Brighton & Hove Albion 2 Leicester City 1
The Seagulls avenged two awful recent results against the Foxes with a scintillating and no doubt controversial win at the Amex.
A minute’s applause was held for former England international Jimmy Greaves who died earlier in the day.
Not long into the game, news filtered around the stands that John Challis, the actor who played Boycie in Only Fools and Horses, had also passed away during the day.
Leicester dominated the early exchanges, with Youri Tielemans and Jamie Vardy causing Albion a few headaches, while Harry Barnes provided some width that gave Albion full back Joel Veltman all kinds of problems, seeing the Dutchman booked on 23 minutes.
Albion had a few chances but first Danny Welbeck then Leandro Trossard failed to fire home.
Adam Lallana also had a good chance after dinking one way, only to fire his effort awry.
Albion went ahead from a hotly disputed penalty. Jannick Vestergaard was adjudged to have cleared Trossard’s corner with his arm.
Leicester argued that Maupay was dragging Vestergaard down. After a good five minutes spent consulting his assistant and VAR, referee Stuart Attwell awarded the penalty and Maupay sent Kasper Schmeichel the wrong way to put Albion 1-0 in front.
Despite the five minutes spent on the VAR, Attwell added on only two minutes at the end of the half.
Just before half time Yves Bissouma jarred his knee in a tackle with Barnes and had to be helped off at the break.
Early in the second half Vardy had a great chance to level for Leicester after good work from newly introduced substitute Ademola Lookman but the effort went wide.
Not long after, Albion won a free kick with the Leicester defenders Boubakary Soumare and Vestergaard seemingly preoccupied with Dunk and Duffy. Trossard sent in a pinpoint delivery for Danny Welbeck to glance Brighton into a 2-0 lead.
Schmeichel, already disgruntled at the earlier penalty, looked particularly angered and the North Stand faithful were delighted by his agitation.
But you should never write off the former Premier League champions and current FA Cup holders. Ten minutes later, after a great centre by Tielemans, Vardy pulled one back for the Foxes.
Albion had an opportunity to increase nab a third after Welbeck was fouled on the edge of the area, but Bissouma’s effort was deflected over.
By 7o minutes Leicester, despite being a goal behind, were firmly in charge with Tielemans running the show.
On 67 minutes Lookman bundled the ball home from close range, for what looked like a Leicester equaliser, but assistant ref Simon Long eventually raised his flag and after an age VAR decreed that Harvey Barnes was active, offside and impeding Robert Sanchez’s view.
Enock Mwepu replaced Solly March but on initial evidence the “computer” might need rebooting.
Barnes linked well with Lookman and saw an effort flash across Albion’s goalmouth. The same combination then saw the former force Sanchez to pull off an acrobatic save.
Albion tried to counter several times but were thwarted by either Soumare or the latterly introduced Timothy Castagne.
The big talking point, however, was the Foxes’ second disallowed goal, almost identical to the first disallowed effort.
The already booked Wilfred Ndidi stooped to head home James Maddison’s corner only for assistant ref Long to flag again and VAR again to consider Barnes to be offside and active in front of Sanchez and so another Leicester goal was chalked off.
In an electrically charged Amex atmosphere Albion held on for all three points and currently sit in fourth place in the Premier League. They will stay there until at least next Saturday and play the old enemy Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park on Monday 27 September.
The Seagulls have never been higher this far into a season, having banked 12 points from four wins out of five. They are currently occupying the Champions League qualification places when, even as recently as 2008, they were in the League One relegation zone.
As Boycie might say: “I didn’t know you were good at maths!”
Although Albion fans might be thinking, is my passport in date?
