Newcastle United 0-3 Brighton and Hove Albion

Dismal display sees the magpies early season momentum collapse to ten-man Albion.

Off the back of the pre-season momentum that the club created with the exciting arrivals of premier league proven talent, matched with an impressive dominant 2-0 win over West Ham, fans were hopeful of a result in the first game at St James’ park.

Steve Bruce named an unchanged eleven from the first game of the season after the impressive performance, however any memories of that were quickly erased after Allan Saint Maximin brought down the exciting Tariq Lamptey conceding a penalty in the first three minutes of the game, to which Neal Maupay dispatched to put the seagulls 1-0 ahead.

Any hopes of an instant response by Newcastle were quickly dismissed after Leandro Trossard picked out Neal Maupay with a cross after 7 minutes to give him the fastest premier league brace since 2012. From this, Newcastle never seemed to recover and looked shell shocked

as Brighton continued to play on the front foot and create chance after chance without any form of reply from Newcastle.

Brighton continued their dominant display into the second half, continuing to press and play high up the pitch and forcing Newcastle backwards and stopping any threat of potential momentum. However Newcastle were given a big chance to take the lead when Ryan Fraser swung a cross in to Callum Wilson who headed over the cross bar from the six yard box, however may have been put off by Lewis Dunk miss timing his header which allowed the ball to get through to Wilson.

Although instead of this chance giving Newcastle a basis to build some presence in the

game, it instead gave Brighton the impetus to create and look for a way to kill the game, with a flurry of chances following, including in the 70th minutes when Trossard once again caused the Newcastle defence issues when he struck the post with a powerful low driven attempt.

After the continued pressure Brighton then delivered the lethal blow to Bruce’s men through a brilliant finish by Connolly bending the ball into Darlow’s far right corner from the left hand side of the penalty area, ensuring Brighton deservedly took all three points back to the South Coast.

However Brighton’s near perfect away performance was slightly marred by Yves Bissouma who picked up a red card in the later stages of the game for a reckless challenge on home debutant Jamal Lewis, which was initially given as a yellow card by referee Kevin Friend, however after being advised by the VAR official to have a look at the incident himself changed his decision to send Bissouma off for violent conduct.

That being the only dampener on a perfect tactical away performance by Potters men, with Man of the Match Tariq Lamptey showing fans around the country the ability and potential that he has, and this being alongside the already exciting Ben White allowing Brighton fans to look forwards to the quality they have currently and to look at how good they can become in the future under the guidance of Graham Potter and his staff.

Although for Newcastle it gave a stark reality check, bringing the expectations of the fans back down to earth, similarly to their 5-0 loss to Leicester last season, showing the inconsistency in the side, and how defensive frailty and failure to create chances still linger within the squad despite the recent flurry of promising signings.