And whether the Premier League consciously agreed to the request or not Chris Hughton’s side will host Manchester City at The Amex on Saturday, August 12 – unless the game is moved for live TV coverage.
Newcastle are also at home to Tottenham, while Huddersfield face a trip to London to take on Selhurst Park.
The Brighton local paper reports that Hughton’s men made the bold request “in recognition of their first appearance in the Premier League and the launch of their first campaign in the top flight since 1983”.
Hughton told The Argus: “It’s a big day for any club, but it will be a bigger day for us, a realisation of Premier League football.
“You would like a home fixture (first), but you probably want a fixture list that comes out as a decent spread.
“It can go either way. You can end up having a really difficult start, but as long as there’s an even spread I think we’ll be happy.
“The last thing you want is, on paper, a really difficult start.”
The Premier League new boys despite hosting Manchester City first up will then have a relatively easy-looking set of fixtures as they journey to Leicester the following Saturday, before battling Watford on August 26 and face West Brom at home in the first week of September.
Brighton will then got head to head with Bournemouth away before hosting last season’s Championship champions Newcastle in a start which gives the club a possible chance to get a strong footing in the Premier League campaign.
“Results breed confidence. For us in the Premier League a decent start will be different to a decent start in the Championship.
“We have to make sure that we are all realistic about the levels we are up against and determining what are good results and what are not good results,” added Hughton.
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