Aston Villa 6 Brighton 1
Two sides met at Villa Park who have transformed their fortunes over recent seasons. If you had told both sets of fans that they would be playing each other in a season where they are both in European competition, many would not have believed you.
Brighton created the first chance of the game when Gilmour played an inventive pass over the defence to find Estupinan but the defender struggled to get the ball from under his feet and his shot was saved by Martinez.
The Seagulls’ attacking play does create a lot of goals but can leave them more open than a high security prison running work drills. This was evident as Villa sprung forward and Cash put an excellent cross into the box for Watkins to slot the ball home.
Watkins then cut inside from the left and shot, beating Steele at his near post. It was a dubious decision to give the goal as it was clear that Zaniola was stood in front of the keeper in an offside position. It went to VAR but their mantra of see no evil, hear no evil, speak to evil was evident once again.
Credit: @AVFCOfficial
Things went from bad to worse for the visitors when Diaby’s shot was parried straight back to him by Steele, an ironic name on this showing, before the midfielder’s second effort was hacked into his own net by Estupinan.
Defensively, Brighton were a shambles and more like a travelling circus. It was almost as if they were trying out for positions as match officials. Going forward, Gilmour found Veltman who headed the ball to March but the midfielder disappointingly headed over the crossbar.
Brighton started the second half on the front foot and when Pedro was played into the box, he dummied a cross to send the sliding McGinn down the shops, before his cross was blocked by Digne. As the ball came back to the Brighton player, Konsa sliced it across his own six yard box for Fati to tap in at the back post.
Both Pedro and Fati looked offside when the ball came back to them but as it came off Digne and was crossed by Konsa, with McGinn off the pitch, this made Martinez the last defender. The goal was given. If you can follow all of that maybe you can translate the Dead Sea Scrolls while you are at it.
As a Brighton attack broke down, McGinn found Watkins, who cut inside and got a left footed shot away. It took a huge deflection off the Brighton defender to beat Steele in the visitor’s goal. They added another when Ramsey bent one past Steele once again, with The Seagulls’ stopper not living up to his name today.
Unai Emery’s side rubbed salt in the wound when Douglas Luiz added a sixth in added time to make it a nightmare away trip for Robert de Zerbi’s side. He followed up Watkins’ shot which was saved by Steele.
Credit: @AVFCOfficial
The Brighton keeper seems to make saves but have an uncanny knack of parrying the ball back into the danger area which makes his initial save about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. It was a resounding win for Aston Villa but the visitors will be concerned about how easy they were to score goals against.
Gareth Southgate was in the ground watching the game, no doubt keeping an eye on the Villa and Brighton benches during each of Ollie Watkins’ goals. Fortunately for the Villa striker there were very few players on either bench eligible for an England call-up.
Unai Emery was spotted after the game, stood on the touchline, saying…….one, two, three, four, five….six Aston Villa goals ah, ah, ah, ah. Not doing much for the rumours that he and the count from Sesame Street are one in the same person.
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