Leroy lives for goals

The on-loan striker aims to score for the second successive away game when the Seagulls go to Wigan on Saturday.

Lita has yet to start a game since arriving on loan from Swansea last month.

But his close-range finish after coming off the bench at Doncaster sent Albion towards their second away win of the season.

And Coppell, who splashed out a club-record £1million to take him Bristol City to Reading in 2005, reckons the 28-year-old’s hunger to get goals means he will always be a threat.

The Crawley Town director of football said: “Leroy is a goalscorer and lives on scoring goals.

“Even in five-a-side you can see he takes a huge pleasure in putting the ball in the back of the net.

“And that is a rare quality as there are not that many players who have that enthusiasm on a daily basis to score goals.

“If a chance is presented, he is one player I would put an awful lot of money on to convert them because he has such a desire to score.”

Wigan wanted to sign Lita from Middlesbrough almost three years ago but were put off by a seven-figure asking price.

Albion head coach Oscar Garcia has yet to give him his full debut despite being short of options up front.

Coppell added: “The game has changed and is more cerebral. People think about it more in terms of preparation but I am sure once Leroy gets his chance, he will take it.”

Ashley Barnes will be favourite to start in attack at the DW Stadium after scoring two goals at home to Blackburn last time out.

Leo Ulloa has stepped up his recovery from a fractured metatarsal and has started running on the club’s anti-gravity treadmill.

Will Hoskins (cruciate ligament) remains a long-term absentee and Oscar is unsure when Craig Mackail-Smith will return from the ankle injury suffered during his recovery from a ruptured Achilles.

Oscar said: “He had the injury he had, then the problem with the ankle, so it’s going a bit slower.

“There is no date yet for him to come back.”