Oscar Garcia relishing play-off challenge

Brighton head coach Oscar Garcia remained tight-lipped regarding team news ahead of their Championship play-off semifinal at home to Derby on Thursday night. But Garcia thinks that it is big fixtures that provide real motivation, he said: “we are in football to play these kind of games, as a manager, as a player, and everybody needs to enjoy it.”

Albion will be looking to exorcise their demons when they face Steve McClaren’s side at the Amex tomorrow evening. Brighton lost both league meetings with Derby earlier in the season and are definite underdogs going into the play-off showdown. It’s shaping up to be a great battle for the neutral; Derby are the highest scoring team in the league while Albion have the second best defence.

Brighton scraped into the play-offs in dramatic fashion with a last-gasp header from Leo Ulloa against Nottingham Forest. The Seagulls’ chances of making the end of season face-off depended on them bettering Reading’s result against Premier League bound Burnley. As full time blew on a 2-2 draw between Reading and Burnley, Brighton were being held 1-1 at Forest’s City Ground – it seemed Brighton were to miss their chance.

But, the final day of the season always seems to conjure an extra bit of magic that calls on certain players to write their own script. Like all great stories, Albion waited until stoppage time for Craig Mackail-Smith to float a perfectly timed cross that met Ulloa’s glancing forehead and sent the travelling fans into pandemonium.

Despite the dramatic circumstances Oscar Garcia wasn’t surprised that Albion got the result they needed. He stated: “We showed great character, we never gave up, but it’s a characteristic of this team, for me it wasn’t a surprise that we will be fighting until the end.”