On paper, they should fail. That’s what the laws of football say. Brighton is a club on the south coast of England. They have never won major titles, like Liverpool and Manchester United. They can’t afford to buy stars, and the talents they have are drifting away. Just since last summer they have lost: Five key players The coach The sporting director The head of recruitment Where the rich teams spend billions on players every year, Brighton has earned around 2 billion in 18 months. Logic tells us that teams that lose their stars weaken. But Brighton is getting better. Always. In 2021–22, they managed ninth place in the Premier League. So they lost five stars, the coach and the sports director … and came in sixth place. Now, before Saturday’s tough meeting away to league champions Manchester City, they are number six again. The coach of Greek side AEK Athens, Matías Almeyda, who recently met them in the Europa League, says Brighton play the most beautiful football in the world. One could well call Brighton the country’s smartest club. Especially in the last year, fans, press and rivals have been wondering the same thing: How on earth do they do it? Cold and merciless The question leads us to the owner, Tony Bloom, who is called “the lizard”. Often the managers of major football clubs are presidents, American investors or figures linked to Arab royal families. Bloom is a local gambler who has won $3.8 million as a poker player. The name “the lizard” comes from how cold and merciless he is as soon as the cards are dealt. CHAIRMAN OF THE FAVORITE CLUB: Tony bloom, also called “the lizard”, is an important piece in Brighton’s success. Photo: GLYN KIRK / AFP In 2006, he started Starlizard, a company that provides gamblers with data about sports. It studies trends, injuries, history, morale in the stable, track conditions – everything that can give punters an advantage. In 2009, he became chairman of his favorite club Brighton, in a liberal and artistic city without the same tradition for football as Liverpool, Manchester and London. Brighton played in tier three in front of 6,000 spectators. Today they play in the Premier League in front of 30,000. – There have been parts of poker that have helped me make decisions as the owner of a football club. Especially calculated risk, Bloom has told the British newspaper The Times. What is Bloom’s secret? Brian Owen, who has covered Brighton for the local newspaper The Argus since 2006, has no doubts. – The key is recruitment, both on and off the pitch, Owen says to news. Bloom himself is even more blunt: – If you don’t recruit well, you move down. The secret algorithm He has had to replace many names. Last summer, Brighton lost midfield boss Yves Bissouma to Tottenham, and then successful coach Graham Potter left for Chelsea, along with five of his assistants, plus head of recruitment Paul Winstanley … and left-back Marc Cucurella. Newcastle secured the sporting director, Dan Ashworth. In January, Brighton sold top scorer Leandro Trossard to Arsenal. Many feared that the team would collapse. – I thought a bit the same myself, says Ronny Aukrust to news. He is the leader of Brighton’s Norwegian supporters’ club, The Seagulls Norway, and has seen many of his favorites leave for richer clubs. – It is tough. You know how much value they have in Brighton, and then you have to trust that we can play in the same way with a new and unknown player. I always think, “Will we be able to make it, or is it now starting to go downhill?”. Brighton didn’t just find replacements who were equally good. They were better. They brought in Roberto De Zerbi, the coach who had left Ukrainian side Shakhtar Donetsk because of the war. And Kaoru Mitoma, a winger from Japan who suddenly became one of the league’s best. And Julio Enciso, a 19-year-old magician from Paraguay. And Moisés Caicedo, a young midfielder from Ecuador who became a superstar overnight. Even non-player Brighton fully understands how it works. – It’s amazing how they find these players, says winger Solly March to The Daily Mail newspaper. IMPORTANT WING: Kaoru Mitoma is one of the league’s best, running up and down the flank. Photo: David Cliff / AP It helps that Starlizard has a database of information about players from around the world. The company can predict whether talents from Japan and Ecuador will strike in England. Owen points out that Bloom also understands how to interpret the numbers. – You can find a lot of good information about players, but then the question is what do you do with it, says Owen. – Have you got the hang of what Bloom’s algorithms are about? – No no no. I don’t think anyone will be able to do that, says