If recent weeks had not already been frustrating enough for Brighton & Hove Albion fans, another week of late heartbreak has only made it worse.
They were just seconds away from registering a much needed win against Everton but any hope of some respite from recent woes came to an abrupt end in the 97th minute when the substitute Beto finished from close range to level up the scoreline, in a dramatic end that had David Moyes galloping on to the pitch to celebrate with his team.
The Everton manager did not escape without a booking for his antics, though, which angered him after full-time.
“Imagine booking for celebrating. Who wants to see managers getting booked for celebrating? I don’t think I’d have danced down if the goal was in the 55th minute,” Moyes said.
Beto sparked wild celebrations in the Everton end with his late strike
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“It means they’ve got nothing about them at all. No thoughts about what football means or what it means to the managers without absolutely just saying, ‘No, you just can’t step outside that line and I’m going to book you.’ ”
He added: “I bloody will do it again. Actually, I think if I had been a bit more mobile, I might have done a knee slide.”
Before this match, Fabian Hürzeler’s side had picked up just eight points since the start of December, with only Wolverhampton Wanderers and Burnley accruing fewer in that time. Last weekend they conceded a stoppage-time winner away to Fulham.
Beto came on and earned Everton a point with a strike in the 97th minute
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So Pascal Gross, who returned to the club in January from Borussia Dortmund, appeared to be the perfect man to drag them out of their slump. He netted at the back post in the second half, but it was not enough to claim all three points.
Hürzeler was defiant after another disappointing result, saying: “In life you have two choices, you can feel sorry for yourself, you can get in a mood where you get a little bit self-pity, or you choose to go again. We will go again, we showed good reactions after we had a very disappointing loss against Fulham, and we will do it again.”
Moyes had deployed a back line comprising four natural centre halves and still Brighton’s crosses into the box in the opening stages were uncomfortable to deal with as the home side played with a surprising amount of confidence.
Their best chance of the first half fell to Kaoru Mitoma, who wasted his one-on-one. The winger had done excellently to find space in the box after a tidy exchange of passes with Danny Welbeck, but even with the time to take a touch to steady himself, he rolled his shot wide.
Gross, the Brighton midfielder, put his side ahead with his first goal since rejoining the club from Borussia Dortmund earlier this month
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Everton failed to register a shot before the break but when Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall’s effort trickled narrowly wide before the hour mark, it did enough to wake up the travelling support. It was followed up by a header from Jarrad Branthwaite that showed the visiting side were now on the front foot.
Bart Verbruggen was called into action soon after when Thierno Barry latched on to a stray pass in the final third and cut back unselfishly to Dewsbury-Hall, who should have scored. Instead it was met by the quick reactions of the Brighton goalkeeper saving with his feet.
That seemed to mark the end of a particularly tetchy period for Hürzeler’s side, and then came Gross’s goal, an instinctive finish that rounded off a counterattack after Charalampos Kostoulas had dummied Yasin Ayari’s squared pass to leave the German to finish the job.
A disallowed goal from Mitoma for offside could have shored up the victory but instead his team were left to defend desperately for the full-time whistle that did not come until after Beto had reached the rebound of O’Brien’s shot first to finish from close range at the death.
Brighton & Hove Albion (4-3-3): B Verbruggen — F Kadioglu, JP van Hecke, L Dunk, M De Cuyper (J Veltman 70min) — Y Ayari, C Baleba, P Gross (J Milner 90+6) — G Rutter (Y Minteh 60), D Welbeck (C Kostoulas 70), K Mitoma. Booked Gross.
Everton (4-2-3-1): J Pickford — J O’Brien, J Tarkowski, M Keane, J Branthwaite (N Patterson 89) — J Garner, I Gueye (T Iroegbunam 80) — H Armstrong (T Dibling 80), K Dewsbury-Hall (C Alcaraz 79), I Ndiaye — T Barry (Beto 89). Booked Branthwaite, Iroegbunam.
Referee C Kavanagh. Attendance 31,419.