🔎 Brighton watch: United Women face tough test against resurgent Seagulls
Manchester United's 100% start to the new season will be on the line in this Saturday's long trip to Brighton and the Amex Stadium in the WSL.
Brighton’s hugely impressive start to 2024/25 strongly suggests they have put a chaotic couple of years firmly behind them, with a brand new chapter being led by summer hire Dario Vidosic.
As recently as two years ago, Hope Powell was still the one in charge. The England legend, having made the switch to club football, was instrumental in Brighton becoming a WSL side and securing a top half finish in 2020/21.
Powell suddenly stepped down in October 2022 off the back of an 8-0 humiliation at the hands of Tottenham. It may have given the impression of the team going backwards given it was a fourth loss in five games at the beginning of that season. In fairness to her, the three others had come against Arsenal, United and Chelsea in a monumentally tough start.
But Brighton had also just lost Polly Bancroft, who had been general manager of the women’s team since 2020 and a key figure behind the scenes in the progress made during that time, to her role as United’s head of women’s football.
Amy Merricks took over on an interim basis for two months until the end of December, at which point ex-Bayern Munich boss Jens Scheuer was appointed on a permanent basis. But he only lasted 10 weeks and three WSL games before being sacked, ushering Merricks back in as caretaker for the second time. Then came Melissa Phillips, who did enough to steer Brighton away from relegation in the final weeks of 2022/23. But her sacking the following February came as another huge shock, even with the Seagulls struggling to climb higher than 8th.
Interim boss Mikey Harris restored some level of calm in the final stretch of 2023/24, although Bristol City were so far off the pace that relegation was never a genuine threat, leading to Vidosic becoming the sixth different permanent or temporary head coach in under two years when he arrived in July.
The Croatian-born former Australia international went straight from calling time on his own playing career in 2022 to taking charge of Melbourne City Women. As a protege of Ange Postecoglou, having worked under the now Tottenham men’s boss as a player, he had strong backing and made a point of saying a “massive thank you” for his references when speaking to the English media for the first time. “There's a long history there of player to coach and now hopefully I can get a little bit of mentorship from coach to coach, that would be awesome.”
Summer reset
Over the summer, nine permanent first-team exits and two loans out were met by ten permanent signings and two loans in. Brighton recruited extremely well, targeting a blend of experienced pros and emerging talents, both from the domestic market and further afield.
Nikita Parris swelled the ex-United contingent in the squad to three, alongside Maria Thorisdottir and Sophie Baggaley. Fran Kirby and Jelena Cankovic both joined from Chelsea, with loans for Arsenal teenager Michelle Agyemang and Barcelona talent Bruna Vilamala particularly exciting. And when Brighton thumped Everton on the opening day of the season, Japan international Kiko Seike became the first ever WSL player to score a hat-trick on her debut.
With a new manager, new ideas and new personnel, there is a freshness about Brighton. It’s three wins from four games so far, losing by a single goal to Manchester City in the other fixture, plus victory in their League Cup opener. Put simply, Brighton have never started this well before. It took 11 league games (half) of last season to record the three wins and nine points they already have in 2024/25, and 14 games the year before.
That makes them a threat to a United side with a perfect record across four games in all competitions and yet to concede a goal.
Spreading the goals
Of all the clubs to have played four WSL games so far this season, Brighton have scored the most goals. They have hit the net nine times at an average of 2.25 per game, only marginally less than United’s 2.33 over three league outings.
In 2023/24, they relied heavily on Elisabeth Terland. The Norwegian, who will face her former club for the first time on Saturday off the back of decisively scoring twice in United’s win over Tottenham, scored 13 WSL goals. That accounted for half of Brighton’s entire league tally as a team and no one else in the squad contributed more than three in the competition.
This season, the share of goals is already more equitable. Seike hasn’t added to her debut hat-trick, but Parris, Kirby, Agyemang and Bruna have all chipped in, as has Pauline Bremer. It’s six different WSL goalscorers, plus another two in the League Cup in Maisie Symonds and Guro Bergsvand.
Although Brighton have kept two clean sheets in the league, there are goals to be had against them from teams set up to attack. Aston Villa breached the defence twice, ultimately shipping four themselves, while it was poor finishing from Manchester City that was mainly responsible for the narrow nature of their 1-0 victory given that Gareth Taylor’s side accumulated an xG greater than three.
Last season against Brighton
United have face Brighton on 14 occasions over the last few years - only Everton and Manchester City have been a more frequent opponent. Of those, there have been 11 United wins, two draw and a single defeat.
Last season, it was mixed. There was a 2-0 WSL win at Leigh Sports Village and a thumping 4-0 at the Broadfield Stadium in Crawley that booked United an FA Cup semi-final date with Chelsea - we all know how that turned out!
The result that rankles was a 2-2 draw down south on Bonfire Night. Terland opened the scoring - Marc Skinner admitted after her brace against Spurs that season was when the club really started to notice of her and this game will no doubt have been a part of that. But while Ella Toone equalised with 78 minutes played - a stunner voted the team’s joint second Goal of the Season - United were wasteful in failing to convert chances, which opened the door for Guro Bergsvand to look she’d won it for Brighton at the end. But, deep, deep into stoppage time, Rachel Williams got United’s second to snatch a point.
Frustration was particularly born out of already dropping points against Leicester, having also conceded a late equaliser at home to Arsenal, but failing to kick on from a 5-0 thrashing of Everton prior to preceding international break.
Brighton’s record at the Amex Stadium
Brighton have been a shining example in the women’s game in England in many ways. In 2021, they opened a dedicated £8.5m women’s team training facility, while last October they were granted permission in principle to construct the country’s first purpose-built stadium for women’s football. It is considered a priority project and nearby Falmer, where the Amex Stadium is located, is seen as the most logical site. But things remain in the planning phase.
For now, if Brighton want to play closer to home and in a bigger stadium than Crawley, it’s the Amex.
The Seagulls set a WSL record attendance there back in 2019 when 5,265 - that number alone shows how much the league has changed in such a short space of time - watched the visit of Arsenal. The fact that the Gunners were set to wrap up the league title that day is the greater explanation behind the bumper crowd, with it being their first in seven years and a short hop from London.
But the following season and with the 2019 World Cup spike, Brighton cruised to a 3-0 victory over Birmingham at the Amex in front of just over 4,000 fans. When crowds were allowed to return post-Covid-19, they opened the 2021/22 campaign with a 2-0 win against West Ham. Leicester were beaten 1-0 there two months later. There were strangely no Amex Stadium games off the back of Euro 2022, but a club record 6,951 watched Tottenham win 3-1 in October 2023. Everton were also victorious at the Amex last season, 2-1, meaning that Brighton’s go into Saturday’s fixture at the stadium having lost their last two Amex games.