History told us Newcastle would not win here. The Amex Stadium has been their equivalent of a trip to the dentist in the Premier League. Seven visits, no victories. It is a long and invariably painful excursion. This time, they at least left with a smile on their face, but only just.
The point extracted could yet prove invaluable in their quest for a top-five finish. But in getting there it was like pulling teeth at times. It took three penalties awarded in the second half – two of them overturned – before Alexander Isak levelled from the spot in the 89th minute.
Credit to him for rolling into the bottom corner, given he had not enjoyed his best game and had already prepared to take two penalties only to have the ball removed from his grasp.
Brighton were leading through Yankuba Minteh’s first-half strike when Eddie Howe turned to Anthony Gordon to enliven his side early in the second half. He soon won the first of Newcastle’s trio of penalties, but referee Craig Pawson had got it wrong. Tariq Lamptey’s foul was outside the area and VAR bailed out Brighton and Pawson.
He pointed to the spot not long after but, again, he had missed Joe Willock’s dive. VAR did not. No penalty. Brighton then could have had a penalty for Sandro Tonali’s clumsy kick on Matt O’Reilly, but play continued.
Finally, one minute from time, Pawson got one right. Fabian Schar’s free-kick was blocked by the hand of Yasin Ayari and, despite another delay, the award remained. Isak did the rest. Newcastle deserved the point for their second-half revival, but the first 45 minutes was a struggle.
At one point in the first half, Howe clapped his hands furiously. Not in applause, but in an effort to quicken his team. It was like an exasperated parent attempting to hasten the ascent to bed. Or, in this case, getting them to wake up.
Newcastle had plenty of the ball but did nothing with it. They probably had too much of the ball, given their strength lies in exploiting space with pace. Once Brighton led when Minteh stepped inside Tonali and finished from eight yards, they were faced with a wall, and no ideas as to how to scale it.
Belatedly, in the 37th minute, they had a shot on target. Not that Brighton goalkeeper Bart Verbruggen would have considered it a shot, so weak was Bruno Guimaraes’ shovelled effort from 18 yards.
Come half-time, Newcastle were reduced to tossing long balls towards Isak. Unsurprisingly, Brighton centre-back Jan Paul van Hecke enjoyed the heading practice.
Newcastle needed an injection of intent and it arrived when Gordon was brought on in the 56th minute. His first involvement was to commit Lamptey to a mis-timed trip and the visitors celebrated a penalty.
It was soon the home fans celebrating the downgrading of the spot-kick to a free-kick, and rightly so given the contact came a few inches outside the area.
Fabian Hurzeler has previously bemoaned the length of time it takes VAR to make decisions. He was not complaining here. Take all day, lads.
In the 70th minute came a second delay and a second penalty overturned and Willock was booked when replays showed Van Hecke had made no contact with him.
During nine minutes of added time – you suspected that was long enough for Pawson to give another three penalties – both teams had a chance to win it, Diego Gomez heading wide from six yards and Callum Wilson denied by Verbruggen’s strong arms after his close-range blast on goal.
A draw felt fair in the end, even if the home fans felt cheated.
