Our 3️⃣ points as Chelsea show they're not The Best at Brighton | OneFootball

Chelsea were comprehensively outsmarted by Brighton on Tuesday evening and were lucky to come away with a 1-1 draw.

Hakim Ziyech’s first half strike put the Blues in front but the Seagulls rallied after the break and almost did enough to claim all three points.

The Best get bothered

Two of the three best midfielders in the world in 2021 were on the pitch tonight.

Meanwhile the very best coach in the men’s game was on the sidelines.

Monday saw the annual The Best Fifa awards take place in Zurich and it was a bumper night for Chelsea.

N’Golo Kanté and Jorginho were named in the World XI while Thomas Tuchel was named the Coach of the Year ahead of Pep Guardiola and Robert Mancini.

But to be honest, you wouldn’t have known that from this performance.

Graham Potter’s side were rarely at their free-flowing, pass-at-will best but they stuck to their tasks well, never really allowed Chelsea to get into the game and knew exactly when to try and break at pace.

Jorginho, usually a metronome in the midfield, wasn’t even in the top five for passes in the game with both Steven Alzate and Pascal Groß ahead of him, while Kanté was negated superbly by the Brighton front three.

This was a night when The Best were very much bothered.

Hang it in the Louvre

Is there a finer sight in football than a well-worked set piece routine?

The answer – apart from outfield players going in goal – is clearly no.

And Brighton served up one of the best of the season on Tuesday with Adam Webster’s equaliser on the hour mark.

A cluster of Seagulls players were gathered at the back post, and with Chelsea defenders pinned there, Webster arched a run back into the six yard box and headed in unmarked past Kepa.

It was only the second header from a set piece Chelsea have conceded this season, with the first coming in the reverse fixture at Stamford Bridge in December.

Lovely stuff.

Tariq the Terroriser

This week Tariq Lamptey has been linked with moves to Tottenham and Manchester United.

And honestly, it’s easy to see why.

The diminutive wide man has endured and enjoyed a mixed season with Brighton but it seems like he finally might be coming into some form.

Lamptey missed the first six weeks of the campaign through hamstring issues and fitness worries and it wasn’t actually until Boxing Day that he played a full 90 minutes for Graham Potter’s side this term.

But up against his former club and going one-on-one with Marcos Alonso, he was superb.

Inside the first 20 minutes he was the Brighton player furthest forward and that unrelenting running didn’t stop the entire game.

Both Alonso and Antonio Rüdiger had nightmares dealing with his pace and although the flying wide man’s final ball was often a little sloppy, the decision-making in the final third was often right.

Brighton have a potential superstar on their hands, and it seems like the big boys know it.