Brighton 3-2 Tottenham (Minteh 48′, Rutter 58′, Welbeck 66′ | Johnson 23′, Maddison 37′)
AMEX STADIUM — At half-time, this looked the unlikeliest of possible outcomes. Brighton had been overrun, their much-discussed high defensive line as flimsy as advertised. But they hauled themselves out of the hole of a two-goal deficit despite the absence of last season’s top scorer, Joao Pedro, and arguably their best defender in Jan Paul van Hecke, through injury, and showed that they still have talent – and will to win – to spare.
Fabian Hurzeler denied that any tactical wizardry on his part had made the difference and preferred to praise his team’s comeback.
“It was the players’ game in the second half,” he said.
“The intensity to win the personal duels, to be ruthless and have more ball-winning in their half, that’s what we were missing in the first half.
“I’m really proud how they reacted. They took responsibility and showed personality. We have great characters in the team.”
It helped that Destiny Udogie miskicked horribly as he tried to deal with a cross by the dangerous Kaoru Mitoma only three minutes into the restart and Yankuba Minteh drove the loose ball home.
After 58 minutes Georginio Rutter took Mitoma’s pass and sidestepped both Udogie and Micky van de Ven before left-footing low past Guglielmo Vicario.
And finally, in the 65th minute, Rutter showed more desire to reach the ball that any one of three opponents, somehow looping it back across goal for the unmarked Danny Welbeck to head in and spark raucous celebrations tinged with delighted shock.
Tottenham had arrived in Sussex on a run of five successive wins in all competitions, having apparently found a blend that worked even in the absence of captain Son Heung-min. They were playing a side that looked vulnerable to speedy attackers, they took a two-goal lead by the interval, and it could have been more. And then they collapsed.
Spursy? That will doubtless be thrown at them. Tired? Perhaps. Complacent? Manager Ange Postecoglou seemed to think so. But this aberration at the Amex still defies analysis.
The simple explanation would include individual errors, coupled with a drop in intensity that might be blamed on their midweek match in Budapest. They were 3-2 down after 66 minutes, which, in theory, offered plenty of time to salvage at least a point. But it never looked on.
They had had few problems puncturing Brighton’s naive high line in the opening 45 minutes. But then few sides should be as expert as Tottenham at dismantling the Brighton system, having had their own difficulties last season when trying to play something like it themselves.
They went ahead after 23 minutes as James Maddison robbed Rutter and Brennan Johnson timed his run perfectly to sweep home Dominic Solanke’s pass. It was the sixth successive match in which the Wales forward has scored.
Then Maddison mishit a shot that somehow found its way in anyway under Bart Verbruggen’s gloves. But Udogie erred twice as Brighton levelled, and the Spurs defence had a collective failure of desire to clear before Welbeck headed the decider.
Postecoglou appeared almost shell-shocked afterwards.
“We didn’t do what you need to do at this level, the basics of the game,” he said, almost in a whisper.
“It was unacceptable. You’re not going to win every game but that’s the first time since I came here that we’ve lost in that manner.
“We should have put the game to bed, but I’ve got to deal with what happened in the second half. There’s a certain level of competitiveness you need to show and we didn’t. That’s probably the most disappointing loss we’ve had since I’ve been here. We didn’t do the very basics. I need to address that.”