[Albion] Brighton & Hove Albion vs Liverpool *** Official Match Thread ***

[Mackenzie]

That's possible the worst I've seen him play at the Amex.

Did coming back and playing against us get to him. He's much better than today's performance

I don’t think he wanted to leave, I think it was down to his dad.

 

[swindonseagull]

Btw great to see Welbeck fitness holding up. Longest spell of availability he's had since he joined..with Lallana and Milner both injured and eating a large chunk of the wage bill no doubt at least one of the 30 somethings is earning his salt

Lallana was on the bench so obviously fit.

 

[London Irish]

Yep. Open play not his style it seems

But he has the best movement of any of our forwards, so creative. We'll have to be patient on the open play goals

 

[Bodian]

Earlier in the season Dunks came off his back onto his elbow, that was given. Have the rules changed?

No, they haven't. Pretty much universally accepted that the one against Dunk was wrongly awarded.

 

[bhafc99]

I want to see that Gross Baleba midfield stuck with now, feck rotation

What about Wee Billy? Still deserves a place for me.

The one I’m least convinced by is Dahoud.

 

[Stato]

I want to see that Gross Baleba midfield stuck with now, feck rotation

It's horses for courses. Baleba' s athleticism was great in a game where there was a lot of space. Gilmour' s passing is more valuable against teams that need picking apart.

 

[aolstudios]

That's possible the worst I've seen him play at the Amex.

Did coming back and playing against us get to him. He's much better than today's performance

Yep. Very quiet

 

[Littlemo]

I want to see that Gross Baleba midfield stuck with now, feck rotation

Tbh I want to see Gross, Baleba and Gilmour in midfield. I think we’d be massively more solid and powerful.

 

[birthofanorange]

Before the match, I would happily have taken a point, given how both us and Liverpool have been playing, recently.
Three points could so easily have gone either way, today, and I have no qualms about the result.
Not only that, it was an entertaining match, with no nasty niggles/time-wasting/etc., which made a welcome change.
Oh, and Liverpool still haven't beaten us for a while....which is nice.

 

[dwayne]

That's possible the worst I've seen him play at the Amex.

Did coming back and playing against us get to him. He's much better than today's performance

He was absolutely rubbish when he first joined us. Had some shockers early on.

 

[maltaseagull]

Earlier in the season Dunks came off his back onto his elbow, that was given. Have the rules changed?

Different interpretation depending on the team perhaps?

 

[Bodian]

I don't think their first was poor defending, they carved through us, playing quick incisive 1 touch passes. Was a good goal.

Second however was an absolute gimme caused by poor decision making, and a poor unnecessary pass by Verbruggen.

I think the point is - we just gave them the ball under no pressure to start their move, and then Dunk was well out of position.

So Baleba gets booked for exactly the same offence that Gravenberch just got away with...

I think the ref thought Baleba's was almost premeditated. He had just stood up from cramp, there was no way he was going to outpace their guy - so he basically decided to foul him instead. Fair enough i thought.

 

[Garyoldfan]

Pedro is not a natural goalscorer I knew that before todays game, and it was rammed home again today I’m afraid. Good player though.

 

[Garyoldfan]

Yes and no, i think. Mistakes are part and parcel of being a goalkeeper and being a young player for sure. A goalkeeper's mistakes are nearly always more costly by the nature of the position too so I don't want to come across as being overly critical of him.

However, two in two games is worrying from a first team perspective. We can't afford to keep giving soft goals away(which is obviously true for the rest of the team too). It puts us under a lot of pressure and stops us getting the points and rewards the rest of our play deserves.

If Ver Bruggen is not consistent enough yet then he needs time out of the team. I realise the counter of that is you can't get consistency without playing. In this case I don't think that's true, the kind of mistakes he's made are correctable with training.

It could of course just be a blip that looks worse because it's the start of his time with us so he doesn't have a large body of work to fall back on. I don't know which it is so will go with what the pro's decide. It just concerns me a little at the moment.

Gross was as much at fault for that goal but it wasn’t a great ball to him.

 

[AlexBH]

Mixed feelings today. We played some great football at times and gave away two poor goals and missed a glorious chance at the end to win it. First half was very good, controlled the game, got ahead and conceded two poor goals against the run of play in quick succession. Second half more even, Liverpool had their spell on on top. Did well to come from behind to get a point, but take out the bad defending and we’d be in the top 4. Still a lot to play for this season and a lot to positive about.

 

[Beach Hut]

were loose

Wrong Dear Friend, were draw

 

[shibainu]

It seemed that Mitoma and TAA were negating each other? Did not see many threatening long passes from TAA.

 

[dadams2k11]

See post 441 .

 

[Cordwainer]

Thought Igor was having a good steady game..shame he’s tweaked something..looked gutted to go off.

 

[Colonel Mustard]

I mean this in the most pleasant way possible, but that’s a really patronising post.

It has nothing to do with his past and he’s always seemed like a lovely guy. My opinion though, is based on watching him play for us. We’ve got consistently worse defensively since he’s come into the team. We concede more goals - that’s a fact. Part of that is style - we score more too. But for me, he doesn’t do many of the basics right. He’s not dominant, the defenders in front of him seem to be consistently making more mistakes which is probably a result of his total lack of communication, and worst of all he never makes saves beyond the basic. And I’d argue that he fails to make saves that I would expect most Premier League keepers to make - they don’t go down as errors but when you watch them you think “a good keeper saves that comfortably”.

Anyways, it’s preference. I accept our manager prefers his goalkeepers to do certain things well and therefore rates Steele, often at the expense of other goalkeeping qualities, but I don’t prefer that type of goalkeeper and watching him doesn’t fill me with any confidence. Watching us defend over the past 6 months makes me question whether the defence has faith in him too.

But, and this is the key point, I want all our players to do well as I support our club and want us to succeed. So when I’m at games, I would encourage Steele as much as possible. But he’s going to have to improve quite drastically for my opinion to change because I really don’t think he’s good enough.

And that is a horribly patronising sentence! Faux sincerity. Condescending.