Soccer Football - Premier League - Brighton & Hove Albion v Wolverhampton Wanderers - The American Express Community Stadium, Brighton, Britain - April 29, 2023 Brighton & Hove Albion's Pascal Gross celebrates after the match REUTERS/Toby Melville
BRIGHTON, England (Reuters) -Brighton & Hove Albion crushed a woeful Wolverhampton Wanderers 6-0 in the Premier League on Saturday, with Deniz Undav, Pascal Gross and Danny Welbeck all scoring two goals each to earn the Seagulls their biggest top-flight victory.
The win was a welcome boost for manager Roberto de Zerbi after a week in which his team were beaten on penalties by Manchester United in the FA Cup semi-finals and lost 3-1 to struggling Nottingham Forest in the league.
"We suffered a lot in the last two games," the Brighton manager told the BBC. "This answer today was fantastic. Today was my best game as a coach."
Four of the goals came in a frenetic first half, with Undav opening the scoring in the sixth minute when he stuck out his left foot to guide Welbeck's cheeky backheel past Wolves goalkeeper Jose Sa.
Gross doubled the home team's lead seven minutes later, sidefooting Julio Enciso's cross into the roof of the net, and volleyed home Brighton's third in the 26th from another assist by Enciso.
Welbeck killed off any hopes of a Wolves comeback when he outjumped Maximilian Kilman at the back post to head home Pervis Estupinan's cross in the 39th minute and scored again three minutes after halftime from just outside the box.
Brighton got their sixth in the 66th after Sa played a poor ball to Matheus Nunes, who crumbled under pressure from Undav, allowing the German to steal the ball and chip the keeper to seal Wolves' heaviest defeat of the season.
Victory catapulted Brighton back firmly into the race for Europe, with De Zerbi's side staying eighth but cutting the gap to seventh-placed Liverpool to a point with a game in hand.
The Seagulls are also two points behind Aston Villa in sixth spot and fifth-placed Tottenham Hotspur, who have both played two games more.
"I think we deserve to achieve our target, Europe, but we shall see," De Zerbi added. "We can achieve. The most important thing is not to lose our DNA and style."
Wolves stayed 13th in the table on 37 points.
(Reporting by Simon Jennings in Bengaluru; Editing by Hugh Lawson and Ken Ferris)
