Everyone connected with the Albion must be thrilled by their highly-encouraging start to life back in Division One after a ten-year absence.

The 3-1 win at Burnley on the opening day raised a lot of eyebrows among football observers and left fans dreaming of another successful season.

After all if the Albion can outplay a team on the brink of the play-offs last term, how hard can life in the second tier of English football be?

Martin Hinshelwood's men followed up the Burnley win with a point at home to Coventry and the Seagulls were unbeaten going in to this afternoon's tricky game at home to Norwich.

Brighton have made an impressive start. Hinsh will be delighted with a return of four points from their first two games although he would have taken a draw away and hoped to win at home.

Importantly Bobby Zamora has got on the scoresheet which will do his confidence good as he adapts to a higher level of football.

I wasn't at all surprised to hear that Tottenham boss Glenn Hoddle was at Withdean watching Bobby in mid-week. He is the first top-flight boss this season to run the rule over Albion's hitman but he certainly won't be the last.

Sixty-three goals in the last two seasons is a tremendous achievement and I have no doubt Zamora will continue to find the net regularly this season.

The next obstacle facing Bobby and his team-mates is how they respond to a sticky patch. When any team has a bad run or suffers a couple of defeats, it is how they bounce back that determines more about a side.

Hinshelwood's qualities will be imperative in this respect. I stated last week that he was a good, experienced player who will be a popular choice among the squad and the lads will want to play for him.

Those qualities and the fact the Brighton players are such a close bunch on and off the pitch will stand the team in good stead during any forthcoming blips.

The other talking point from the Coventry match was the decision to re-call wantaway defender Danny Cullip at the expense of Adam Hinshelwood who performed so admirably at Turf Moor.

Cullip was unavailable for the curtain-raiser up north because he was ill and his 18-year-old understudy must be disappointed to drop down to the bench after doing so well.

The manager has clearly gone for experience and I think he made the right judgement, not because Cullip is a good defender but because young players need to be kept on their toes to maintain their concentration.

Look at Pompey left back Matthew Taylor who was being hailed as the next England left back following his successful debut at home to Forest.

What happened in midweek? Taylor gifted Peter Ndlovu a goal at Bramall Lane.

Feuds do go on in football and I wasn't the least bit surprised to read about Roy Keane's pre-meditated foul on Alf-Inge Haaland.

When I was at Watford I waited a year to nail Sheffield Wednesday's Peter Shirtliff after he put me out of action for six weeks.

In our home game against Wednesday a year later I was on Shirtliff as soon as he touched the ball, I went steaming in and caught him so hard he landed in the dugout. Footballers were a lot tougher back then and he got back up and played on.

Saturday August 17