Brighton & Hove Albion 2020-21 Season Review: February

If ever a month has summed up what it is like to be a Brighton fan, then the crazy February that the Albion put together during the 2020-21 season was it.

Within the space of 24 days, Brighton went from the unbelievable high of winning away from home against Premier League holders Liverpool to the low of managing to miss two penalties in an hour on their way to losing against soon-to-be relegated West Brom.

We all know that Brighton’s ability to go from the sublime to the ridiculous is unparalleled, but even by the Seagulls high standards February was an astonishing month – and that is before we even begin to consider the 2-1 home defeat against arch rivals Crystal Palace, who only managed two touches in the Albion box all evening.

First though to that hard day’s night at Anfield. Three days after Brighton had shocked Tottenham Hotspur with a 1-0 win at the Amex, Graham Potter masterminded an even bigger surprise against Liverpool with a repeat of that scoreline against Jurgen Klopp’s self-proclaimed greatest champions ever.

The Redmen may have been going through something of a rut at the time, but you could not take anything away from the Albion. Burnley had ended Liverpool’s 68 game unbeaten home run a couple of weeks earlier with a backs-to-the-wall, smash and grab raid on Merseyside in which the hosts had 72 percent possession, 27 shots, six on target and won 12 corners.

There was none of that against Brighton. Potter instead sent his side out to win, playing the quicker, more pragmatic style adopted in January which had delivered two victories in three matches after the same number from the opening 18 games of the campaign.

Liverpool had more possession with 63 percent but that was all part of the game plan. In all the areas that mattered, the Seagulls were dominant. Brighton had 13 shots to Liverpool’s 11, four of which were on target compared to the home side’s one.

Even Klopp, who so often looks for excuses like fixture scheduling or a bit of wind to blame his team’s failure on, admitted that Liverpool had been beaten by the better team. “Brighton deserved to win, no doubt about it.” Was he feeling okay?

So good were the Albion that Robert Sanchez hardly had a save of any note to make on his way to becoming the first ever Brighton goalkeeper to keep four consecutive top flight clean sheets.

His one notable intervention was a perfect claim of a last minute Liverpool corner as he came barrelling through a sea of bodies to collect, relieving the pressure on the defence and ending any hopes the hosts had of an equaliser.

The only goal of the game arrived around 35 minutes minutes prior to Sanchez’s confident piece of goalkeeping and it was via the best move of the match.

Steve Alzate started it deep in his own half with a pass back towards Adam Webster. Webster played it first time to Dan Burn on the left. Burn helped it on to Neal Maupay who returned it to Burn to hit a clever lofted ball inside to Leandro Trossard.

Trossard delivered a lovely little flick to Yves Bissouma – outstanding in front of Klopp who was rumoured to want to take the midfielder to Liverpool in the summer – and he drove forward to find Pascal Gross.

The German laid off to Solly March, a David Beckham-esque switch back to the left found Burn who had gone charging forward with determination to head back across goal for Alzate to volley in, via a slight deflection off Trossard.

A nine-pass-plus-Burn’s-head move involving seven different players in which the Albion advanced 70 yards up the pitch and placed a shot into the corner of the net. Potterball at its very best.

Brighton might have won by more. Before Alzate’s goal, Burn showed all the composure of a giraffe on a skateboard when a chance fell to him in front of the Kop and he sent the ball somewhere towards the back row.

Once the Albion were ahead, Liverpool were indebted to goalkeeper Caoimhin Kelleher for ensuring it only finished Liverpool 0-1 Brighton.

The young Irishman pulled off a world class save at full stretch from Gross’ low drive, Trossard was denied by a good block from the Liverpool goalkeeper in a one-on-one and Burn had another effort from close range.

Dan Burn with two shots on goal (and an assist) from inside the penalty area away at Anfield. It was football Jim, but not as we knew it – and proof that Brighton could mix it with the very best on their day.

The only negative from Anfield was seeing Solly March limp off. March had been enjoying the best campaign of his career having won WAB Player of the Month in both October and November to put himself in line for a shock England call up. His season was now over though as surgery was required on his knee, leaving him out for 12 weeks.

There was further bad news on the injury front in the second game of February when Adam Webster – also having an excellent 2020-21 – left the action early in Burnley 1-1 Brighton.

Initially, Potter said he hoped to have Webster back within a few days. In classic Brighton style, a few days ended up being the best part of eight weeks in which the Albion’s form deteriorated quite badly without two of their most important individuals.

A draw at Turf Moor was an impressive result given the exertions that had gone into defeating both Spurs and Liverpool. It also allowed Brighton to show another side to their game as they had to battle and fight to a point, something we had rarely seen them do in the 2020-21 season before February.

The Albion were not the only ones doing something uncharacteristic. Burnley too shrugged off their reputation as fighters who rely on set pieces by playing the sort of attractive football we have come to expect from Brighton, the Clarets missing a glut of opportunities and registering an xG of over two.

