Solly March voted WAB March 2023 Brighton Player of the Month

March 28, 2023March 28, 2023 WeAreBrighton.com 0 Comments

So much for expecting this to be a close run thing. Solly March was voted as WAB Brighton Player of the Month for March 2023 in an absolute landslide.

The winger received nearly 60 percent of the vote in a poll which we had tried to claim was the most difficult of the season to call.

That either says that the good guys at WAB know nothing about football, or March was so superb as to have been head and shoulders above all his teammates despite their own fine performances. It is probably a mix of both.

March scored three times through the month named after him. One of those went down as an own goal away at 1996 Coca Cola Cup runners up The Leeds United, but we felt it was his goal and Soccerbase agrees with it listed as belonging to March.

Any Albion player who scores a winner against Crystal Palace has his reputation instantly enhanced. Brighton were nowhere near their best when facing the Eagles and so it fell to March to grab the only goal of the game, securing a first Seagulls win against their arch enemy in over four years.

There was an extra amount of enjoyment garnered from the fact it was March scoring in the 15th minute of March 15th.

He saved his best goal of the month for last with a fantastic diving header from a Adam Webster cross late on in the 5-0 FA Cup quarter final win over Grimsby Town.

The only disappointment for Solly March in March 2023 was that he did not receive the England call up his form deserved.

Okay, so he should not be starting for the Three Lions over Bukayo Saka. But March must be the second most in-form right sided forward in the Premier League right now. His omission by Gareth Southgate was strange to say the least.

Kaoru Mitoma has been the dominant force in WAB Player of the Month polls since the winter break. Having missed out on the top three in the February award, he was back on the podium as runner up to March in March.

In most of Mitoma’s Premier League outings through the month, he was double marked. Grimsby even went so far as to triple mark him.

And yet that could not stop a return of two goals and three assists. Mitoma scored in the 4-0 home win over West Ham United with a sliding finish at the far post. He then notched against the Mariners via a heavy deflection.

He added one assist in each of the Albion’s three league wins, the best of which was a pinpoint cross onto the head of Alexis Mac Allister to open the scoring at Elland Road.

Just 0.72 percent separated Mitoma in second with Joel Veltman in third. Veltman was an early introduction from the bench against West Ham when Tariq Lamptey limped off injured inside the opening 10 minutes.

The dependable Dutchman made the most of the opportunity, scoring the second Albion goal after finding himself completely unmarked from a corner six yards out.

His best performance of March however was easily his pocketing of Wilfried Zaha when Palace visited the Amex.

The Eagles’ talisman has caused plenty of woe for Albion full backs down the years, including those as good as Bruno and Wayne Bridge.

On this occasion, Zaha had zero impact such was the job Veltman did on him. It was a masterclass in defending for a player who remains criminally underrated even into his third season with the Albion.