Newport County 1-1 Brighton: Albion play get out of jail free card in FA Cup

Brighton & Hove Albion are into the fourth round of the FA Cup – but in having to play their get out of jail free card to scrape through on penalties after drawing 1-1 with Newport County, there were more questions raised about where the Seagulls are heading under Graham Potter.

How can the Albion hope to avoid relegation from the Premier League if Potter cannot even lead a strong side featuring his three best defenders, his best midfielder, the left wing back who has been his best player this season and his top scorer to victory over a League Two outfit?

Has the Brighton manager lost leave of his senses to think that Jason Steele is now a better goalkeeper than Maty Ryan, to the point that Potter is currently treating Ryan like something he has found on the bottom of his shoe?

What happens if Robert Sanchez is not the great goalkeeping hope everything is determined to think he is, and we end up facing half a season in a relegation battle with our options to mind the net being a rookie and a man who, for 120 minutes, made the sort of comedy errors you see at Waterhall on a Sunday morning from someone who has taken far too much MDMA the night before?

Do the players even listen to Potter? The Brighton manager said before the game that the Rodney Parade pitch – which resembled the surface of the moon after hosting a rugby game 24 hours earlier – meant that the Albion would have to change their approach.

Either he did not communicate that or the players simply ignored him. It was still sideways pass followed by sideways pass with the ball bobbling up all over the place and possession subsequently squandered on a frustratingly frequent basis.

Was this why, whenever the camera panned to Potter, he had the confused look of a man who has just opened his cupboard to discover he has run out of teabags?

Is the presence of the Lion of Judah enough to convince Brighton’s new legion of South African fans to stick with Percy Tau and his new club as they discover that this is what it is really like to support the Albion?

And most importantly of all, who was the hero who climbed a tree behind the goal to watch whilst wearing just a Brighton shirt on a freezing cold Monmouthshire evening to watch a 1-1 draw with Newport?

The first half at Rodney Parade was best summed up by the fact that the man in a tree was the highlight of a tedious 45 minutes. It was a throwback to the Albion’s early days at Withdean, when only 7,000 supporters could watch and so people would head for the nature reserve behind the South Stand to seek out a vantage point to watch Brighton battling for promotion out of Divisions Two and Three. All that was missing was the return of the Withdean Rocketman to let off a firework every time Brighton scored.

Had Rocketman made the journey to Newport, then he might have been expecting to be in for a busy evening. Potter included Lewis Dunk, Adam Webster, Ben White, Yves Bissouma, Solly March and Neal Maupay in his starting XI for Newport 1-1 Brighton, a welcome change of approach from the disdain with which he treated the FA Cup in last season’s disappointing third round exit at home to Sheffield Wednesday.

Despite the strength of the Albion team, if an alien popping down from Mars were watching then they would have struggled to pick out whether the side in amber or the side in blue were meant to be the Premier League outfit.

And with the bloke up a tree reminiscent of the Albion at Withdean, it was pretty easy to draw the conclusion based on this 120 minutes that Micky Adams’ fourth tier champions of 20 years ago would give this current Brighton team a run for their money.

That should simply not be possible based on the fact that Potter has at his disposal arguably the most talented and definitely the most expensive squad in Albion history.

Newport could have taken the lead inside of four minutes. Dunk’s shoddy backpass was the first sign that the players had not got the memo about adapting to the pitch as the Albion captain played in Padraig Among but he thankfully fluffed his lines.

Another dodgy bit of defending gave Newport their other chance of the first half. Pascal Gross hit a ludicrous 30 yard volley back to Steele, who ended up in a right mess as a result.

Steele’s initial attempt to clear simply saw the ball spoon directly up in the air. He then tried to head the ball clear as it dropped out of the sky, only to completely miss it.

Amond eventually picked up the pieces but his lob towards the empty goal was somehow kept out by a brilliant flying clearance off the line from Dunk.

Whilst Steele was struggling, his opposite number Tom King was busy keeping out a Dunk header and producing a world class reaction stop from Andi Zeqiri. Both those opportunities came from Gross corners as the Albion struggled to create anything from open play.

Remarkably, the second half was even worse than the first. Potter sent on Handsome Davy Propper to try and assert some control in midfield and he at least was able to get his foot on the ball.

