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Oscar Garcia last night told central defender Lewis Dunk he can become a "fantastic" player for the club, after he helped Albion shut-out promotion chasing Queens Park Rangers at the Amex last night.
Defender Dunk returned to the starting eleven in place of suspended skipper Gordon Greer, and speaking after a 2-0 win over Rangers, Oscar told seagulls.co.uk, "In all the games that Dunky has played this season his performances have been really good.
"He is a young player and still has to improve, but with the right mentality I know he will be a fantastic player for Brighton & Hove Albion for a very long time."
Oscar also praised his goalscoring centre-forward Leo Ulloa, and says the Argentinian is now hitting form, after missing much of the first half of the season due to injury.
"Leo is back to his best. He didn’t play for a long time, and he is the kind of player who needs to play a lot of games to reach 100 per cent, but he is one of the players who can make a difference.*
"It was a great cross from Bruno and Leo was there to score another crucial goal. Leo works very hard, he holds the ball up and it is not easy to play on his own upfront, but he is doing really well, playing 90 to 95 minutes in most of the games and now he is fit enough to do that.*
"We only have Leo as an out-and-out goalscorer at present, because Mackail-Smith and Hoskins have been out for a year and it is difficult for us to score a lot of goals.*
"The good thing for us is that we keep creating chances and that is what we have to do. All the time we are creating chances I am not worried.
"The good thing tonight was that we did not sit back after scoring the first goal but we pushed on to get the second goal. Stephen Ward has a desire to go forward and score all of the time and he is yet another player that I am very pleased to have in my squad."*
Oscar's attacking options could soon be boosted, as he hopes to have both Hoskins and Mackail-Smith back in the first-team fold: Hoskins came through a 90-minute run-out on Monday evening for the under-21s, while Mackail-Smith is set to continue his rehabilitation against Bournemouth next Monday.
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