Derby County Under 18s’ FA Youth Cup adventure came to an abrupt end with a 2-0 defeat to Brighton & Hove Albion on Wednesday evening.

In a game that the Rams struggled to take control of, two first half strikes from Danny Mandriou and a Joe Bateman own goal saw Justin Walker and Rory Delap’s side exit the competition in the third round.The Rams’ closest chance came in the second half via Jahvan Davidson-Miller, but the forward saw his effort cleared off the line by a superb diving header from Albion defender Owen Moore.The first half of this meeting saw Derby start brightly as they carved out the first real chance of the game courtesy of Cameron Cresswell. A quickly taken corner from the visitors was cleared straight to their top scorer Cresswell and his well struck volley forced a good save from Brighton goalkeeper Tom McGill.However, Brighton took the lead midway through the first half. A well timed through ball by Luis Garcia sent Aaron Connolly through on goal, but before Connolly could shoot Derby’s Cain Thomas bought Connolly down in the box and received a yellow card for the foul.Brighton’s top scorer, Mandriou, stepped up and calmly placed his penalty past the Rams’ goalkeeper Matt Yates for his fifth goal of the season.The visitors almost had an immediate opportunity to get level after McGill was adjudged to have handed the ball just outside his 18-yard area.From the resulting free kick, the Derby centre half, Thomas, came close to putting his side level, but his header from a Cresswell free kick was comfortably stopped by Brighton ‘keeper McGill.Brighton nearly got their second shortly after with half time looming. It started out with a clever pass from Mandriou, whose back heel sent David Ajiboye down the right wing. His cross was then finished off by the unfortunate Derby skipper Bateman, who put it past his own goalkeeper.Connolly then found himself through on goal again just before the interval. Yates was quickly able to run out and prevent the Brighton forward from making it three.Shortly after the restart, Mandriou again sent Connolly clear on goal. The forward selfishly shot instead of squaring it to either Max Sanders or Garcia, who were both in acres of space. Connolly’s effort was saved for a corner – from which Danny Barker, the Brighton captain, cracked the top of the crossbar.The home side controlled the early phases of the second half. Ajiboye nearly got himself on the scoresheet, but he was unable to steer his back-post header on target that come from a well worked cross from Garcia.Barker later saw a headed effort cleared off the line by Derby defender Jayden Bogle.Garcia stood out for Brighton throughout the match. He came close to adding his name to the scoresheet after a quick one-two, Garcia cut inside and beat Bogle. His shot, however, hit the side netting and he was unable to finish off a very well worked attack.The result means that the Seagulls will face a home tie against Cambridge United on the 14th of January at 7pm.McGill, Davies, O’Sullivan, Molumby, Barker (C), Moore, Ajiboye, Sanders, Connolly, Mandroiu, GarciaCochrane, Bentley, Hutchinson, Ljubicic, CashmanYates, Bogle, Thorne, Mills, Bateman, Thomas, Mitchell-Lawson, Haywood, Davidson-Miller, Bird, CresswellEdwards, Fryatt, Wise, Rashid, JiboduTweets by @ dcfcofficial