Match Review: Everton 1-0 Brighton

They’re a charitable bunch aren’t they, this Brighton and Hove Albion squad of 2019-20? Brighton went to Everton knowing that the more saves Maty Ryan had to make, the more money he’d donate to the Australian Bushfire Fund and so they deliberately had a first half shocker, giving the Toffees a 1-0 win but raising thousands to save kangaroos and koalas.

That’s what we reckon happened at Goodison Park anyway. Otherwise, the uncomfortable truth is that we only looked a threat against a struggling Everton side once Graham Potter introduced a 38-year-old striker who may not even have a future at the club.

Glenn Murray entered the fray with 20 minutes left to play. In that time, he saw a header superbly kept out by Jordan Pickford and then lobbed a through ball from Neal Maupay agonisingly wide.

Potter keeps saying Murray is a valued member of his squad, but the amount of game time Murray has received suggests otherwise. In December, the veteran striker featured for just 88 minutes out of a possible 540 – and that in a month in which the Albion played six times and Potter was constantly rotating his squad.

He also missed last week’s terrible 1-0 FA Cup defeat to Sheffield Wednesday – a convenient game for a player whose saleable value to the Albion will be more if he isn’t cup tied to have been absent for through a minor knock.

Murray doesn’t appear to fit the way that Potter wants to play. He thrives on balls into the box. With Potter favouring either 4-2-2-2 with no width or 3-4-3 with wing backs rather than out-and-out wingers, Murray isn’t going to get the sort of service which saw him top score in Brighton’s two previous Premier League campaigns.

Which is why he might move on this January. Clearly, Murray’s at an age where he needs regular first team football as his glittering career comes to its conclusion and nobody could begrudge him wanting a move to another club to get that.

Nottingham Forest. Reading. Queens Park Rangers. Celtic. Newcastle United Aston Villa. Tottenham Hotspur. All have been linked with a move for Murray. Even Crystal Palace are said to be interested, a transfer that the Albion could surely not facilitate for a second time.

It was bad enough when Murray fired the Eagles to promotion over us, imagine his goals keeping Palace in the Premier League as we flirted with the relegation zone? Unthinkable.

What this cameo showed is that, presuming Potter actually plays to his strengths, he does still have something to offer – especially on an afternoon when we looked so toothless in attack.

Letting Murray go when we are desperately short of firepower would be a bolder move than the Iranian military firing a missile at a random plane leaving Tehran airport.

If the trip to Goodison Park told us that Brighton should keep Murray, then it also showed us that they should be doing everything in their power to make Aaron Mooy a permanent member of this wildlife-loving squad.

Mooy was missing with an injury picked up in training and without his guile and creativity, the Albion had nothing. The case that Leandro Trossard is better as an impact sub than a starter was strengthened and Alireza Jahanbakhsh’s two goals in two games suddenly looked like the fluke that we hope they’re not.

Those two flanked Maupay as part of a rejigged front three as Potter reverted to 3-4-3. Before kick off, it appeared to be the logical thing to do; allowing Bernardo to come in as a wing back for the injured Dan Burn, reuniting Dale Stephens and Davy Propper as a midfield two and giving a bit more steel to the defence by including Shane Duffy in the back line against one of his former clubs.

Albion fans everywhere appeared happy with it. Fast forward 45 minutes though and the score was Everton 1-0 Brighton. Even those treasured possession statistics that Seagulls supporters have busted out with increasing excitement to justify how well we’ve played in defeat couldn’t help paint a pretty picture – we managed just 37% possession in the first half.

Brighton could have been more than 1-0 down to Everton as well. A lot more in fact. Ryan pulled off a string of stops to keep Everton at bay, Duffy headed anything that came towards him and the hosts really should have had a penalty when Lewis Dunk pulled back Theo Walcott after the Albion captain had gotten himself into a bit of a state.

VAR took a look but ruled no foul. Had Walcott gone to ground though rather than staying on his feet and getting a shot away, referee David Coote would surely have awarded a spot kick.

