Has Amazon Prime had a better sight than Graham Potter jumping for joy?
Wednesday night’s trip to West Ham United kicked off a busy December period for Brighton of seven games crammed into 29 days.
Whether you watched from the London Stadium, via Amazon Prime for the first time this season, or listened along with Johnny Cantor and Warren Aspinall on BBC Radio Sussex, a meeting with the Hammers was always going to be a tough game.
It is one of those quirks of football that, despite West Ham being a quality football outfit, they had not beaten the Albion in eight previous Premier League meetings.
Make that nine now thanks to Neal Maupay and his amazing scissor kick in the final minute as it finished West Ham 1-1 Brighton.
I opted to watch this one alone, giving up my usual place on the lounge settee and instead shutting the bungalow doors to the kitchen diner area where the action was beamed live onto our 55 inch TV via Amazon.
This proved a good decision when the 89th minute rolled around as I am not sure if the already-worn springs on the settee could take the sort of reaction that Maupay’s goal might have subjected them to.
The first thing to say is that the picture quality of Amazon was absolutely superb. They had all six Wednesday night games available to watch, followed by both Thursday evening matches. A real treat if you like live football.
West Ham put on a colourful start before kick off with fireworks and a light show to support the Rainbow Laces campaign. Although impressive, it was not as good as the Rainbow Laces display we saw at the Amex against Leeds United at the weekend.
Kick off at the London Stadium was at 7:30pm. By 7:31pm, Maupay had missed the first opportunity of the evening, which I am sure gave everyone a feeling of deja vu following the frustrations of the Leeds match.
Both West Ham’s recent form and that one of the main areas of goal scoring comes from set pieces had been well discussed before the game.
It came a no surprise that moments after Maupay squandered that early chance, West Ham banged on Robert Sanchez’s goal to win an early corner.
Danger! Alarm bells immediately rang for me, as I am sure they did for other Brighton fans and even the team themselves. Over came a cracking corner taken by Pablo Fornals, whose in-swinger glanced off Tomáš Souček’s head to put the Hammers 1-0 up after only five minutes.
Brighton now had it all to do and by heck they put in a real shift which took a toll on several bodies. Albion players started dropping like flies and Graham Potter had to use his substitutes far sooner than he would have anticipated.
Jeremy Sarmiento went down first with what looked like a hamstring injury in the 12th minute. It was a real shame for him and for us Brighton supporters because this was the debut of a young talent we are all very excited about.
I am sure he has a great deal to offer and will grasp the chance to show everyone exactly what he can do and bring to the team – it is just a shame that we now have to wait a few months to see it.
Next to fall was one of our solid back three, Adam Webster. He initially went down holding his calf and having recently returned from injury, it was a real concern.
After having physios on the pitch for treatment he initially battled on, but alas had to concede to the injury a few minutes later.
Potter replaced Webster with Shane Duffy, which did at least give Brighton a stronger aerial presence to try and deal with any further West Ham set pieces.
The half time whistle went after significant time added on to cover the injuries. With the way the opening 45 minutes had gone, I felt sure that West Ham would score again before the game was out.
They did manage to put the ball in the back of the net, but it was thankfully disallowed. VAR took a very long look at what had happened before deciding to rule in the Albion’s favour.
Sanchez still had to make some excellent acrobatic saves from numerous West Ham attempts on goal. Those stops set the scene for Maupay to come through in the dying moments with that most brilliant goal to put the Albion back level.
To see Graham Potter and Billy Reid jumping for joy in the technical area was a wonderful sight. The seats in the away dugout and the terraces at the London Stadium may have taken a bashing, but at least my settee springs did not.
