular, disrupts an established midfield partnership with Granit Xhaka. They are the only outfield players who have started all of Sunderland’s league games.
Plain sailing for Arsenal
A trip to the Emirates Stadium will not be made any easier.
The table-toppers are one of six Premier League teams without a player from one of the AFCON squads in their first team.
It is an unusual situation for Arsenal, who have been able to call upon a host of top players from the continent over the years. Brighton have a good recent league record at the Emirates — two wins, one defeat and one draw in their last four visits — but the scale of the challenge the day after Boxing Day was illustrated by their 2-0 exit from the Carabao Cup in north London in October.
Hurzeler named a strong line-up that night, while Arteta went with what amounted to a second or even third XI. Brighton were punished for missing early chances, before Bukayo Saka came off a star-studded bench to seal Arsenal’s passage to the quarter-finals.
This winter’s AFCON won’t deprive Arteta of any of his Arsenal players (Michael Steele/Getty Images)
Hammer blow in defence for Nuno
West Ham will be without both of their regular full-backs for the final fixture of 2025 at the London Stadium, a rapid return meeting after the teams drew 1-1 at the Amex on December 6.
Georginio Rutter rescued a point for Hurzeler’s troops with a late equaliser. It will be more difficult defensively for West Ham’s head coach, Nuno Espirito Santo, second time around without right-back Aaron Wan-Bissaka (DR Congo) and left-back El Hadji Malick Diouf (Senegal).
Wan-Bissaka was voted the club’s player of the year last season, while summer signing Malick Diouf has established himself in Nuno’s starting XI since a £19m move from Slavia Prague.
Kyle Walker-Peters, signed on a free transfer from relegated Southampton in the summer, is a solid and experienced alternative to Wan-Bissaka, and on the opposite side, Oliver Scarles provides cover for Malick Diouf. The 20-year-old academy graduate has recovered from fracturing a collarbone in a 2-1 defeat against Leeds United in October.
Centre-back Igor Julio can also fill in at left-back, but the Brazilian is ineligible for the game under the terms of his loan from Brighton to West Ham.