Norwich 0-0 Brighton: Welcome to ‘Brighton should be beating teams like…’

There were several questions to come out of Norwich City 0-0 Brighton. Are the Albion now paying for their failure to sign a striker this summer? How on earth did Josh Sargent produce that miss? Is the pedestrianisation of Norwich city centre a good thing?

And most pertinently, when did Seagulls fans become the thing that we hate most in the world? A fan base who uses the “We should be beating teams like…” phrase.

Brighton supporters may have their differences, but one thing unites us like nothing else – #TeamsLikeBrighton. Whenever the Albion claim unexpected points off bigger clubs, we revel in the meltdown and arrogance that follows as opposition fans bemoan the fact that their club should be beating teams like Brighton.

Yet here we were, walking away from Carrow Road with a point which left Twitter awash with comments that we should be beating teams like Norwich.

Not only that, but there was an actual fight in the stands between Albion fans because an argument over whether we should be beating teams like Norwich got too heated.

According to one chap, the players did not deserve to be clapped off. Others disagreed and before you could say: “The temperature inside this apple turnover is over 1000 degrees, if I squeeze it, a jet of molten bramley apple will squirt out,” handbags were being drawn at dawn.

It seems as though a good eight game sequence of results has led some Brighton followers to think we now support prime Barcelona and have a divine right to turn up at places like Norwich and turn teams over rather than drawing 0-0.

That notion is of course ridiculous The Albion have not finished outside of the bottom six in the Premier League in four attempts.

When you are a club with that sort of record, any point on the road should be seen as a good point. You certainly cannot go around saying “We should be beating teams like Norwich” without looking like a complete lemon.

With this being the reaction to a draw, imagine the meltdown if Brighton had lost. That really should have been the case were it not for that extraordinary miss by Sargent.

Albion fans have expertise far beyond any others when it comes to glorious misses so it takes something spectacular to leave us describing an effort as the worse miss we’ve ever seen. Even Aaron Connolly would have blushed.

It occurred with minutes remaining in the first half when Robert Sanchez came haring from his goal in an attempt to clear, succeeding only in wiping out Lewis Dunk.

That left Sargent with the simple task of rolling the ball into an empty goal. For reasons nobody will ever know, he hit it with so little pace that Shane Duffy was able to make up 25 yards and slide the ball behind for a corner.

Norwich had other chances too. Dan Burn struggled through the opening 45 minutes but after the interval, he was a giraffe reincarnated.

Burn made two perfectly timed last ditch tackles to nick the ball from Sargent and Teemu Puki as they bore down on Robert Sanchez’s goal.

If Virgil van Dijk makes either of those, the red half of Merseyside takes a week off work to celebrate and Sky Sports News play it on loop for six months whilst a clairvoyant claims they spoke to the spirit of Bobby Moore, who said they were the best ever tackles in human history.

Brighton were not without chances of their own. Neal Maupay went down in the area when he appeared to be clipped by former Albion goalkeeper Tim Krul.

It looked to the whole world to be a penalty – and Jeff Stelling on Soccer Saturday certainly felt so if his spectacular rant was anything to go by – but after a VAR check, referee Peter Bankes decided Krul had done no wrong.

Blaming VAR for Brighton’s failure to beat a team like Norwich would provide a convenient scapegoat. Nobody in blue and white has the right to complain about VAR until at least February though after its interventions prevented the 2-1 win over Leicester becoming a 3-2 defeat at the hands of the Foxes last month.

Krul may have got lucky with the penalty but there was nothing lucky about his astonishing finger tip save from Leandro Trossard. One of the best passing moves the Albion have put together all season ended with the Vampire of Genk flashing a volley towards goal.

Somehow, Krul managed to get a touch onto the powerful strike which proved just about enough to divert it onto the cross bar. It was a fantastic stop to deny what would have been a fantastic goal.

Tariq Lamptey replaced Joel Veltman with 30 minutes remaining for his first appearance since December. Lamptey looked a little tentative and a little rusty, something to be expected after a 10 month lay off.

It might therefore be some time before we see him and Marc Cucurella flying down the flanks in tandem but still, what a sight that will be when both are going at full throttle.

Despite Norwich enjoying the better of the second half, Brighton had two chances in the final 10 minutes to ensure that it did not finish 0-0 at Carrow Road.

Another delightful passing move teed up Pascal Gross whose shot looked to be heading in until Ben Gibson deflected it away. Substitute Solly March then dazzled to set up a chance for Neal Maupay who was mere yards out and with the goal gaping.

Maupay though side footed over the bar. Nobody could quite believe how, except Sargent who could at least walk off at full time a little less embarrassed as he was no longer the only player to have produced an astonishing miss in Norwich 0-0 Brighton.

Thanks to Leicester City beating Manchester United 4-2 earlier in the day, a point from the Canaries lifted Brighton into fourth spot in the Premier League.

That is fourth from the top rather than fourth from the bottom for those who feel let down by drawing with Norwich or anything else this Albion side have achieved so far in 2021-22.

The best teams find a way to avoid defeat when they do not play at their best. Brighton did that at Carrow Road. There can be little doubt that it was one of the poorer performances of the campaign and yet it ended with a valuable point and a clean sheet to boot.

Last season, this is exactly the sort of game that Brighton would have lost. Just as they did away at West Brom and Sheffield United or home to Crystal Palace.

Progress is being made, even if some fans have got ideas above their stations that the Albion should be beating teams like Norwich.

Long-standing Brighton supporters know how this goes, anyway. The Albion way is failing to win against bottom-of-the-table Norwich before defeating Manchester City and Liverpool in the next two matches.

How many times have we seen that happen before, a disappointing result or run of form followed up by unexpected victory? It is just a shame that we can no longer take the piss out of City fans using #TeamsLikeBrighton quite so much any more…