Summary Newcastle need to bin an underperforming £15m flop after his poor display against Brighton. He looked out of his depth, losing 100% of his aerial duels throughout the contest. The player has only featured 17 times in the Premier League since signing for the Toon.

Newcastle United's start to the season went from bad to worse on Saturday evening as they fell to their third defeat in four Premier League matches.

After losing consecutive matches against Manchester City and Liverpool, Brighton supplied their next test, and it was one they failed dramatically as Evan Ferguson's superb hat-trick inflicted a 3-1 defeat.

While losing three matches on the bounce is far from ideal preparation ahead of their Champions League campaign, it's the manner of those defeats that will worry Eddie Howe the most.

Newcastle were one of the strongest defences in the league last season, ranking second for expected goals conceded (41.86) and joint-best for goals conceded with Man City (33).

During this season, however, the Magpies have come under scrutiny for their disorganization at the back and severe lack of communication which has seen them gift the opposition opportunities at will.

It was Nick Pope who set the tone for their wobbly display at the Amex as the goalkeeper made multiple errors for Brighton's first goal, spilling Billy Gilmour's shot before Ferguson clinically finished the rebound.

For their second, Ferguson was afforded time and space deep into Newcastle's half as the lack of closing down encouraged the Irishman to shoot, and he duly obliged by curling a shot into the bottom right corner from distance.

He completed his hat-trick five minutes later as his strike from outside the box took a wicked deflection off Fabian Schar, who made a half-hearted attempt to block the shot, inadvertently sending it past a hapless Pope.

Following a pretty dismal performance from Newcastle's defence, Pope, Kieran Trippier, Fabian Schar and Dan Burn were all criticised for their shortcomings defensively, but it was left-back Matt Targett who drew the brunt of that criticism as he put in a performance to forget.

How did Matt Targett perform against Brighton?

Signing from Aston Villa for an initial £15m last summer, Targett arrived with hopes of nailing down a starting spot at left-back, but he only managed 17 appearances in the Premier League last season as the instrumental Burn made that position his own.

With Targett forced into being a bit-part player for the club, it became apparent that he was out of favour under Howe as he preferred to start a natural centre-back, Burn, over a player brought in for big money to play that role.

In an interview with the Chronicle Live during the club's pre-season tour of the US, Howe commented on the left-back competition, stating: "I would not say he wasn't at the same level (as his first season) last season. I think the difficulty was Dan Burn got in the team and our defensive record was excellent and I didn't want to change it."

While Howe was unwilling to change a winning formula, injury to centre-back Sven Botman, who has been a revelation since signing for around £35m last summer, forced the Newcastle manager into a reshuffle and this was perhaps the catalyst to their defensive downfall.

Targett was a major culprit for that downfall as the 6-foot dud fell short in most of his defensive metrics, losing all of his aerial duels, making zero interceptions and only making one tackle, as per Sofascore.

The Chronicle's Lee Ryder summarised his afternoon to forget aptly: "Handed his chance but never made the most of it. A miserable night capped by late withdrawal." It it precisely for that reason that he deserves as much of the criticism as Pope received.

Struggling to live with live wire Solly March meant Targett was pinned back in his own half, rarely grasping the opportunity to maraud forward and provide quality in the final third, demonstrated by the fact he made zero accurate crosses, successful dribbles and big chances created.

On the basis of that abysmal performance, the 27-year-old has seen an opportunity to become a mainstay in Newcastle's team slip by, and Howe could now look to throw left-back 18-year-old Lewis Hall into the fold, ruthlessly ditching Targett in the process.