João Pedro hits hat-trick as Brighton beat Sheffield United in goal-fest

What an all-action, thrill-a-minute contest this meeting between Sheffield United and Brighton proved. Top billing was shared by João Pedro, whose hat-trick featured two penalties and took his team into Sunday’s fifth-round draw, and the bustling handful named Will Osula, scorer of the Blades’ second and creator of Gustavo Hamer’s first.

Jayden Bogle, too, had a lead part but in conceding both of the spot-kicks not for a reason he would wish. And while the Blades are eliminated, what is evident is how, since replacing Paul Heckingbottom on 5 December, Chris Wilder has transformed them into a spirited proposition able to come back from 2-0 to 2-2 and remain in the tie even after Pedro’s third, the visitors’ fourth. Danny Welbeck’s added-time strike finally killed them off.

Roberto De Zerbi’s more artistic unit were a picture of cool and cultured play before and after being pegged back by Osula’s header and it was this calm that propelled them on to emerge as clear and deserved victors.

Brighton fired the first salvo via an Evan Ferguson header that beat Ivo Grbic but was instantly flagged offside. Next, the Blades keeper flung himself left but was helpless to repel Facundo Buonanotte’s 25-yard rocket that opened the scoring and had the travelling Seagulls fans in party mode.

Grbic was one of five Wilder changes from Sunday’s chaotic 2-2 draw here with West Ham, the same number De Zerbi brought in following Monday’s 0-0 at Wolves. Bert Verbruggen was in this quintet and when Osula burst through the equaliser was on. Yet the centre-forward’s effort was blocked, as was Cameron Archer’s follow-up.

Ben Brereton Díaz, who scored against West Ham on his Premier League debut, skipped along the left, turned infield, and sliced the ball over to Hamer on the opposing side of Brighton’s area but a clumsy miscontrol followed.

The same characteristic was present in Bogle’s mistimed challenge on Pedro that cost his team a first penalty and concession of the second. The No 9’s dip-then-turn into the area opened up the field, the desperate Bogle’s solution was to fell the Brazilian. After a delay for a VAR check, Pedro scored to the audible disgust of the home faithful who, after only 28 minutes, were facing a humiliation, a sense deepened when Pedro soon went close again.

Their mood was about to change, though, as the Blades ripped up the script by prospering along their right: fromOsula crossed, Verbruggen pushed the ball to Hamer, and he rifled the roof of the net.

Wilder’s men were in charge, flooding Brighton, and now came a Bogle ball from the right that had Osula popping up and heading in to equalise. Could the second half be as entertaining? Yes was the resounding answer.

The Blades were punchy but Brighton were silkier and De Zerbi’s men claimed their second spot-kick seven minutes after the break. Again Bogle was in the dock, this time for a handball, when challenging Ferguson – the referee, Sunny Singh Gill, had no hesitation awarding the penalty and again, after a VAR check, Pedro trotted forward and beat Grbic, this time to the keeper’s left.

There were more twists in the pell-mell entertainment. Bogle could not be kept out of the action and his next offering was to skate onto a deflected Diaz pass and hammer at goal to no avail. Pedro’s third – Brighton’s fourth – was a peach of a low 20-yard finish and was the latest touch of class in an outing that oozed quality.

The Blades, as they do under Wilder, kept the heat turned up but could not breach Brighton again – Welbeck’s dribble-and-finish ending the scoring though James McAtee, on as a substitute, did crash the ball off Verbruggen’s bar with this riveting game’s final act.

The previous meeting of these protagonists in the competition ended goalless in January 1987, with the Blades triumphing 2-1 after the replay at the Goldstone Ground. A 19-year-old Wilder enjoyed his debut in the first meeting but he will not have enjoyed the result of this latest encounter.