John Roper’s Preston North End Fans’ Panel verdict: Tiredness may be an issue come the weekend

A fairly even first half saw the teams go in level but after the break PNE could make little impact on the visitors’ goal and as the game wore on we started to look weary and in danger of a conceding a few more.

Brighton are clearly a side with bags of confidence playing at the top of the game, and although this was supposedly a second string there were plenty in the Seagulls side who could more than hold their own in the top flight.

We didn’t really make enough chances in the game to seriously worry Graham Potter’s men and when we did we failed to make them count.

You have to feel sorry for poor Jayden Stockley who really was going it alone for North End at the top end of the pitch

Alex Neil made nine changes to the team that started at Norwich on Saturday with just Joe Rafferty and Patrick Bauer being retained, while Graham Potter changed all his personnel as he did in the last round against Portsmouth.

The game started at a brisk enough pace with PNE playing some very decent football and certainly had the better of things in the first fifteen minutes of the game.

The Seagulls then came into it more and had the better of things in the second quarter of an hour.

Chances eventually started to come after half an hour and it was Conor Ripley who made a good near post save to keep Brighton out.

At the other end Stockley had a fine effort saved down at the post by Steele in the Brighton goal.

From the resulting corner a Bauer header hit the top of the crossbar with the keeper beaten.

The visitors had a really good chance a minute before the break but Bauer managed to get between forward and goal and the ball went out to safety.

I thought North End were good value at the break and just needed a goal although Brighton did look dangerous when coming forward.

After the break it wasn’t long before the visitors had a couple of half-chances and although we looked solid enough for the best part of an hour it was no surprise when Jahanbakhsh smashed the ball home from the right-hand side following a cross from the left.

To be honest from that moment on I never really fancied us to get back into the game even though we were working hard we just didn’t have that bit of extra movement and quality to get us back in with a chance.

The manager brought on Maguire and Sinclair with 20 minutes to go, quickly followed by Pearson but we were wilting and when MacAllister made it 2-0 with quarter of an hour to go it was ‘game over’ for North End who couldn’t really muster another decent chance.

We battled hard and worked hard but the scoreline in no way flattered Albion and North End will have to live to fight another day in a competition in which they have never been further than the fourth round.

No disgrace whatsoever in this result and some good football played even though the quality told in the end.

The worry for me was that quite a number of players looked tired towards the end and with a turnaround of just 66 hours before the home game against Stoke City on Saturday, it looks very much like that Alex Neil will rest most of those who took part in this game and bring back most of the XI who did such a good job down in Norwich last Saturday.

It was an unfortunate defeat if only for the fact that a pay-per-view game against Manchester United would have drawn in plenty of subscribers at a tenner each with the income split 50/50 between both teams.

Anyway that has been and gone and we must get to work on ensuring our first league victory of the season when Michael O’Neill’s charges are the visitors on Saturday.

A win against the Potters and it won’t have been a bad start to the season in my opinion.