Brighton beat Arsenal 3-0 to end the champions' nine-game Premier League winning run

Brighton beat Arsenal 3-0 at the Amex on Saturday 19 September 2026, ending in one afternoon both of the runs the 2025/26 Premier League champions had brought to the south coast: nine consecutive league wins and seven victories from seven matches this season. Pascal Gross, Charalampos Kostoulas and Chema Andrés scored for Fabian Hürzeler's side, on the day the club marked 125 years since its first professional match.

A fast start from the hosts

Brighton set about Arsenal from the kick-off. They pressed high and won the ball in the opposition half, and in the opening minutes Ferdi Kadıoğlu shot over from outside the area before Kostoulas forced David Raya into a fingertip save. By Arsenal's own account, Mikel Arteta's side needed at least 15 minutes to make any headway into Brighton territory.

Arsenal did settle midway through the half. Christos Tzolis ran on to a Bukayo Saka pass on the break but was dispossessed by Luka Vušković before he could shoot. The breakthrough came at the other end after 31 minutes: Gross found space on the right side of the box and struck a low right-footed shot that went in off the post.

Yasin Ayari then hit the angle of post and bar, and Arsenal wasted their best chance of the half when Martin Ødegaard's deflected effort fell to Saka in the area, only for the forward, off balance, to scuff his shot into Bart Verbruggen's arms. Within seconds, Verbruggen had rolled the ball out to Andrés, space opened up and Kostoulas drove a low shot from the edge of the box into Raya's corner. It was 2-0 on the stroke of half-time.

A third goal, and no reply

Arteta made no changes at half-time, the BBC noted, and the response he wanted never came. Kostoulas dragged a shot wide early in the second half, and after 57 minutes Gross swung in a corner from the left, Raya failed to reach it and Andrés, unmarked, headed in off the inside of the post. It was his first goal for the club, on his first league start.

Pascal Struijk, making his first Premier League start for Brighton since his summer move from Leeds, almost added a fourth from another corner. Arteta turned to his bench, and substitute Viktor Gyökeres produced Arsenal's best opening of the afternoon, a ball over the top that sent Kai Havertz through one on one. Verbruggen saved. At the other end Raya kept the score down, twice denying substitute Matt O'Riley late on.

The runs that ended at the Amex

For Arsenal, the cost of the afternoon was considerable. They arrived with nine straight Premier League wins, spanning the end of last season and the start of this one, and with seven wins from seven games in 2026/27 across all competitions. The club's own preview had spelled out what was at stake: victory at the Amex would have equalled Arsenal's record for consecutive wins at the start of a season, set in 1903, and a tenth straight league win would have been their first such run in 24 years. Neither came. It was Arsenal's first league defeat since April, the club said.

A defence that had conceded only once in the first four league games was breached three times in a single afternoon. The BBC's analysis pointed to the detail most likely to trouble Arteta: the first two goals came from shots at the edge of the area where the scorer was given far too much time and space, and the third came from a set piece. Arsenal finished with just two shots on target.

Arteta had made two changes from the 2-0 win at Sunderland the previous weekend, with Bruno Guimarães and Jurriën Timber making their first Premier League starts of 2026/27. Ben White missed out injured and William Saliba was still recovering from a back problem. In the BBC's assessment, Guimarães never clicked with Declan Rice and Ødegaard in midfield.

Brighton: 125 years and 11 goals in a week

For Brighton, the occasion was complete. They wore a commemorative shirt to mark 125 years since their first professional match, in front of a record crowd of 31,944, according to the club. The win capped a week of 11 goals: 5-0 away at Coventry the previous weekend, a 3-2 comeback victory over Manchester United at Old Trafford in the Carabao Cup after trailing 2-0, and now 3-0 against the champions.

Hürzeler's side finished eighth in 2025/26, securing a tenth straight season in the top flight and European football for only the second time in the club's history, before beating Norway's Tromsø 4-0 on aggregate to reach the Conference League league stage. They came into this match as the Premier League's top scorers, according to the BBC, and left it with 16 goals scored and 5 conceded from five games. Aston Villa were their opening-day opponents; Coventry and Arsenal the two most recent.

The three names of the afternoon

Gross, at 35, was the conductor. The German, who rejoined Brighton from Borussia Dortmund in January, now has four goals in his last five games, according to the BBC, and he also delivered the corner for the third. Kostoulas, a 19-year-old Greece international, scored in a third successive game as he bids to become Brighton's main striker following Danny Welbeck's summer move to Chelsea. Andrés, a Spaniard, marked his first league start with a goal.

The starting line-ups are those released by Arsenal before kick-off, and Brighton's substitutions follow the home club's report. Arsenal's own report mentions only Gyökeres coming on, so the table lists no other changes for the visitors.

How the table looked

The defeat left Arsenal second on 12 points at the end of the match, level with Manchester City but behind on goal difference, having played a game more: City were scheduled to host Sunderland on Sunday 20 September. Brighton rose to third on 10 points, two behind the top two. The table below shows the top five immediately after the game at the Amex.

What the managers said

On the eve of the game Hürzeler had described Arsenal as maybe the best team in England and said he believed Brighton had a chance of winning. Arteta, for his part, had praised the work of his opposite number and predicted a beautiful game to watch. Afterwards, the Arsenal manager told the BBC the defeat was “painful” and “a big lesson to learn”, while Hürzeler urged his players to stay humble.

Brighton's first home win over Arsenal since 2020

The result also ended a recent pattern in the fixture. Arsenal had not lost at Brighton since 2020 and had gone six visits without defeat. Overall they were unbeaten in six Premier League meetings with Brighton, winning four and drawing two, since a 3-0 home defeat at the Emirates in May 2023, the same scoreline as on Saturday.

What comes next

The match completed a run of four consecutive away games for Arsenal in under two weeks and led straight into the international break. According to the club's fixture list, Arsenal's next Premier League match is scheduled for Saturday 10 October, at home to Leeds United. Saturday's referee was Darren England, with Tim Wood on VAR.