Brighton’s first real attack of the afternoon ended with the ball in City’s net. Eleven minutes in, Lewis Dunk took a quick free kick, Diego Gómez squared a cross, and Matheus Nunes failed to clear. Maxim De Cuyper laid it back, and Yasin Ayari swept it into the bottom-right corner.
Manchester City spent the rest of Saturday at the Etihad trying to undo it. They finished with 21 shots worth 1.92 expected goals, a measure of chance quality. Brighton’s seven were worth 1.0.
Bart Verbruggen carried the afternoon. He tipped an Iliman Ndiaye shot onto the woodwork and got a strong hand to a curler from Nunes. Then, with City pushing for an equalizer, he smothered Jérémy Doku’s close-range poke at the death.
It was the first time City had lost to Brighton at the Etihad. It was also their second straight league defeat, and the first time since February 2025 that they had conceded first in back-to-back league games.
Fabian Hürzeler had asked for “revenge” after Brighton lost a penalty shootout to City in the EFL Cup earlier in the week. They led that game too, and it finished 2-2 before penalties. Saturday gave him the ending he wanted.
A 175-1 shot in third place
Sunday reshuffled the top. Arsenal beat Liverpool 1-0 at Anfield through a 16th-minute Kai Havertz goal, their first league win there since 2012. Mikel Arteta said his players “loved the mission.”
Arsenal now lead on 24 points, with City second on 21 and Brighton third on 19. That puts Brighton five points behind the reigning champions with the league’s best attack, 24 goals in nine games. Brighton also beat Arsenal 3-0 in September, which means they have taken points off both clubs above them.
Few saw it coming. Brighton’s title price before the season was 175-1, and they had finished eighth in each of Hürzeler’s first two years in charge. FourFourTwo’s summer preview tipped them for ninth.
Leicester began the 2015-16 season at 5,000-1, a year after they finished 14th and narrowly escaped relegation. Claudio Ranieri’s side ended with 81 points, 10 clear of Arsenal, and the club’s first title in its 132-year history.
| Leicester 2015-16 | Brighton 2026-27 | |
|---|---|---|
| Title odds before the season | 5,000-1 | 175-1 |
| Previous league finish | 14th | 8th |
| Manager | Claudio Ranieri | Fabian Hürzeler, 33 |
| League defeats | 3 all season | 2 after 9 games |
What Leicester had that Brighton does not yet
The comparison holds on price and on nerve, then starts to slip once you look at how the goals arrive.
Leicester’s title run had Jamie Vardy’s 24 league goals at the front of it. Eleven different players scored in Brighton’s first seven league games, and Pascal Groß, Charalampos Kostoulas and Jack Hinshelwood shared the lead on three each. Saturday’s winner came through De Cuyper, a left-back with five goal involvements already this season, as many as he managed in 30 games last year.
Ayari’s goal was his second in three league games, more than in his previous 14 combined. A spread like that is hard for any opponent to plan around.
Hürzeler’s side usually wins by denying shots, and through their first seven games they had faced the third-fewest in the league. On Saturday they absorbed 21 and still kept a clean sheet, their sixth of the season and the most in the division. That is a different skill, and a useful one in a title race.
The gap between the two seasons is the cushion. Leicester lost three league games all year. Brighton lost 2-0 at Liverpool the weekend before they beat City, and the table already shows two defeats in nine.
The next test is on the calendar. The league fixture list has Arsenal hosting City on November 28, the same day Brighton host Newcastle.
So, are Brighton the new Leicester? Not yet. Brighton have 29 games to go and two defeats already on the card.
