Sunderland 0-2 Brighton & Hove Albion: result and report

Report

## Brighton & Hove Albion win a match they finished a man down

Brighton & Hove Albion won 2-0 away to Sunderland, even though they spent more than half an hour with ten men. That makes this a stronger away win than a routine two-goal margin suggests.

Maxim De Cuyper opened the scoring on 53 minutes, set up by Pascal Groß. Four minutes later Pascal Struijk was sent off, so the visitors had to protect a one-goal lead with a man down. They still added a second in the third minute of stoppage time, when Jaouen Hadjam scored from Georginio Rutter's pass.

Where the real chances came from

The xG was almost level, 0.99 to 0.98. However, the clearer openings belonged to Brighton & Hove Albion. They created five big chances to Sunderland's one and took 11 shots to five.

They also missed three of those big chances, so the margin could have been wider. Each side hit the woodwork once, which means neither can point to bad luck as the difference.

Sunderland: plenty of the ball, little threat

Sunderland had far more of the game territorially. They had 62% of possession, 76 dangerous attacks to 28 and more key passes, 11 to eight. Their pressure also averaged more than twice that of the visitors.

Yet all that pressure produced only five shots, three of them on target. Brighton & Hove Albion made three saves and kept out every one. Nordi Mukiele was named player of the match despite the defeat. That reflects a home performance with real effort and territory behind it, but not enough cutting edge.