Brighton and Hove Albion’s pre-season now comes with a complication that matters well beyond Saturday’s win over Bologna. The result itself was useful, but Fabian Hurzeler’s update on Yankuba Minteh was the more significant takeaway: the winger will miss a longer period, and the head coach made clear that is a blow because he is one of the team’s key players.
That leaves Brighton with an early-season puzzle at exactly the wrong time for a side that is already being pulled into a busy schedule. They are one of the exceptions in pre-season because they still have a UEFA Conference League play-off to navigate before Friday’s Gameweek 1 deadline, so any extended absence now carries extra weight. In FPL pre-season terms, this is not just an injury note. It is a reminder that Brighton’s opening weeks are going to demand flexibility.
What Hurzeler said about the injury picture
Hurzeler did offer some reassurance elsewhere in the squad. He said Brighton do not have many other injury concerns, with Pascal Struijk coming back, Matt O’Riley coming back and Carlos Baleba getting closer. That is an encouraging backdrop, even if it does not soften the loss of Minteh, whose availability would have mattered in both league and European selection decisions.
The manager also singled out Jack Hinshelwood, describing him as someone who is always there, highly active and a constant danger because of the way he occupies the opponents’ box. Hurzeler said Hinshelwood creates chances through that activity and added that he should have scored more goals. It was a neat summary of why Brighton value him: he is not just involved, he consistently arrives in the right places.
For Brighton, the bigger picture is straightforward. Minteh’s absence removes a key attacking option, but the wider squad news is not bleak. The injury list sounds manageable, several players are on the way back, and the club still has a competitive fixture to handle before the league campaign fully takes over. That combination means the challenge is less about crisis and more about timing. In a season that starts before the dust has really settled, timing can be everything.
