Everything Fabian Huerzeler said in his Brighton press conference

Questions asked focused on injuries – notably Joao Pedro – as well as his team’s progress and the big challenge offered by Nottingham Forest after their 1-0 win at Liverpool.

But he also spoke in some depth about the development of his team and, in one answer, Carlos Baleba, balancing positive feedback with criticism.

Here is what the Albion head coach had to say in the non-embargoed section his press conference.

Update on Joao Pedro?

“He will train today with the team, then we have to see how it’s going. If he can train fully, if he can do all the movements.

“Of course we won’t take any risk but he will be part of the training today.”

Other team news?

The rehab players continue to do their rehab pretty good. I am really happy to see them working. Gruda is back on the pitch, I think he will also be returning in the next few days to the team training. We have Matt O’Riley who is in very good shape, who is also trying to train already in the gym doing different stuff. James Milner, his process is doing good. So I am happy that all the players are working hard on their comebacks and I am hoping they will be back soon.

Against Arsenal, 22 shots and one goal. Against Ipswich, 21 shots and one goal. How much have you missed someone like Joao Pedro?

He played against Arsenal and he scored! It would be easy as a coach to say, “We miss Joao Pedro and if Joao Pedro had played against Ipswich, we would have won” but that is not my kind of working and philosophy. For me it is important about creating the chances – and we created chances. On top of that, I think every player wants to score. They don’t do it on purpose to miss a shot in front of goal. My solution is more in thinking we have to create more chances that we have to force more, to attack the box maybe with more players, to be more convinced of losing. I think it starts with the individual’s attitude – how I sprint into the box, do I do it with 89% or 95% or do I do it with 100%. How bad do I want to score. I think we missed the last step in creating more chances against Ipswich. That is the solution we try to work on but I will never judge a player by not scoring because I am sure every player wants to score.

Nottingham Forest will probably sit in a low block and attempt to hit you on the counter-attack. How impressed have you been with them and what have you been working on in training?

It is not easy to work a lot in training sessions if you have a Carabao Cup game during the week. Of course we did a lot of analysis and we know the strength from Nottingham. It is very impressive how they have started the season. They have great counter-pressing players. The winger Hudson-Odoi with Elanga, with Wood as a striker. It is amazing how they do it. It is amazing how compact they defend, especially against Liverpool. It shews there is a great togetherness in this team. They are very compact, they defend very close to each other so it will be a challenge to find the solutions. And on top of that of course we have to stop their transition moments. We have to be very good in counter-pressing, very good in rest defence and it will be a challenge for us. I think we managed it quite well against Ipswich. Of course they had one big chance after a transition moment but that is exactly one key for us which we are working on. It is not only about good rest defence, it is also about the reaction we have. How fast do we react when we make a mistake. This will be a key in his match especially but also, I think, in all the matches because every team has the skill to do good transition moments in the Premier League.

Is Mats Wieffer in a good enough place to be able to start?

He will be an option, yes.

How pleased are you about the start you have made while you are getting your ideas across?

In football, the most important is results. Results enable you to keep working and to believe the idea is there. It was very important but it was only a start and now it is about keep doing it, keep improving. There are a lot of things where we can improve. There are a lot of things we have to do better. We have to be much more consistent across all phases of the game. Against Ipswich, for example, we played the first half very good. We came out from half-time, we were very dominant, then we lost the structure a little bit. Then we need to stay more calm, believe in our own ability and our own quality. Stay structured until the 90th minute because it increases the percentage of scoring. Don’t get wild, don’t do individual things, it is very important. We also had the same against Wolverhampton. We played a good first half and the second half we lost a little bit our structure. These are things we have to keep working on. Therefore a good start helps you but now it is about taking the next step, pushing the limits and that is what I demand from my team.

Baleba’s start has impressed fans. Is he already showing how key a role he can play this season?

I think he’s a great player, he's developing fast, improving fast, he's adapting to the ideas very quick, he understands it. Like I always said, he has so much potential.

When we go really into detail, there's so many things where you can improve and our job is to help him, to give him this environment where he can improve. I have great staff. I have great experts who help him every day, my assistant coaches, my analysts that work with him individually, Andrew Crofts, also Max Lesser, my analyst, work with him almost every day, talk to him every day, and that's very important for young players, that they always get feedback and fast feedback after their performance.

It's very important to find a balance when giving a player positive feedback, but also saying to him, ‘you have to improve this and that’. I think that's very important to not stagnate in your development, you have to always try to improve.

Have the squad improved since you took over?

I see the development. I see the improvement. Of course it doesn't happen overnight, we have to be clear about that. It's a process. There are some habits, what they had in the past and to change a habit takes time. That's the natural way. But you can only do it by giving them feedback all the time, by working with them.

That's the key to what we try to do. And on top of that, the most important is that the individual player wants to improve. And what I recognise here is that every player has this mindset. They come to the training ground, they do everything they need for their body and for their mindset to improve themselves and to help the team.

That's always the basic thing. If you don't have this you can sit in front of them and tell them, do that or that, but if they are not convinced and don't want to, or they don't have this inner motivation to improve themselves, you have no chance.

Goals from other players not just Joao?

It's very important that not only we know, but also the opponent knows that we have several players who have the ability to score, who have the ability to make the difference. I think every team in the Premier League has this key player, has this player who makes a difference. In our way, it's Joao Pedro, but like I said before, we have also other great players who can make the difference. We have Mitoma, he can make the difference. Simon [Adingra] can make the difference. Minteh can, Welbeck has already scored. We have now Georginio Rutter. We have Evan Ferguson, where everyone knows he has the ability to make goals.

We have young players in the midfield like Carlos Baleba and Yasin Ayari. They all have the ability to score. So we have to help them score, to increase their percentage of making assists, of making goals. That's our job to develop them and to make a team who's not only fixed on one player. That's very important.