A surfeit of Brighton sport
Yesterday I went first to Hove Cricket Ground and then the Amex where Brighton secured their status in the top flight.
County cricket has rather slipped under the sporting radar with atrocious weather preventing any result then a draw. The big stars are in India for the IPL. I hear the players are less than enamoured by the draft system of the Hundred (the new formatted 100 ball competition) as their schedules are big enough without knowing whether they are engaged or not to a new competition.
Wickets were falling cheaply all over the country. Yorkshire in the first day versus Essex were dismissed for 50 but batting their second innings by tea time. The counties will be ruing a glorious bank holiday Monday….and no cricket.
Over at Hove Middlesex were dismissed for 238 and Sussex stuttered to 60-4. Although the ball kept low, this wicket did not look dodgy to me so and many were dismissed more by poor judgment than a uneven bounce. At Chelmsford, both Joe Root and Alistair Cook went for ducks.
At Hove, Ollie Robinson took 7- 58. Sussex have an excellent pace attack but it’s the batting that is the problem as they look to replaced Ed Joyce, Mike Machen and Chris Nash.
At 6-15 I hotfooted to the Amex. I say ‘hotfooted ‘ but getting to the Amex quickly is an impossibility. The bus journey took an hour and half. We took the courtesy bus for the final stage which was facing the other direction and had to negotiate a busy roundabout before proceeding to the stadium.
It was the best game I have seen at the Amex as Brighton added Manchester United, Arsenal and a draw with Spurs to their scalps. We have only lost 4 games at the Amex all season and two of these were to Chelsea and Manchester City, the only other loss being to Leicester. From the outset the aim was to finish outside the bottom three. In the relegation mini-league Southampton, for example, may have had bigger aspirations and were ill-equipped to deal with relegation.
Brighton played with great heart and Antony Knockaert was outstanding. As for United, I saw plenty of desire unlike Mourinho but their big stars like Pogba and Mata are not producing enough.
I said to my neighbour that you had to get through a midfield of Matic and Fellani, a mean defence and then beat David de Gea who must be the best keeper In the world.
Anyway we did and – thanks to goal line technology – Pascal Gross’ goal was awarded. Cue much celebration at the end of the season with relegation avoided with two games to go – just as well as these are away at Manchester City and Liverpool. Bravo above all Chris Hughton.