Leandro Trossard also entered proceedings but it was an evening to forget him. Trossard gave the ball away 24 times from 59 touches in 57 minutes on the pitch according to the excellent Albion Analytics.

To continue the Withdean-era theme, spring cannot come soon enough for the Belgian Paul Brooker who has spent the winter months hibernating for the second season running.

Then on 70 minutes came the moment we had all been waiting for. 905 days after Brighton paid £2.5 million to Mamelodi Sundowns for his services, the Lion of Judah made his Brighton debut.

Tau looked lively during his 50 minutes, injecting some much needed pace and the willingness to actually run at the Newport defence. Early days it may be, but there was enough there to suggest he can make an impact on the Premier League – if for no other reason than he looks different to any other striker option available to the Albion.

Fingers crossed Potter does not coach Tau’s uniqueness out of him and turn him into a player whose first instinct is always to pass sideways.

Extra time was looming when March scored the goal which looked like it would break Newport hearts. Some clever play from Propper worked a little space on the edge of the box, from where March showed his teammates what can happen if you do radical things like shoot from outside the area with a left footed curler which swept past King.

The Albion now just needed to see out injury time to take their place in round four. Poor game management has been one of Brighton’s major downfalls this season as they often concede shortly after scoring, but surely they could hold onto a lead for five minutes against opponents 50 places below them in the football pyramid?

Wrong. Bernardo was introduced as a token substitute in place of March in the immediate aftermath of the goal and when he merely dangled a leg at a cross field pass when he should have been doing everything to put a foot through it, Newport had the opportunity to deliver one final ball into the box.

Still, it should have been an easy claim for Steele. He chose a bad moment to develop wrists made of margarine however and the ball went straight through him, hitting the surprised Webster and bouncing in for an own goal equaliser with just seconds remaining.

Comedyfending from Brighton and really, you had to laugh or else you would cry. Brighton now faced another 30 minutes with countless first team players on the pitch ahead of a week in which they go to Manchester City on Wednesday followed by a huge six pointer in the Ben White Derby with The Leeds United next weekend. No wonder Potter looked dazed.

Steele was the reason that extra time was taking place and in many ways, what happened to him next summed up a ridiculous evening. Never has an Albion player managed to go from villain to hero quite so quickly as the former Sunderland goalkeeper managed as once the tie finished Newport 1-1 Brighton, he saved an astonishing four penalties in the shoot out.

Nobody held out much hope when it went to penalties. It would not have been a surprise if Brighton’s first taker had run up and played a sideways pass rather than taking a shot.

That did not quite happen, but missing three spot kicks was a reminder that this Albion side have woeful composure in front of goal, even when given a free shot from 12 yards with just the goalkeeper to beat.

Maupay, Bissouma and Trossard all missed for a variety of reasons. We already know Maupay is a ghastly penalty taker; Bissouma’s run up included a shuffle which looked like he was attempting the foxtrot with Dianne Buswell; and Trossard achieved the seemingly impossible by producing an effort worse than Ryan Harley away at Millwall a decade ago.

Luckily, their blushes were spared by Steele. All four of his saves were excellent as he went full stretch the right way and got powerful body parts behind efforts from Josh Sheehan, Mickey Demetriou, Liam Shephard and Scott Bennett to keep them out.

Steele’s general goalkeeping may have been a real cause of concern and Lord knows what would happen if he had to be pitched into the relegation battle at some point over the next five months, but you cannot doubt his worth from penalties.

And so Brighton progress to round four. Potter described the night as “traumatic” and whilst a final score of Newport County 1-1 Brighton with the side sent out is hardly a result to inspire confidence ahead of a tough run of Premier League fixtures, the Albion are not the first side to (nearly) come a cropper against the Exiles.

Watford, Newcastle United, Leicester City, Middlesbrough, The Leeds United and Tottenham Hotspur have all failed to beat Newport in various cup competitions over the past four seasons.

You could even argue – given the pitch, the magic of the FA Cup and the Exiles’ reputation for giant killing – that Newport 1-1 Brighton and winning on penalties is actually a good result.

One man who might disagree? That poor bugger who spent two hours watching it from up a tree. Hopefully, he thaws out by the time the next round takes place.