Walcott’s honesty saved us in much the same way as Martin Montoya’s spared Palace last month when he didn’t go down in the Eagles box in the first half at Selhurst Park.

There’s something about Goodison that seems to result in Dunk’s performance levels dropping markedly. He had a bit of a shocker last year in front of Gareth Southgate and if the England manager was watching this one, then he wouldn’t have been that inclined to call Dunk up for the Three Lions’ March fixtures with Denmark and Italy.

The defending for Everton’s goal was a case in point. Yes, it was an excellent finish from Richarlison, who danced twisted and turned in the box before bending into the bottom corner.

But the chance was still made far too easy by the cumbersome Brighton back line. Montoya wasn’t close enough to Lucas Digne, allowing the Frenchman the chance to cross.

Duffy was then far too slow to get to the ball, going to ground as he was beaten by the nimble Richarlison. Adam Webster had a chance to recover the situation but he too couldn’t react quick enough to clear while Dunk’s role involved simply watching proceedings whilst stood in the middle of the goal.

Potter ditched 3-4-3 at the break in favour of 4-2-3-1. To make this work, we were treated to some Mark McGhee-style positional bingo.

Webster went to right back, Montoya left back with Bernardo playing alongside Stephens as the two holding players. Propper was pushed into the number 10 role, Trossard and Jahanbakhsh went either side and Maupay was left as the lone forward.

Within seven minutes of the restart, the Albion had their first attempt on goal. Webster stepped out of defence and played a delightful 25 yard cross field pass over to Trossard on the left.

A couple of stepovers later and Trossard had found his way past Djibril Sidibé, cut inside and crashed an effort against Pickford’s bar.

Brighton introduced Steve Alzate and Pascal Gross in a double change for Jahanbakhsh and Montoya but still Everton were the better side and nearly added to their 1-0 lead on two occasions.

Webster was caught dozing at the back post, allowing Bernard to tee up Dominic Calvert-Lewin but his effort from point blank range was superbly saved by Ryan. Ryan then denied the same player from a powerful one-on-one after the Everton striker escaped Dunk.

Everton did get the ball in the back of the net after more abysmal Brighton defending but the score stayed 1-0 thanks to VAR. This time, a corner came over which Duffy, Propper and Dunk all watched sail to the back post.

Digne headed it back across goal where Calvert-Lewin was completely free. Webster’s attempts to clear merely saw him nearly kick Calvert-Lewin in the head, but that proved to be enough to put off the Everton striker, who as a result hit the ball in with his hand in panic about Webster potentially decapitating him. Any other body part would have doubled the hosts’ advantage.

Potter then threw Murray on for Stephens. This led to the pathetic scene of some supporters in the away end actually cheering Stephens as he was replaced.

It wasn’t a day in which the travelling support covered itself in glory if truth be told. Along with Stephens’ reception, there were one group of young supporters who must have had one too many fizzy drinks on the way up as they proclaimed throughout the afternoon that Stephens had autism, Trossard was a Belgian c**t and followed all that by screaming about the IRA when Seamus Coleman came on for Everton.

Now as far as we’re aware, Coleman has never professed to liking the IRA – unlike our own Mr Duffy. We’d love to see them shout “IRA c**t” in Shane’s face in Molly Malone’s one Saturday night to see how far it gets them.

Murray’s two chances came after that, Pickford’s excellence and a matter of centimetres denying the Albion what would have been an undeserved point.

Potter talked afterwards about the difference between the two sides being a moment of quality, and in a sense he was right. Richarlison is a forward who cost £40m – and a finish like the one he produced is what that sort of money buys you.

But that doesn’t excuse the lacklustre defending, the piss poor first half or the fact we hardly created a meaningful chance before Murray came on.

A much better performance will be needed next week against Aston Villa. And then against Plucky Little Bournemouth. And then against Watford. And then against West Ham United.

Just four points separates those four opponents and the Albion in the Premier League table. We’re approaching crunch time, where Brighton’s season will be defined by what happens over the course of the next 360 minutes.

At Goodison, the players did their bit to save animals in Australia. Now, they need to do their bit to help save Brighton’s top flight status.