S U S S E X
By Laurence Elphick
Brighton and Hove Albion
A season to forget?
I think Seagulls fans
are unanimous in
this decision; it
certainly doesn’t
take a genius to work
out that finishing two
places and six points
outside the relegation zone wasn’t the
progress that we had all hoped for. In fact,
a Millwall-supporting journalist in a well
known nationalpaper, was quoted recently
as saying, that apart from his own team,
Brighton were one of the surprise failures
in the Championship this year! A fair point
perhaps when you consider Brighton
had made it to the play-offs in both the
previous two campaigns.
Looking ahead then, the feeling (as
every pre season comes around!) is that
new recruits are needed in a number of
positions. Our lack of goals in the latter
part of the season was painfully obvious,
but how did it compare to previous
seasons at the Amex? Leicester City
striker Leo Ulloa lead the way in the
2013/14 season with 15 out of a total of
64 while the Seagulls actually managed
Sussex Cricket Club
So lets talk about
the overseas
signings……I for
one am very excited
by the prospect of
Australian batsman,
George Bailey joining
for the second half of the season. This is a
major coup for Sussex and the top-order
batsman will be available for the final seven
NatWest T20 Blast matches and Sussex’s
Royal London One-Day Cup games.
57 this season, inspite of the top scorer
this year being defender Lewis Dunk
with seven goals!. Compare this to that
fabulous first season at the Amex with
a total of 73. Fairly obvious then, that a
couple of new strikers wouldn’t go amiss
for next season? (another Ulloa or Murray
would do very nicely please).
Brighton have offered new deals to both
Inigo Calderon and Casper Ankergren
to stay at The Amex for 2015/16, while
five players have been told they are
being released including the clubs record
signing Craig Mackail-Smith along with
Aaron Hughes, Kemy Agustien, Paddy
McCourt and Vitajils Maksimenko.
By the way hats off to Bournemouth for
winning the Championship...absolutely
the best team in the division and so
pleased for two former Seagulls, Captain
Tommy Elphick and his defensive partner
Steve Cook.....all the more amazing,
considering they were close to liquidation
in 2008!
With summer signings seemingly F