Match Report: Oldham 1 Albion 3

"If we perform like that throughout the season then we won't go far," he warned.

What more could he ask, you may ask, than an away win on the opening day with his two new loan rangers supplying the goals?

Coppell has never been one for hype. He keeps a level head, win or lose.

The result, in his words, "flattered" his team and he went further.

"That was probably the worst we have played, including pre-season games," he claimed.

Coppell's comments arguably did not do justice to the efforts of his players in searing heat, but his scepticism was in some respects understandable.

Nobody should need reminding that an identical result at nearby Burnley a year ago proved a false dawn for his predecessor Martin Hinshelwood.

Visiting Oldham with the sun still burning brightly worked in Albion's favour as well. Better that than in the depths of winter.

Boundary Park can be a bleak outpost, as Albion discovered on their previous visit when they were soundly beaten on their way to winning the Second Division.

More to the point, Iain Dowie will have sorted Oldham out a few months into the season, not enough to repeat last season's play-off place perhaps but certainly enough to avoid any relegation worries.

The Latics are still in disarray following their summer brush with extinction and the exodus of their best players, sold off behind Dowie's back by ex-chairman Chris Moore.

As late as Friday he made five signings to boost his depleted squad. One of them, youth coach John Sheridan, retired in April.

Oh and I forgot to mention a crippling injury list, which ruled out club captain David Eyres and worsened in the first half as Will Haining and Chris Killen were hospitalised.

Nothing, however, bonds quite like adversity. With desperation often comes inspiration, as Albion themselves demonstrated so memorably six years ago.

In this sense it was a great result for the Seagulls, one which I suspect will look better and better as the season progresses.

Their own sequence emphasises how difficult it is to win at Boundary Park.

Albion were never quite in control of the contest to the extent the scoreline suggests. Almost every match has a turning point and one arrived as early as the 23rd minute.

Referee Eddie Ilderton controversially ruled that Danny Boshell handled a Paul Watson cross.

The decision did not impress a joker in the press box when somebody asked where the ref was from. "Brighton!" he replied.

Darius Henderson seized the opportunity to celebrate his debut with a goal, winning a battle with Leon Knight to take the ensuing penalty and despatching it with admirable aplomb.

Coppell admitted: "We were certainly not playing well when we got the penalty.

"We were responding to them rather than doing anything ourselves. The penalty gave us a boost and knocked them down."

Oldham were knocked down further when the predatory Knight, all 64 inches of him, planted a precise downward header into the bottom corner from Richard Carpenter's pinpoint centre a minute before the break.

It was the perfect repost to Oldham fans with long memories. They were giving Knight stick because he had been sent-off after two minutes for a stray elbow when playing against them for Huddersfield two seasons ago.

Oldham rallied courageously at the start of the second half, but Knight destroyed their comeback hopes with another piece of aerial opportunism from a move straight off the training ground.

Watson, rediscovering his set piece accuracy, picked out Danny Cullip with a free-kick as the captain peeled away at the far post.

His header across the face of goal was missed by a couple of team-mates but not Knight, sprawling to conquer from close range.

The great imponderable with Albion this season is up front. If Henderson and Knight stay together they could replace the 40 goals Steve Coppell reckons Bobby Zamora would have scored and created, but as things stand Henderson has 25 days left and Knight a month longer.

Elsewhere the squad has a solid look. Dean Blackwell's pre-season injury was a blow and on Saturday Coppell went for the extra security of three central defenders, young Adam Hinshelwood and Kerry Mayo joining Cullip.

Ben Roberts, preferred to Michel Kuipers in goal, made a brilliant one-handed stop in the second half while Hinshelwood fitted in like an old hand again, although he was at fault for Paul Murray's headed consolation with eight minutes left.

Hinshelwood held his hand up for misjudging the bounce of the ball before it reached Murray. "A more seasoned player would have blamed the sun or something," Coppell observed.

It made the scoreline the same as when Albion last won at Oldham in 1979. Ward, Rollings and Ryan were on the scoresheet then and they went on to win the Second Division but shush, don't tell Coppell!

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