Having missed his former side Aston Villa’s 4-0 humbling at the hands of Brighton last time out, Chelsea debutant Emiliano Martínez made his first start of the PL season here against the same opponents.
And after just four minutes, he was celebrating his new club taking the lead when Mats Wieffer blocked Joao Pedro’s goalbound header, only to get caught in a mix-up with Bart Verbruggen, allowing Romeo Lavia to turn home.
Morgan Rogers had assisted more career goals against the Seagulls than any other side, and he added a fifth when Pedro Neto darted into the box to poke his cutback past Verbruggen 10 minutes later.
Brighton were leaking chances, and they were fortunate not to fall further behind as Pedro somehow side-footed wide after excellent wing play from Neto.
Aside from a relatively simple catch from Malick Yalcouye’s volley on the stretch, Martinez had been virtually untroubled by the time Chelsea added a third with 32 minutes on the clock. This time, Jorrel Hato was at the heart of the attack, marauding forward before teeing up Pedro for his second goal of the campaign.
But Martinez was soon picking the ball out of the net after Yalcouye thrashed a volley in off the post to extend Chelsea’s PL run to 18 games without a clean sheet.
That goal gave the visitors a lifeline, and they should have reduced the arrears further after the break when Diego Gomez sent a bullet header narrowly wide from a set-piece delivery.
At the other end, Cole Palmer failed to turn in a whipped ball from point-blank range, which came back to bite his side with just over an hour played.
A rifled effort from Gomez forced Martínez into a smart stop, yet there was nothing he could do as the resulting corner led to a Pascal Gross square ball being inadvertently diverted in by Pedro.
However, a triple change from Alonso regained control of the contest, and Palmer bent a delicate effort beyond Verbruggen’s reach to restore their two-goal advantage.
That was until Gross cleverly nodded home in stoppage time, but it was too late to affect the result.
Victory marks Chelsea's second home win to open a PL season in the last eight years (D4, L2), laying down a marker for the rest of the campaign, having netted a league-high seven goals en route to maximum points thus far.
Meanwhile, for Brighton, it’s back down to earth after their fast start last week.
Flashscore Man of the Match: Malick Yalcouye (Brighton)