Wearside will always be a special place for James Milner. On Boxing Day 2002 he scored his first Premier League goal for Leeds here, at the age of 16 years and 356 days. Who, back then, could possibly have imagined that the 40-year-old Milner would have been back at the Stadium of Light on Saturday as an impressive part of Fabian Hürzeler’s Brighton midfield?

He played the entire game too, helping guide the 33-year-old Hürzeler’s team to their first win at Sunderland since 1981 as Régis Le Bris’s injury-hit side could find no riposte to Yankuba Minteh’s fortuitous second-half winner.

Wearside will always be a special place for James Milner. On Boxing Day 2002 he scored his first Premier League goal for Leeds here, at the age of 16 years and 356 days. Who, back then, could possibly have imagined that the 40-year-old Milner would have been back at the Stadium of Light on Saturday as an impressive part of Fabian Hürzeler’s Brighton midfield?

He played the entire game too, helping guide the 33-year-old Hürzeler’s team to their first win at Sunderland since 1981 as Régis Le Bris’s injury-hit side could find no riposte to Yankuba Minteh’s fortuitous second-half winner.

Wearside will always be a special place for James Milner. On Boxing Day 2002 he scored his first Premier League goal for Leeds here, at the age of 16 years and 356 days. Who, back then, could possibly have imagined that the 40-year-old Milner would have been back at the Stadium of Light on Saturday as an impressive part of Fabian Hürzeler’s Brighton midfield?

He played the entire game too, helping guide the 33-year-old Hürzeler’s team to their first win at Sunderland since 1981 as Régis Le Bris’s injury-hit side could find no riposte to Yankuba Minteh’s fortuitous second-half winner.