Brighton and Hove Albion 1 Fulham 1
A last-minute equaliser deprived Brighton of a win in their opening fixture of the Premier League season at home to Fulham this afternoon (Saturday 16 August).
Rodrigo Muniz left Seagulls fans devastated as he fired in a corner from Harry Wilson at close range in the sixth minute of stoppage time.
Albion skipper Lewis Dunk got a head to the corner but the ball fell to the Brazilian whose confident finish levelled the score.
Brighton looked to have landed all three points, having taken the lead 10 minutes into the second half when Matt O’Riley scored from the spot. The Fulham goalkeeper Bernd Leno went the right way but had no chance.
Referee Sam Barrott showed no hesitation in awarding the penalty after Sander Berge brought down Georginio Rutter in the box.
Yankuba Minteh had a goal disallowed after four minutes of a fairly evenly matched encounter in which Brighton looked – just – to be the better side.
There was nothing wrong as Minteh put the ball in the net but the ref immediately signalled for the video assistant referee (VAR).
The verdict was that Carlos Baleba, who started the move, had been unable to keep the ball in play during the build up.
And still inside the first 10 minutes, Fulham appealed for a penalty after 18-year-old midfielder Josh King tumbled while trying to dispossess Jan Paul van Hecke. The defender was furious. A VAR check found no foul.
In the 15th minute Baleba, on the edge of the box, sent a rebound soaring over the bar – and a few moments later, as he broke forward again, he was felled by Joachim Andersen.
King and Baleba had quite the afternoon of it. Manchester United might be interested in Brighton’s 21-year-old Cameroon midfielder but King, an England U19 international, showed plenty of promise too.
For Brighton, Kaoru Mitoma, O’Riley and Rutter all had chances – and after Albion went ahead, Minteh and Diego Gomez both had solid shots while Gruda missed late on.
The hosts could and should have bagged a second. Instead, both sides battled out a thrilling contest, with the final word going to Muniz.
Fulham had two other penalty appeals – one of them after Baleba barged defender Calvin Bassey and the other when Yasin Ayari appeared to catch King – but Barrott waved both appeals away.
The ref booked three players from each side, with Mitoma, Ferdi Kadioglu and Gomez all picking up yellow cards in the second half. Bassey, Tom Cairney and Muniz were the Fulham players cautioned.
Before kick-off, there was a minute’s silence for the Liverpool footballer Diogo Jota and his brother Andre Silva, who died in a car crash in Spain last month.
And moments before the end of the match today, Jota’s former Anfield team-mate James Milner, wearing the number 20 shirt in his memory, came on in place of Albion’s goal scorer O’Riley.
