Team news: Chema, Kostoulas and Kadioglu could return against City

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Albion head to the Etihad for the second time in four days on Saturday.

Bruce Talbot

2026-10-30T06:00+00:00

Babis Kostoulas was rested on Wednesday when Albion played Manchester City in the Carabao Cup. 📷James Boardman

Albion are back at the Etihad Stadium on Saturday to face Manchester City, this time in the Premier League. Kick off is 3pm.

Team news

Ferdi Kadioglu, Chema and Babis Kostoulas - who all missed the Carabao Cup tie against City - are back in contention. "We are quite convinced they will be options for Saturday," Fabian Hurzeler said at his pre-match press conference. Yankuba Minteh and Mats Wieffer, who both made their return after injury on Wednesday, are also available.

Fabian Hurzeler’s thoughts …

“On Wednesday we saw plenty of good individual performances, so we definitely took that away. If we change something in the starting XI it depends if players are available and how they present themselves after Wednesday.

“We need to go there with a mentally and physically refreshed team because we need intensity against City. They have the best individual players in the league, so you need to be tough, tight, precise, and at the highest physical and mental level.”

Facts and stats

Manchester City won 12 of their last first 14 Premier League matches against Brighton (D1 L1) but they are winless in four since then (D2 L2).
Albion have never won in 16 away league games against Manchester City (D4 L12), though have avoided defeat in their last two. It’s the most Brighton have played away without winning against an opponent and the most Man City have faced an opponent at home without losing.
Manchester City have won their last 10 league matches on Halloween and have 15 wins overall on October 31t, the most of any team in Football League history.
Manchester City lost their first Premier League game of the season last time out against Aston Villa. They last lost consecutively back in August 2025, the second game of which was against Brighton.
Albion have scored more goals than any other side in the Premier League this season (23), though they failed to score for the first time this campaign last time out at Liverpool (0-2).
Manchester City (16.7) and Brighton (16.2) are the two highest ranked teams for expected goals so far in the Premier League this season, as well as being the highest goalscorers (Brighton 23, Man City 20).
Manchester City have scored in each of their last 24 Premier League games, last having a longer run between December 2018 and September 2019 (29). Meanwhile, the only teams to stop Man City from scoring in their last 94 home league games are Arsenal, Spurs (twice) and Liverpool.
Only Bournemouth (5) have made fewer starting XI changes than Brighton (7) in the Premier League this season, while the Seagulls also have the second youngest average starting age this term (25y 214d) behind Newcastle (25y 192d).
Man City’s Erling Haaland has scored seven goals in seven Premier League appearances against Brighton, scoring in the last four without winning any (D2 L2). He’s one of three players to do so in Premier League history along with Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink against Man Utd (Nov 1998 – Feb 2001) and Charlie Austin against Arsenal (Dec 2014 – April 2018), neither of whom did five in a row.
Pascal Gross has created more chances than any other player in the Premier League this season (23), with no player registering more assists than the German so far (4).