Brighton & Hove Albion Fan View: Hughton hammering home the message

Seagull Griggo revels in the win at West Ham – and cannot say enough good things about the manager

After adding to the woes of both Everton and West Ham, don’t shout it too loudly but Chris Hughton is doing a fantastic job at Brighton.

Friday night’s 3-0 win at West Ham was by far our best result since promotion to the Premier League: a first away win, three goals away from home, two forwards off the mark for the season and a clean sheet against a Hammers side that had conceded four goals in their previous five league matches, or one in four if you take out the 3-2 loss to Tottenham.

Eleven points from the first nine matches is an excellent return for a club widely predicted to go straight back down. Let’s just hope these bigger, struggling clubs don’t come knocking at our door asking about the availability of our manager.

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Jamie Carragher said in co-commentary last night that, while West Ham had the better individual players, Brighton played more like a team, which is exactly what we are all about. Since being asked to follow the ill-fated reign of Sami Hyypia, Hughton has galvanised the club, made us hard to beat, with a dressing room spirit which few other teams can match. That is all down to the manager.

There are fine lines between success and failure in football. I criticised the approach to the 2-1 defeat at Bournemouth last month, when I felt there was not enough ambition going forward. Last night the tactics were not too dissimilar, setting up to defend in numbers first and foremost, but we committed more men to attack when we did get forward and that was duly rewarded. Maybe I was too hard after the Bournemouth game because with a slight tweak we were excellent against West Ham.

Hughton’s selections were key to the win. He made two changes from the draw with Everton last Sunday. Jose Izquierdo came in for Solly March, which was perhaps a bit harsh on March, but Izquierdo’s pace meant he could play his part in the defensive effort – as shown with a superb bit of tracking to get back and tackle Michail Antonio in the first half – but was also able to join the attack at speed, which helped him get on the scoresheet. The other change was Gaetan Bong for Markus Suttner, which was again a little tough on Suttner, but proved the right decision as Bong’s strength gave that licence to Izquierdo to get up and down. They were both hard calls, but absolutely right.

Hughton has experience of fighting fire in the Premier League, not that West Ham were particularly showing any fire last night; it was more like a little warmth off the glowing embers.

As someone brought up in West Ham ‘territory’, whose parents apparently still live in the Upton Park area and who has his own links with West Ham as a player in the twilight of his career and a fledgling coach, it would be an easy two-plus-two equals a good fit for West Ham should they change their manager which seems even more likely now.

But Hughton is fundamental to Brighton’s hopes of staying up this season, so let’s hope these bigger clubs stay away and continue to take the European route should they be looking for a new manager.

As a footnote to last night, how good again were Shane Duffy and Lewis Dunk? There are international friendlies coming up for England. Please take a look at Dunk, Mr Southgate. Chris Hughton would endorse that and he is a manager of status worth listening to.