Alex Royal watched Davy Propper during Brighton’s FA Cup tie with Middlesbrough. He gives Goan opinion on the Dutchman’s performance below.
by Alex Royal
Follow Alex on Twitter!
I’ll be completely honest, I haven’t really had a chance to watch Davy Pröpper too closely since he signed for Brighton; Mainly due to the fact that I’m going to be focusing on the Dutchmen plying their trade in the Championship.
Brighton broke the club’s transfer record to bag him from PSV; a record which they subsequently smashed with the signing of Jürgen Locadia, again from the Eindhoven club earlier this month.
Saturday was a chance to see him in action, as my team Middlesbrough took on Brighton in the FA Cup Fourth Round at the Riverside. I was looking forward to seeing how Davy had adapted, both physically and technically to the English game, with the gap between the Eredivisie and Premier League being huge, not only financially but in terms of quality as well.
Middlesbrough vs Brighton
I wasn’t at all surprised to see Davy named on the bench. Brighton rested or benched several of their key players, with their ambition being Premier League survival.
Both sides started the game in typical cup-tie fashion, trying to bag the early initiative, this was the case for the first 30 minutes with the final third of the half somewhat petering out.
It was surprising to see Pröpper enter the game as early as he did, replacing Dale Stephens at half time.
Davy was assigned his typical box-to-box role in a second half which was nowhere near as exciting or end to end as the first. It was the visitors who mustered the first real chance of the half on the hour through Jirí Skalák. A few minutes later Adama Traoré forced a smart save from former Newcastle & AZ keeper Tim Krul, who tipped his effort onto the post. Brighton won the game late on thanks to Glenn Murray, who has been in the news for all the wrong reasons recently.
Pröpper’s performance
In terms of his performance, I feel Davy had an average game. But we all know that 45 minutes does not reflect a player’s true ability! He picked up a yellow midway through the second half for a foul on Traoré.
Along with doing his share defensively, Pröpper also managed to get forward on a few occasions; with his main highlight being a nice through ball which Izquierdo did well to get on target.
Overall I’d like to think that Brighton have a decent player on their hands, one who looks technically gifted, with a good range of passing skills.
PS. Just want to thank you for taking the time to read this, my very first piece for this site, constructive criticism is also appreciated.
Follow
22 year old from the UK, Middlesbrough fan but have a huge passion for Dutch football in general, especially the Eredivisie. I try and get over when it doesn't clash with Middlesbrough games.