In a way, it was a bit like that John Travolta and Nicholas Cage film where they swap faces. Brighton became Burnley and Burnley became Brighton for the day.

The first 30 minutes at Turf Moor was pretty much a non-event, so much so that most Brighton fans were more excited about goings on at Adams Park where Glenn Murray scored inside of 10 minutes on his Nottingham Forest debut from a Gaetan Bong assist.

Murray would go onto add a second half penalty and Anthony Knockaert a third as Chris Hughton’s side won 3-0 against Wycombe Wanderers. The band was well and truly back together at Nottingham & Hove Albion.

Whilst Murray was banging them in for fun in Buckinghamshire, it was Lewis Dunk who scored a towering header which had all the trademarks of his former teammate to give Brighton the lead.

It came with 36 minutes played. Pascal Gross sent over an out-swinging corner and Dunk rose highest above James Tarkowski to power the ball between Nick Pope and a Burnley player guarding the post.

From that point on, it was pretty much all Burnley. Some heroic defending and a string of superb saves from Sanchez restricted the Clarets to only one goal, arriving on 54 minutes when Sanchez saved an Erik Pieters shot but the rebound fell to Johann Berg Gudmundsson to fire home.

Potter named an inexperienced but strong team for the midweek trip to Leicester City in the fifth round of the FA Cup, including giving full debuts to Polish duo Jakub Moder and Michal Karbownik following their January arrivals from Lech Poznan and Legia Warsaw respectively.

In a game of very few opportunities, it looked like the Albion might take the eventual winners of the trophy to extra time until conceding thanks to an extraordinary bit of defending with 10 seconds remaining.

Brighton had nine men back plus goalkeeper Christian Walton to defend a corner against only three Foxes players. The Albion though completely switched off, Leicester took it short and every player in yellow began panicking that Youri Tielemans had all the time and space in the world to deliver a cross.

Whilst this was going on, nobody subsequently noticed Kelechi Iheanacho completely free at the back post, leaving him with the simple task of heading home Tielemans’ ball into the box whilst unmarked. Leicester 1-0 Brighton and the Albion’s interest in the FA Cup over for another season.

Aston Villa goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez gave one of the best performances of any opposition player against Brighton in 2020-21 in the fourth game of February, helping Villa to a 0-0 draw at the Amex.

The Albion registered 26 shots against Villa, the most they have ever had in a Premier League game. Whereas previously Brighton’s problem had been getting things on target, on this occasion nine of those efforts were on goal.

Martinez made unreal saves from Burn, Alexis Mac Allister, Joel Veltman and Danny Welbeck to name but four. It was like one of those nights out when you are single and go to Shoosh to talk to as many girls as possible to see how you get on, only to end up in Buddies alone at 3am waiting for the first train home.

Almost as impressive as Martinez was Joel Veltman. The Dutchman was given the sizable task of keeping Jack Grealish quiet and where many defenders failed during the 2020-21 season, Veltman succeeded with a showing that went a long way towards helping him win the WAB Brighton Player of the Month award for February with 84.35 percent of the vote.

Grealish became so frustrated with his inability to escape Veltman’s pocket that he ended up picking up a first half booking for a crude challenge on the right back. Job done for our Joel.

Brighton’s dominance over Villa gave a sense of confidence ahead of the big one when Crystal Palace came to the Amex. Palace did not possess a goalkeeper of Martinez’s ilk and so if the Albion could produce a similar showing against the Eagles to that of their Villa one, Potter would surely oversee his first win against the old enemy.

Then there was the contrasting form the sides were in. Brighton were unbeaten in six, their best run of top flight form since 1981. They had kept five clean sheets and had those famous wins over Spurs and Liverpool in the bank.

Palace meanwhile arrived in Sussex having just lost 3-0 at home to Burnley and with pressure mounting on Roy Hodgson. The Holmesdale Fanatics even borrowed a bedsheet from one of their mothers to scrawl a message of dissatisfaction and hung it outside the training ground before their trip to Brighton.

There was no Wilfried Zaha for the visitors, either. Injury prevented Zaha from making the trip to the Amex. Palace had not scored a goal without him up until that point in the 2020-21 season, let alone taken a point when their talisman had been absent.

All of that meant that Palace were as big as 9/2 to win on the morning of the game. If you stuck a tenner on that, then you could have picked up a decent bottle of prosecco as with grim predictability, the final score at the Amex was Brighton 1-2 Crystal Palace.

Brighton had 25 shots over the course of the 90 minutes. Palace had three. The Eagles managed just two touches inside the Brighton penalty area, both of which resulted in goals. The Albion had 75 percent possession and 13 corners. In terms of xG, it finished Brighton 2.06 – 0.24 Crystal Palace.

None of those stats matter though, especially not when it is Brighton v Palace. The only thing that counted is what was on the scoreboard, and the Albion failed in that regard.

