Aston Villa picked up three points with a 2-0 win away to Brighton, which meant the Seagulls have now sustained three successive defeats. Goals in each half scored by Matty Cash and Ollie Watkins sealed the victory.
Kick off was delayed until 3.30 at the AMEX stadium due to traffic issues on the M23, but that didn’t stop the visitors from scoring first after Matty Cash’s strike from the outside the box nestled in the bottom left corner, against the run of play.
Cash took his shirt off to reveal a ‘stay strong’ message to Poland team-mate Tomasz Kedziora and his family, who are stranded in the Ukraine capital, picking up a booking for the gesture.
Alexis Mac Allister had the chance to pull the home side level soon after but chose power over placement and his effort clipped the bar on the way over from 12 yards.
Ollie Watkins extended Villa’s lead after he got on the end of Tyrone Mings’ lofted pass over the Brighton defence and slotted home with his left foot.
John Brookes oversaw today’s game, his third in the Premier League so far, and handed out a total of nine yellow cards over the course of the game. Steven Gerrard said: “I didn’t think there were any bad tackles in the game, it was two sides competing to win.”
Neil Maupay had a chance to pull one back for Brighton after he cut inside Ezri Konsa, but Emiliano Martinez dived to the right and kept hold of the ball to keep the score at 2-0.
Brighton enjoyed far more possession than Villa finding space in behind their full backs but were unable to trouble Martinez much with just one shot on target in 90 minutes.
Tim Iroegbunam was Steven Gerrard’s final change, replacing Coutinho, to make his Aston Villa debut.
The Aston Villa boss was pleased with his side’s performance. He said: “The important thing for us is to take the confidence and belief from today’s game and take it into next week.”
Graham Potter believed his side were better today than last week against Burnley. He said: “We are disappointed with the result but not as disappointed with the performance.”
Potter added: “Sometimes in football these things happen, to win a game in the Premier League, you need them to go your way and today they didn’t.”
