Grealish rescues draw for Aston Villa at Brighton
BRIGHTON, England (AP) — Jack Grealish rescued a 1-1 draw for relegation-threatened Aston Villa at Brighton in the Premier League on Saturday.
Grealish scored his seventh league goal of the season in the 75th minute to earn 18th-place Villa a point. He’s now scored in four consecutive games against Brighton.
Brighton had earlier taken the lead in the 38th when Leandro Trossard scored.
Pepe Reina started his first game as Villa goalkeeper on loan from AC Milan and made a superb acrobatic save late on to stop a shot from Neal Maupay, who earlier assisted Trossard’s goal for Brighton.
Villa handed a Premier League debut to the 18-year-old American forward Indiana Vassilev as a 67th-minute substitute.
Vassilev, from Savannah, Georgia, had made previous brief appearances for Villa in cup competitions and also scored six goals in 13 games in the Premier League 2 reserve competition. Vassilev struggled to make his mark against a Brighton defense which twice caught him offside.