Coventry City’s disastrous return to the Premier League continued as they endured a horror show against Brighton.
Frank Lampard’s side finished with ten men as they suffered a 5-0 defeat. They are still yet to pick up their first point since promotion, losing four out of four, and haven’t yet scored a goal.
Against Albion, they actually started the brighter with two decent chances to open the scoring. Jack Rudoni’s early effort drew an instinctive save from Bart Verbruggen in the visitors’ goal before the ‘keeper was tested again, this time by Frank Onyeka’s long range attempt that he pushed over his bar.
Then, the breakthrough arrived when Brighton’s Charalampos Kostoulas showed exceptional control before hammering the ball home past Carl Rushworth to give them the advantage before the break.
That lead was doubled just after half-time when Malick Yalcouye produced a tidy, clipped finish as he raced away from two Coventry defenders from just inside the hosts’ half.
Things went from bad to worse for City when striker Taiwo Awoniyi was shown a straight red card for an elbow on Maxim de Cuyper.
That effectively killed off any brief hopes the hosts may have had, with more Albion goals following.
Bobby Thomas clumsily felled Kostoulas in the area to concede a penalty which Pascal Gross tucked away for a third. The goal of the day, though, belonged to Brighton centre-half Lewis Dunk as he scored a long-range stunner to make it 4-0.
Coventry’s misery was compounded in stoppage time when Yasin Ayari placed home a precise shot into the corner of the net for a fifth.
Downtrodden Coventry boss Frank Lampard reflected: “It’s a difficult scoreline and it’s not easy at home. The first half was pretty good, we created some chances, better chances and we had them under a lot of pressure. Then a mistake to make it 2-0 and the red card makes it very difficult.
“We have to take responsibility. We did some good stuff, then the game became very, very difficult for us. We have to keep working.”
Delighted Brighton boss Fabian Hurzeler, whose side are now up to fourth, said: “We used our chances in an efficient way today. We have players on the pitch who want to score. We score a lot of goals but we have to find a good balance. Scoring goals helps but a clean sheet is even better.”
