Brighton replaced Chelsea in the Premier League’s top six with a dominant 3-0 win over Liam Rosenior’s struggling Blues, who have now lost five games in a row in the competition.
The Seagulls utterly dominated Tuesday’s game at the American Express Stadium and, in truth, it was always a matter of how many they would win by after they broke the deadlock in the third minute.
After ex-Brighton goalkeeper Robert Sanchez tipped Kaoru Mitoma’s volley over, the resulting corner flicked off Jorrel Hato and landed at the feet of Ferdi Kadioglu, whose first-time strike deflected in off Wesley Fofana.
Sanchez was bailed out by Trevoh Chalobah’s goal-line clearance after a terrible pass out from the back allowed Carlos Baleba to tee up Jack Hinshelwood in front of a gaping goal.
But Hinshelwood would get on the scoresheet in the 56th minute, staying onside to collect Georginio Rutter’s pass before slotting past Sanchez at his near post.
Chelsea had shown a brief improvement after Rosenior ditched his 3-4-3 experiment at half-time, but they were out of the contest at 2-0 as Brighton hunted more goals, with Mitoma and Kadioglu both going close.
And Brighton did add further gloss to the scoreline in the first minute of second-half stoppage time, as Maxim De Cuyper’s centre was stroked home by substitute Danny Welbeck.
Chelsea’s hopes of Champions League qualification are now surely over, given they trail fifth-placed Liverpool by seven points with just 12 left to play for.
Brighton, by contrast, might feel they have an outside chance of reaching Europe’s premier club competition, having jumped to sixth, one place and two points above the Blues.
5 – Across each team’s last nine games in the Premier League, only Tottenham (2) have picked up fewer points than Chelsea (5). Dumbfounded. pic.twitter.com/OO2nAwvGK1
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) April 21, 2026
Data Debrief: Rosenior’s miserable run continues
Chelsea have lost five straight Premier League games for only the second time, having previously endured a six-match losing streak near the start of 1993-94.
It is the first time they have lost five league matches in a row without scoring, meanwhile, since November 1912. They did not have a single shot on target here and put up a mere 0.38 expected goals (xG) to Brighton’s 2.17.
Across each team’s last nine games in the Premier League, only relegation favourites Tottenham (two) have won fewer points than Chelsea (five – W1 D2 L6).
And, Chelsea’s figure of 0.04 xG in the first half was lower than they had in any of Enzo Maresca’s 114 halves of Premier League football as their head coach.
Brighton, meanwhile, are unbeaten in their last five Premier League games, their best such run since a six-match sequence that spanned the end of last season and the start of the current campaign.
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