Aston Villa 2-2 Brighton & Hove Albion

Aston Villa wrapped up the year with a 2-2 draw against Brighton & Hove Albion in their final fixture of 2024.

Morgan Rogers’ well-taken strike early in the second half looked to have secured the spoils until Tariq Lamptey levelled for the Seagulls in the 81^st minute and pegged back the hosts.

Ollie Watkins’ first-half penalty, his eighth goal of the season, had earlier cancelled out Simon Adingra’s strike, with the England international firing over from a corner deep into injury time as a high-tempo, end-to-end encounter finished all square at Villa Park.

A share of the spoils ensures Unai Emery’s side are now unbeaten in nine Premier League matches on home soil and have lost just one of their last 15 in B6.

The Villans, who lost Pau Torres to injury in the first half but welcomed the return of Jacob Ramsey after the break, will look to get back to winning ways against Leicester City on Saturday.

Villa showed three changes from Boxing Day defeat at Newcastle United, as Watkins, Diego Carlos and Leon Bailey came into Emery’s starting XI.

The trio replaced suspended pair Matty Cash and Jhon Durán, while Amadou Onana was named among the substitutes alongside fit-again midfielder Ramsey.

Recent history favoured Villa heading into the encounter having won five of the last six meetings between the two sides, including a 6-1 triumph in last season’s corresponding fixture.

But it was the visitors who opened the scoring early on as Lewis Dunk’s long ball over the top for Joao Pedro dropped in the area for Adingra, who took a touch before firing beyond Emi Martínez.

The hosts suffered another blow shortly afterwards as Torres hobbled off due to injury, replaced by Tyrone Mings.

Villa pressed forward with intent, albeit without testing Bart Verbruggen, while Martínez pushed behind a long-range strike from Julio Enciso, before Jan Paul van Hecke headed narrowly wide from the subsequent corner.

Emery’s side then saw loud penalty appeals waved away after Rogers appeared to be brought down by van Hecke.

Yet, from the following corner, Rogers was again upended, this time by Pedro, and a spot-kick was awarded following a lengthy VAR review – with Watkins sending Verbruggen the wrong way.

Villa continued to pose questions in search of further reward as the clash flowed freely.

But, despite 12 minutes of added time, which saw Watkins head narrowly over from a corner, it remained all square at the interval.

However, all that changed within just two minutes of the restart as Brighton could only half-clear a corner, Kamara’s header dropped to Watkins, who found Rogers with a delightful ball and he fired home a low effort into the far bottom corner.

Watkins headed Lucas Digne’s cross straight at Verbruggen before Pedro fired off target at the other end having been presented with a clear opening.

The clash continued to hang in the balance and it was the visitors who levelled with nine minutes remaining as Pedro laid the ball off for Lamptey to drill a fine strike beyond Martínez.

Having already introduced Ramsey for his return, boss Emery turned to Ian Maatsen, Ross Barkley and Amadou Onana for the final stages.

Villa continued to surge forward in search of all three points and saw Watkins fire over when well placed in added time as the clash finished honours even.