Palace took the lead in the 28th minute with with their first foray forward. Although Jordan Ayew got away from Burn far too easily to sweep a low cross into the box, there did not appear much danger as Ben White and Sanchez were both on the scene.

Jean-Phillipe Mateta though had other ideas, producing an improvised backheel finish which went through the legs of White and then the legs of Sanchez for his first Palace goal and instant hero status in the slums of Croydon.

Brighton were woeful in the first half, leaving Vicente Guaita without a save to make. Potter realised something had to change and so he abandoned 3-4-1-2 in favour of 4-4-2 at the break, hauling Alzate and introducing Danny Welbeck up top alongside Maupay.

The Eagles were clearly not expecting such a switch and the Albion should have been out of sight long before Christian Benteke’s goal in the final seconds won it for Palace.

Veltman scored the Brighton equaliser, coolly despatching a clinical effort low and hard past Guaita after a Gross shot deflected into his path off a Palace player.

Palace should have been there for the taking after that. The formation change and the goal seemed to have completely bamboozled the visitors and it was now all Brighton.

Four good chances came and went in the space of 10 seconds from a game of pinball in the box; Trossard was twice denied by Guaita, Welbeck’s follow up was blocked by the Palace goalkeeper and Mac Allister’s follow up to the follow up crashed into a defender.

Gary Cahill produced a world class block from Welbeck, substitute Adam Lallana thought he was playing in the Six Nations for a moment and fired not one but two glorious chances over the bar and Maupay hit a couple of weak efforts straight at Guaita.

With each chance that Brighton passed up in that second half of utter dominance, it seemed to become more inevitable that Palace would find a way to commit daylight robbery.

Lo and behold, after 94 minutes and 8 seconds of football they grabbed a thoroughly underserved winner. It was a terrible goal to concede from a Brighton point of view.

White needlessly and stupidly hoofed the ball towards the NASA probe recently landed on Mars, gifting possession back to Palace. Andros Townsend subsequently broke down the left, Dunk and Burn were nowhere to be seen in the box and that left Benteke free at the back post to drive a volley past Sanchez who simply fell to his knees. Unbelievable.

Still, at least we knew that Brighton had hit rock bottom in terms of woes in front of goal in 2020-21 ahead of the final game of February and the trip to West Brom, right?

Wrong. The Albion managed to set a new Premier League record at the Hawthorns by putting two penalties in the space of an hour against the frame of the goal on their way to a 1-0 defeat against opponents who had won just once at home all season.

West Brom earned three corners inside the opening 11 minutes. From the third of those, the Albion were once again woeful defensively as Conor Gallagher swung over a delivery which Kyle Bartley met inside the six yard box with a free header to give the Baggies the lead.

Gross then crashed the first spot kick of the afternoon against the bar – things really had become that bad that Brighton had even managed to turn a German into a bad penalty taker.

Referee Lee Mason took centre stage next, showing all the decisiveness of my missus in Ikea when allowing, disallowing, allowing and then finally disallowing Dunk’s quickly taken free kick.

Dunk did not hold back in his assessment of Mr Mason afterwards: “I said to the referee ‘Can I take it?’ He blew his whistle and I took it.”

“Why doesn’t he come and speak to the press like me? Never. They hide behind their bubble. I don’t think he knew what he was doing. He gave the goal. Why did he give it? I don’t know why VAR was getting involved. He lost control of the game. Fact.”

Despite attempts to put the result at the door of Mr Mason, Brighton had nobody to blame but themselves. Aaron Connolly stepped up his quest to have more haircuts than goals scored in the 2020-21 season when firing over the bar from six yards out with an open goal to aim at.

Maupay found himself in a great position eight yards out and put his shot out for a throw. And then came that second penalty, Welbeck crashing his effort against the post.

If you did not laugh, then you had to cry. Luckily, Brighton fans could see the funny side of it with two penalties missed in one hour being voted as our WAB Comedy Moment of the Season.

In their final three games of February, Brighton racked up a record reading 60 shots, 20 on target, one goal and one point – ludicrous even by the standards of the bizarre 2020-21 campaign.

And whilst we may have been laughing, the relegation zone was creeping back into view. After the 1-1 draw away at Burnley, Brighton were 10 points clear of the drop.

Following the defeat at West Brom, a Fulham win in their game in hand would have reduced that gap to one point. As February came to a close, Brighton knew that they would need a much-improved March to avoid getting sucked back into the 2020-21 relegation battle.

February 2021 record: P6 W1 D2 L3 F3 A5
Results: 1-0 v Liverpool (A), 1-1 v Burnley (A), 0-1 v Leicester (A), 0-0 v Aston Villa (H), 1-2 v Crystal Palace (H), 0-1 v West Brom (A)
League position at the end of the month: 17th
WeAreBrighton.com Player of the Month: Joel Veltman