RYAN ON THE SPOT TO REPAY HUGHTON’S BLIND FAITH
CHRIS HUGHTON, the Brighton manager, admits he’d never seen Mathew Ryan play live before spending a then club-record fee last summer to buy the Australian international goalkeeper. But the blind faith he showed is being rewarded as Ryan is playing a pivotal role in keeping Brighton in the Premier League. Ryan made a superb last-minute penalty save from Charlie Adam and coupled that with quick reactions as the Scot tried to catch him with a corner that was curling in at his near post. It was enough to earn Brighton a precious away point. ‘I’ve got to credit my goalkeeping coach Ben Roberts with signing him,’ Hughton said, ‘because he went to Valencia to watch him and kept on at me that he was top quality. Ben went to see him play, watched hours of video, and insisted he was a player of the right age with the right ability and attitude for us. ‘He’s a really enthusiastic player, he’s different, we know he is not as big as some keepers but he is very athletic and really hungry to do well. ‘The second save he made, straight after the penalty when your emotions are all over the place, was probably even better than keeping out the penalty.’ Midfielder Dale Stephens, whose
pass set up Jose Izquierdo’s firsthalf goal, said, ‘We’ve gone four games unbeaten now and we want to build on that. ‘We need to focus on how well we played because for all we rode our luck at the end we should have been out of sight in the first half.’ The result left Stoke back in the bottom three. The improving form of Xherdan Shaqiri (right), who scored their equaliser, one of few crumbs of comfort for new boss Paul Lambert. Lambert insisted there was no fallout in the dressing room from the row between Adam and Jese Rodriguez over who would take the spot kick. Lambert said he won’t be taking the players away during the break for the FA Cup, but will work on his own team plans. Defender Erik Pieters said: ‘We have to get out of this, we have to do it. We have the talent, we have the group, we have players to get out of there. ‘People score and people miss, it’s part of football, you have to be stronger and stay together and work hard as a group — not just us but the fans too.’