Burnley vs Brighton, match report: Brighton quickly off the mark but then pay penalty

There are just two points separating the top five in the Championship

Bobby Zamora scores for Brighton in the first minute of play (Reuters)

The game was four minutes old, both teams had scored and many may have wondered what on earth the result might be after an hour and a half of this frenzy.

The answer was 1-1 because following Bobby Zamora’s goal after 58 seconds and Andre Gray’s reply, less and less happened. Had this been a Western, it would have begun with a furious saloon-bar shoot-out before John Wayne and Gary Cooper spent the rest of the film discussing cattle quotas.

Brighton are still the only unbeaten side in the Football League and, although they did not overtake Hull at the top of the Championship, this might prove a valuable point.

Burnley are six months out of the Premier League and are armed with its parachute payments. It is almost two months since they were last beaten. Brighton have not experienced top-flight football in 32 years and seven of their last 10 matches have been drawn.

There are just two points separating the top five in the Championship and as their manager, Chris Hughton, pointed out, Brighton are the only team you would not expect to see in that group.

When the first minute was up, it seemed it might be very easy for them. Tomer Hemed met the first cross of the game with a shot that was driven into the ground and struck the top of Tom Heaton’s crossbar. Zamora reacted more quickly to the rebound than Tendayi Darikwa, and Brighton were ahead.

Play had not advanced much more when Burnley drew level as Lewis Dunk not only held Michael Keane’s shirt but almost pulled it off. His team-mate, Ben Mee, heard it rip. Given the plummeting temperatures, that alone might have produced a straight red. The referee, Simon Hooper, awarded only a spot-kick that Andre Gray converted with a short swing of his boot.

Hughton did not argue with the award while pointing out that, if the letter of the law was adhered to on shirt-pulling, football would be littered with penalties. The Burnley manager, Sean Dyche, was more emphatic. “I was standing 65 yards away and I could see Keane’s back. If the shirt is being pulled off your back, it’s usually a penalty.”

Thereafter, Burnley played the kind of neat, passing football they insisted on during last season’s vain struggle against relegation while Brighton were more direct. But for a fine save from David Stockdale, Rouwen Hennings might have scored his first goal for Burnley since his move from Karlsruhe.

The two best chances to inflict Brighton’s first defeat since they were beaten by Watford in April fell to Scott Arfield. One shot flew past Stockdale’s left-hand post while the other, after a fabulous pull-back from Gray, skidded past the right.

The game fizzled out with Joey Barton being given, to his manager’s surprise, the man of the match award. “They always get it wrong,” said Dyche. “It was Ben Mee by a mile.”

Burnley (4-4-2): Heaton; Darikwa, Duff, Keane, Mee; Boyd, Barton, Jones, Arfield; Hennings (Long, 61) ,Gray. Substitutes not used Gilks (gk), Ward, Kightly, Taylor, Lowton, Long, Marney.

Brighton & Hove Albion (4-4-2): Stockdale; Bruno, Dunk, Greer, Rosenior; March, Kayal, Stephens, Murphy; Hemed (Manu, 83), Zamora (Forster-Caskey, 64). Substitutes not used Maenpaa (gk), Goldson, Holla, Chicksen, Akindayini.

Referee S Hooper (Wiltshire).