Danny Welbeck agrees one-year Brighton contract extension through to 2027

Danny Welbeck will remain a Brighton & Hove Albion player until 2027 after the club activated a one-year extension clause embedded in his previous deal, the club confirmed today. The 35-year-old striker reached the 30-appearance threshold across all competitions during Sunday’s 2-1 victory over Nottingham Forest, automatically triggering the additional season.

The forward’s new terms reward a campaign in which he has already struck ten Premier League goals, matching last season’s career-best tally and leaving him one shy of joining an exclusive group of players to score more than ten top-flight goals in a season at 35 or older. Only Gary McAllister (Coventry City, 1999-2000) and Zlatan Ibrahimovic (Manchester United, 2016-17) have previously achieved the feat.

Welbeck has found the net in each of Brighton’s last two league fixtures, scoring the opener in the 2-0 win at Brentford before repeating the trick against Forest at the Amex Stadium. His brace of goals has propelled the Seagulls to 11th in the table, arresting a slide that had seen the club register just one victory in 13 league matches.

Since arriving on a free transfer from Watford in October 2020, Welbeck has amassed 48 goals in 191 appearances for Brighton, 11 of which have come this season in all competitions. A purple patch of seven goals in seven games during September and October fuelled speculation of an England recall under new national coach Thomas Tuchel ahead of the upcoming World Cup.

Off the pitch, Welbeck is a senior member of Fabian Hurzeler’s leadership cadre, a group that also includes fellow thirty-somethings Jason Steele, Lewis Dunk, Pascal Gross, Joel Veltman and evergreen 40-year-old James Milner, who recently surpassed Gareth Barry’s Premier League appearance record by featuring for the 654th time.

Hurzeler has leaned heavily on experience of late, naming the same starting XI for back-to-back fixtures against Brentford and Forest. The unchanged side registered an average age of 28 years and 355 days at the Brentford Community Stadium, making it Brighton’s oldest line-up of the campaign.

Next up for Welbeck and Brighton is a high-profile encounter with league leaders Arsenal—one of the striker’s former clubs—at the Amex Stadium on Wednesday night, where another goal would etch his name deeper into the club’s history books.