Lewis Dunk is and has been a giant for Albion.

Now the challenge is to prove they can win without him after a game-changing red card.

The Seagulls were flying towards safety when his textbook header sent them into a 13th-minute lead at Wolves.

They were camped within 30 yards or so of their own goal once he saw red for a tug on Fabio Silva.

Should the skipper have let Silva go? Maybe – but it is so easy to say that after the event.

Hard though the ten men battled, as resilient as they were in throwing bodies in the way of the ball, there was an increasing inevitability about Wolves getting back into the game from that point on.

That they left it to so late for Morgan Gibbs-White to score the winner just added to the agony.

WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT REPORTED BISSOUMA TRANSFER REQUEST

Neal Maupay’s needless red card after full-time rounded things off.

Albion will in all likelihood still be safe at some point.

Had they made more of their first-half control the job would be done already.

If they DO still need a win to make sure next week, they must do without their top scorer - and their top man.

Dunk and Maupay each face two-game absences.

What we saw at Molineux was not an unfamiliar script in many ways for Albion this season.

But this time they took it to extremes.