Well, well, well – we nearly beat one of the ‘big four’ last week against United and this Sunday we knocked off their noisy neighbours Manchester City – away from home no less.

Due to existing commitments I watched the entire game sat in the car park of Bluewater Shopping Centre – and let me tell you our family Seat was rocking when Lee’s goal went in. Talk about steamy windows.

Sadly, as I am now away with the wife and kiddiwinks at Center Parcs I’m unable to get a full recap written up, but I trust the fantastic work of Richie Mills on the Albion’s website here will suffice on this occasion.

I did buy a fresh notebook after forgetting mine though, and made copious notes, so it seems sad to waste them…

Notes

• We very (very) nearly conceded in the first minute of the game when Chloe Kelly hit the bar after 20 seconds. I believe that’s the third game in a row I’ve written the exact same comment – so it’s clearly an issue. Have to be wide awake from whistle to whistle.
• City had an incredible 35 shots although the majority of them were either off target or straight at Sophie Baggaley who was dominant once again on the occasions she was called in to action.
• The volume of attempts in addition to the lack of real clear cut chances is to the credit of the defence who I thought had easily their best game of the season. Maria Thorisdottir has been as advertised and has added strength and stability at centre back, but I’ve been particularly impressed with Guro Bergsvand alongside her. Last season she had a couple of shaky outings where I questioned her ability to deal with WSL-quality opponents, but I’ll hold my hands up and say, this season, she’s been far better.
• The midfield did ok, that’s about as much as I can say. City dominated the middle of the park so all they could do was make a nuisance of themselves and try and help out the defence when needed. For the most part they did so admirably, although there were a few occasions where they lost the ball sloppily or two players left it for each other and Man City regained possession.
• I felt a bit sorry for Tatiana Pinto in what I believe was her first WSL start. She was never going to have a lot of time and space in this game and she was taken off at half-time, a casualty of a tactical reshuffle. I’d like to see her start, maybe not against Arsenal, but the following game against Liverpool where she can get some game time in a lower pressure environment and be given a chance to show what she can do.
• Pauline Bremer and Elisabeth Terland played well going forward, in so much as they offered at least some threat on the counter. Bremer is fast joining Terland as a player you can rely on to produce a quality performance week-in-week-out and her assist for Lee was more than deserved.
• The passage of play to make it 1-0 was an excellent team effort, echoing the goal against Chelsea in many ways. I said it then and I’ll say it again – that’s how Melissa Phillips would draw them up every week if she could.
• A broader point I realised after this game is that perhaps the losses to West Ham and Spurs weren’t the anomalies – the victory over Everton was. Had we lost that game with the Toffees you could draw a line from there, towards this victory, of a Brighton team steadily growing and improving as the season continues. Because we won the opener, the expectation was that we were ready to go, firing on all cylinders, but the truth is we weren’t and it’s taken until now to start turning the heat up.