Wolves 0-2 Brighton
by Gene Sylvester
at Molineux Stadium

THE Wolves players can be forgiven for taking their foot off the pedal after their Premier League safety was confirmed a couple of weeks ago, and Brighton took full advantage of that fact with a fairly straightforward, whilst laboured, 2-0 win at the Molineux stadium.

Brighton’s three points came courtesy of a Danny Welbeck penalty and Brajan Gruda’s first goal for the club since his move back in August.

Brighton’s recent form has been a bit patchy with them only registering one win in the last eight games, and for a team that still has their sights set on European football next season, an upturn in results really was required as they jostle for position amongst a host of clubs that sit just outside the top four.

Whilst the result pleased Brighton manager Fabian Hurzeler, he was also quick to admit that the performance was not so pleasing.

“Overall I wasn’t too impressed with my team’s performance today. We lost control after the penalty and made too many easy mistakes,” stated the Brighton manager. “Wolverhampton used this to try and get back control of the game.”

The opening goal came after Wolves talisman Matheus Cunha was dispossessed on the edge of his own box by Brighton defender Mats Wieffer.

In the Wolves forward’s desperation to win the ball back, he felled the Brighton player in the box, just as he was about to square the ball to his teammate Yankuba Minteh who would have had a simple task of tapping the ball into an empty net.

Michael Oliver awarded the penalty, giving the Wolves forward a yellow card in the process when a red was probably more befitting of the offence, seeing as Cunha was the last defender.

Welbeck stepped up to place his penalty to the goalkeeper’s left, sending Sa the wrong way to give Brighton a 26th minute lead.

The Brighton striker’s goal made it 10 Premier League goals for the season, the first time in his 16-year career that he has achieved this feat.

Wolves, who started the game with Jorgen Strand-Larsen on the bench, did have their own opportunities to score.

Goncalo Guedes could have put the home side ahead as early as the 6th minute following a Cunha free kick into the box, but the Portuguese striker’s flicked effort from eight yards out cleared the crossbar of Brighton’s goal.

Cunha also tested Bart Verbruggen with an effort from the edge of the area, but the Brighton keeper got down smartly to his left to palm the shot away from danger.

Despite Vitor Pereira’s attempt to wrestle back control of the game, making wholesale changes in the 59th minute — bringing on four substitutes at once, it was Brighton who sealed the win with a second goal from Gruda.

It was a sublime dinked effort over Wolves keeper Sa following an equally sublime through ball from Seagulls substitute Simon Adingra, which clearly left the Brighton goalscorer visibly emotional. 

“Behind the player is a person, a really young person,” explained Hurzeler following the game. “He came from Germany and left a lot of things behind and then doesn’t always play. But he worked hard on the training pitch so I have to give him compliments.”

Wolves boss Pereira was accepting of the fact that his team were beaten by the better team on the day.

“We competed against a team with quality, that’s why they are playing for European positions. They deserved to win today.”