The Australian stopper praised his fellow Socceroo for a fantastic showing in the 3-0 win at the Amex, and stressed that there’s more to come from the midfielder.
He said, “He’s demonstrated his ability time and time again already at this level with Huddersfield, and with my experiences of playing with and against him, you can see his quality.
“That was probably his best performance for us, but it’s normal that players take time to settle when they come into a new environment.
“He’s getting better with every week and his contribution at the end of the season will be a big one, I have no doubt about that.”
An early goal from Neal Maupay and Aaron Connolly's brace sealed the three points for the Seagulls on another memorable afternoon at the Amex, and Ryan says that the result is a reward for the side sticking with their game plan despite a tough recent run of results.
“It just goes to show how hard you have to work to be successful at this level and the standards you have to set throughout,” he continued.
“It’s been a bit tough recently until now, that naturally brings pressure externally, but internally we’ve been sticking with it and working hard to turn things around.
“I didn’t feel like we’d been getting the rub of the green, but we didn’t do anything differently coming into the game.
“We’ve been learning the hard way up until now that the little moments can be so important, and I’m just happy with the clean sheet and thought the whole defence did really well.”
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Connolly’s brace came on his first Premier League start, catching admirers aplenty and resulting in the forward getting the call-up for the Republic of Ireland senior squad on Saturday evening. The keeper praised the exploits of both Connolly and Steven Alzate since the pair entered the first-team fold ahead of the campaign.
“Aaron and Steve have been involved with us from day one this term, and it’s a trend that’s becoming more common throughout the Premier League in terms of young players getting a chance.
“The managers seem to be putting faith in youth, and credit to Aaron and Steve, because they have both stepped up and not looked out of place at any time.
“I’m really happy that Aaron took his chances, and Steve obviously produced that superb performance away to Newcastle on his first start too – that speaks volumes and they’ve both done really well.
“Credit to both of them because they gave everything, as did the whole team, and it was a great day for the club.”