fter 90 goalless minutes and 5 penalties apiece, there may be nothing to separate League One strugglers Charlton and Premier League flavour of the month Brighton at The Valley.
Their Carabao Cup last-16 tie goes into sudden loss of life and, after Tariq Lamptey scores for the Seagulls, it falls on Steven Sessegnon, who has by no means taken a penalty in his skilled profession, to attempt to maintain the Addicks within the competitors.
“We had a list of players for the first five and then I just sort of stepped up,” he tells Commonplace Sport. “I took one in a Youth Cup game once and I missed. But we had a few young boys on the pitch at the time, so I felt the need to step up and take one.”
Fortunately, this try ends with extra success, Jason Steele diving out of the way in which of a spot-kick lifted good of centre. Moises Caicedo misses for Brighton, earlier than Samuel Lavelle takes his decisive penalty the way in which all centre-halves ought to to ship Charlton, in disarray off the sphere, into the quarter-finals, the place tonight they face Manchester United.
“It felt like it was written in the stars in that game, because they had so many chances,” Sessegnon says. “It was a real graft and we sort of accepted what the game would be like even before we got to the stadium. We knew we were going to have to sit in, not have much possession and defend for our lives. It was around the 75th or 80th minute that we started to think, ‘Okay, if we can see this out we’ve got a chance to win on penalties’. That’s exactly what happened.”
The rearguard has given Sessegnon and his team-mates “real belief” that they will spring an upset tonight at Outdated Trafford, a venue which was as soon as an annual cease on the Premier League circuit for Charlton, however one the place they haven’t performed since relegation in 2007. “I’m glad I can be a part of it, to take Charlton fans, especially the young ones who have never experienced it, to a Premier League stadium,” says Sessegnon. “We’re going to really give it a go.”
The 22-year-old believes the Brighton victory is chargeable for sparking the current upturn within the membership’s League type, the Addicks having climbed away from the relegation zone and into the highest half of the desk after taking seven factors from 4 video games since Christmas underneath new supervisor Dean Holden.
Holden is an avid United fan and Sessegnon jokes that he “hopes not” when requested whether or not any extra could be lurking within the away dressing room this night. Holden’s affect thus far has been encouraging, however Sessegnon nonetheless has regrets over the sacking of his predecessor, Ben Garner, who performed a big half in his arrival on mortgage from Fulham and began Charlton’s Cup run.
“It wasn’t nice to see,” he provides. “We players had to take responsibility. I didn’t feel like we were far off it in terms of how he wanted to play. We’d lose ourselves in some moments of a game, for five or 10 minutes, and you can lose a game just like that. We let ourselves down.”
Sessegnon went near League One promotion on mortgage at Plymouth final time period, however after Fulham have been promoted again to the highest flight in Might, the choice to exit on mortgage once more this season was, he says, not a troublesome one.
“We had a very honest conversation,” he says of final summer time’s talks with Fulham and Marco Silva. “It was unrealistic for me to try and fight for a place for where Fulham were trying to get to. Accepting reality and accepting where I’m at is best in terms of my development.”
