WeAreBrighton.com 2018-19 Season Review: September
September 2018 was the month of the Brighton comeback as twice in as many games, Chris Hughton’s side rallied from two goals down to take a share of the spoils.
The first of those was against big spending Fulham at the Amex. The Cottagers had forked out over £100m on new players in their first Premier League season for five years and it looked like money well spent as they surged into a two goal lead inside of an hour.
Summer arrival Andre Schurrle opened the scoring two minutes before half time after latching onto summer signing Jean Michael Serri’s beautiful pass.
£22m man Aleksandar Mitrovic doubled that advantage on the hour mark after a horrific cock up from Lewis Dunk. Given how heavily the Albion were linked with Mitrovic last season, it was inevitable he would score against us and when he did, it looked like it was curtains.
The Albion had actually dominated the early exchanges until Pascal Gross did the most un-German like thing since Germany went out of the group stage at the World Cup two months previously by missing a penalty.
There would be another spot kick to come but before that, Glenn Murray coolly sloted under the body of Marcus Betinelli in the Fulham goal for 2-1.
When Mitrovic inexplicably decided to attempt to catch the ball inside his own box under absolutely no pressure, Murray was given the chance to equalise from the spot and he duly did, keeping a cool, calm and slightly balding head to beat Betinelli and earn a 2-2 draw.
Afterwards, all the talk in the bars around the Amex was of a point gained or two points dropped? It was a bit of both really depending on your viewpoint. Given we were 2-0 behind with 65 minutes, it was a point gained.
But look at the game overall and it was hard not to see it as two points dropped – especially given the number of uncharacteristic errors the Albion made. Sadly, by the end of the season such mistakes weren’t uncharacteristic at all.
There was no question that the 2-2 draw in the next fixture away at Southampton was a point gained. Brighton were dire in the first half to the point where we wished we’d accidentally turned up to St Mary’s 24 hours late for the Dinner with Ed Miliband event the stadium was hosting the following day – watching the former Labour leader struggle his way through three courses would have been much more entertaining than seeing Dale Stephens gift the ball to Southampton or Solly March look like a bloke who’d won a cornflake competition to play.
Murray hardly touched the ball in the first half as Chris Hughton had very clearly set his stall out for a draw. Naturally, this invited wave upon wave of Saints pressure and goals from Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and a Danny Ings penalty after a clumsy tackle from Gaetan Bong put the hosts 2-0 ahead.
Shane Duffy soon pulled one back with a header from an Anthony Knockaert free kick to set up a tense last 20 minutes. The Albion – or to be precise, Jurgen Locadia – looked like they’d blown their chances of picking up a point when missing two glorious chances.
The first came when the Dutch striker ran at the defence with options left, options right and a clear sight of goal, at which point he fell over his own leg.
He then failed to connect to a Bong cross when brilliantly placed, leading some to speculate that he could actually be the ghost of Craig Davies come back to haunt us. Still, his latest track on iTunes was due for release in a couple of weeks, which was the important thing.
It was as late as the 94th minute when referee Anthony Taylor gave the Albion a lifeline. Mr Taylor spotted a foul that virtually nobody else in the ground did on Duffy in the box and awarded a 91st minute penalty.
It wasn’t a great spot kick from Murray as it went straight down the middle but it fooled Alex McCarthy in the Saints goal and Murray had his 98th goal in a Brighton shirt and Brighton were heading back along the A27 with a point.
The home game with Tottenham Hotspur saw the Albion gift their opponents yet another two goal headstart but on this occasion, Spurs proved to have too much quality for there to be a chance of a third rescued point in as many games.
Mauricio Pochettino’s team arrived at the Amex having lost their previous three games in a row and with a cloud over them. Not only was their new stadium massively over running, but they were also having to abandon the much-vaunted cheese room from the facility.
They also turned up with only their third choice goalkeeper available. Michael Vorm was injured while Hugo Lloris remained sidelined with a hangover from the infamous night he was caught drink driving his car around London at 5mph while covered in sick.
That meant that Paulo Gazzaniga, a 26-year-old with 20 games in League Two at Gillingham and 21 appearances over six years with Southampton was making only his second start for Spurs between the posts.
The Albion should’ve made it their mission to test him as much as possible, yet once again Hughton was far too respecting of the opposition with Gazzinga not having one shot to save in the first half as Spurs racked up 79% possession.
They took the lead through a Harry Kane penalty three minutes before half time after Murray had decided to block a free kick with his hand. That was despite the fact that the ball was going to be blocked by the face of Davy Propper.
Spurs added their second with 14 minutes remaining. Erik Lamela broke forward with the ball to find Danny Rose, at which point Yves Bissouma was either worryingly unaware that Lamela was continuing his run or just lazy in tracking him.
As a result, the Argentinian winger was picked out by Rose on the edge of the box from where he swept the ball low and hard past Ryan. Cue 10,000 Albion supporters abandoning the Amex, probably in the hope of getting home in time to perve over Ashley Roberts on Strictly Come Dancing.
Those who did leave missed Anthony Knockaert’s late consolation. The eventual winner of our WeAreBrighton.com September Player of the Month award latched onto a 70 yard hoof up the pitch from Duffy, collecting the ball and cutting inside before producing a smart finish past Gazzaniga.
There was good news in the aftermath of that Spurs defeat as the Albion announced the appointment of Dan Ashworth as their new Technical Director.
The man credited with transforming the England national set up from laughing stock to world champions across multiple age groups would leave his post with the FA later in the year to begin work at the Amex with the deal being quitea coup for Tony Bloom and Paul Barber to have pulled off.
The month came to an end away against the eventual champions, Manchester City. It was a case of damage limitation at the Etihad Stadium and in that regard, losing 2-0 was seen as a decent result.
Three times in 13 months we’d now faced City with the aggregate score standing at 7-1 to the Citizens. Pep Guardiola’s side could rack up that scoreline against plenty of teams in a single game.
Both of City’s goals came on the counter attack. From Knockaert losing possession inside the City half, it took just eight seconds for the hosts to sweep up the other end and make it 1-0 with Bernardo Silva, Sergio Aguero, Leroy Sane and Raheem Sterling all involved.
The second took slightly longer at 11 seconds from Locadia heading it forward to nobody other than John Stones who was situated 30 yards away from Ederson’s goal.
Stones found Aguero who chested to David Silva. He passed back to Aguero who skipped away from Bissouma and Propper as if they are ghosts. Aguero then went straight past Dunk as if he were a mere shadow, before playing a pass to Sterling who knocks it straight back to Aguero to beat Maty Ryan.
Pep Guardiola’s side never really needed to get out of second gear to get their three points. For the Albion, they would’ve been glad to see the back of a horror run of fixtures which had seen them play the previous season’s top four in their first seven games.
Given those fixtures, five points seemed like a decent return from the opening two months of the campaign. With no fixtures against any of the big six scheduled in October or November, expectations were high that we’d soon be pushing up the Premier League table. The next month wasn’t to disappoint in that regard.
September 2018 record: P4 W0 D2 L2 F5 A8
Results: 2-2 v Fulham H, 2-2 v Southampton A, 1-2 v Spurs H, 0-2 v Manchester City A
League position at the end of the month: 14th
WeAreBrighton.com Player of the Month: Anthony Knockaert
