The Seagulls visit Stamford Bridge looking to maintain an unbeaten start to their top-flight campaign. The Blues, meanwhile, will be attempting to make it four successive victories across all competitions.

Chelsea will be aided in that ambition by the return of Romeo Lavia, who Maresca confirmed in his pre-match press conference is available for selection after overcoming a hamstring injury.

‘Romeo is back available,’ the Blues head coach explained. ‘We will see [whether he can start the game or be one of the substitutes]. We have one more session now and then we will decide. The important thing is he’s back and available, which is very good news.

Maresca will also be able to call upon Malo Gusto after the Frenchman returned in our midweek Carabao Cup triumph.

Gusto hasn't featured in the Premier League since our home draw with Crystal Palace but was among those involved in today's session.

Having rotated his starting XI against Barrow on Tuesday night, eleven changes were made for the Carabao Cup fixture, Maresca must decide which players return to the side for Brighton's visit.

One of those could be Robert Sanchez, who has kept back-to-back clean sheets in the Premier League and has spoken about facing the club from which he joined Chelsea.

‘I’ve still got really good friends who are playing in the [Brighton] team,' the Spaniard said. 'It’s the club that gave me everything since I was 16. The academy helped me when I arrived, through loan spells and improving my outside life. I owe everything to them.

‘I think their start to the season has been amazing. They have two wins and three draws right now, they are unbeaten, so it’s a strong team that knows how to play football really well.

'So we have to go and play them with our best mentality and thinking that we need to win, not taking it for granted.’

With a much-changed Chelsea side recording a comprehensive 5-0 midweek victory over Barrow in the Carabao Cup, Maresca has several difficult selection decisions to make against Brighton.

Perhaps the biggest is who leads the attack, with Nicolas Jackson scoring twice in our last league win – a 3-0 success at West Ham United – and Christopher Nkunku netting a hat-trick on Tuesday evening.

‘I think it’s good for me to have some doubts,' Maresca explained when asked about his team selection. 'That means the players are doing well and take the chance when we give it to them.

'This is something important and something we need to continue to do because I think we create the right culture in terms of the team competing and this is important.

‘It’s one of them [Jackson or Nkunku] but I think Pedro (Neto) did well the other day, Misha (Mudryk) did very well the other day, all of the to be honest. Benoit (Badiashile) did well, Axel (Disasi) did well, Renato (Veiga) too.

'Cesare (Casadei) also for me played a fantastic game. It’s important when there is a chance, be it five minutes, ten minutes, half-and-hour or from the start, they give everything, so it’s important.’