Erik ten Hag’s first English Premier League game in charge of Manchester United was a home defeat to Brighton in August last year when Graham Potter was in charge of the Seagulls.

Roberto de Zerbi took over last September and guided Brighton to a seventh-place finish in the Premier League and the FA Cup semi-finals.

Brighton did the league double over United last season, winning the reverse fixture at the Amex Stadium 1-0 in May and they are unbeaten in their last four games against United in regulation time.

“I love to play them,” Ten Hag enthused. “It is typical we had two great games against them.

“We know we have to play tomorrow (Saturday) to our best because they will let you sacrifice and suffer. I’m really looking forward to this fight.”

Lisandro Martinez is fit for the home game. Martinez was forced off in the second half of United’s 3-1 defeat at Arsenal two weeks ago and did not play in either of Argentina’s World Cup qualifying wins against Bolivia and Ecuador.

However, the centre back is available and set to resume his partnership with Victor Lindelof, who captained Sweden in their European Championship qualifiers against
Austria and Estonia.

Raphael Varane and Mason Mount are still out injured but Ten Hag stressed the pair are “in a good place”.

Mount has been out for four weeks with a muscular injury while Varane came off at half time against Nottingham Forest three weeks ago.

Ten Hag did not directly address questions about Jadon Sancho amid the forward’s exile from the first-team over a disciplinary issue, but stressed that it was his job to set standards at the club.

Sancho was omitted from the squad for United’s 3-1 loss at Arsenal on September 3, with Ten Hag stating at the time that the England player was left out due to poor training performance.

Following the match, the 23-year-old winger responded to Ten Hag’s comments in a lengthy post on X — the social media platform formerly known as Twitter — saying he had been unfairly made a “scapegoat”. The post has since been deleted.

On Thursday, United said Sancho will train alone until the resolution of the issue.

“There are different characters and you have to manage those characters. But the team is always above everything else,” Ten Hag told reporters.

“Strict lines is what the club asked me (to bring), because there was no good culture before last season. I had to set good standards.

“It is never someone makes one mistake, it is a whole process before you come to a certain outcome about strict lines. There is a structure to cross lines, staff or players, so you have to be strong.”

Written with inputs from Reuters