Owen. That’s something people misunderstand, adds Owen. In England, few had heard of Mitoma and Caicedo before they came to Brighton. But in their countries they were famous. – Brighton can’t find these players on the loop in Paraguay or pub teams in Ecuador, says Owen. But if these talents are so famous, why is it always Brighton who get their hands on them? Cheap sale In today’s football, most people know most things. Teams spend fortunes on scouts, databases and analytics tools to find the next star. When Caicedo played in Ecuador, The New York Times writes, he was on the radar of teams such as Manchester United, Chelsea and AC Milan. Nevertheless, Caicedo went to Brighton. For change. THE CHASE: Caicedo was wanted by several big clubs, but chose Brighton, despite the fact that the money was nothing to brag about. Photo: TOBY MELVILLE / Reuters Head of recruitment Paul Jewell says they tell players they can go to bigger clubs but that Brighton will give them the chance to develop in the first team. Get good with us first, they say, and then you can go to your dream team. But there is something more behind the success. – They don’t need confirmation that the player will succeed in Europe, says Tor-Kristian Karlsen to news. Having spent 20 years as chief scout and sporting director for a number of European clubs, he has noticed one particular advantage Brighton have. Bigger teams like Liverpool and Manchester United often sign young players who have had one or two good seasons in a minor league in Europe. This increases the chance that they will strike in the Premier League. But the wait has its price. Last summer, Benfica bought midfielder Enzo Fernández from Argentine River Plate for around NOK 185 million, according to transfer guru Fabrizio Romano. A little more than six months later, Chelsea bought him for NOK 1.3 billion. So Brighton takes the place of Benfica. They become a link between other continents and the elite in Europe. They brought in Mitoma from Kawasaki Frontale, Enciso from Libertad and Caicedo from Independiente del Valle. This way they can buy cheap and sell expensive. The partner in Belgium So one can ask: Why don’t the big teams do the same? There are several reasons, says Karlsen. Although Caicedo was good when he arrived at Brighton, he was not ready for the first team. At United, where the pressure is enormous, many had expected Caicedo to help the A team straight away. Brighton gave him time, says Karlsen. – They think that if he doesn’t strike straight away, then everything will be fine. We will wait until next season, then we will use this season to get him into the environment, teach him the language and train him. Those who follow Brighton understand this approach. This includes the press. At United, the media circus is constant. – It is a very disturbing element, and it gives it a great advantage if you are shielded from it, says Karlsen. Bloom has another ace up his sleeve. In 2018, he bought the Belgian club Union Saint-Gilloise, which has since moved up to the top level. Karlsen says that Bloom has used the team to test ideas that can later be used in Brighton. Union also gives Brighton the opportunity to loan out players who are not ready for the Premier League. Mitoma went there on loan almost as soon as he arrived in England. Brighton could decide how much he played, an advantage they had lost by sending him to another club. These factors create the right conditions for talent to succeed in Brighton. Karlsen has read that United apparently want to copy Brighton’s recruitment. – That’s all well and good, but that doesn’t mean that Caicedo had succeeded at Old Trafford, he says. Did the Norwegian coach rate Are there more secrets? In August, The New York Times went to Brighton to ask the general manager, Paul Barber, who has been there since 2012. – Everything is in there, Barber replied. And then he pointed to a laptop. It contained a document listing replacements for at least 25 of the most important players and managers at the club. If one disappeared, Barber knew who he would bring in. If a star was on his way out, he would bring in a new player before the sale. – There is nothing worse than making a big sale and then using the money to shop, said Barber, who knows that selling clubs can then push up the price. BEFORE WAS: They have been prepared and cunning. If one disappeared, they knew who to bring in. Photo: PETER CZIBORRA / Reuters In recent years, the timing has been perfect. When Potter left last year, it took 10 days for De Zerbi to arrive. Caicedo replaced Bissouma, Mitoma replaced Trossard. Barber even has a list of replacements for himself. But Tony Bloom is the exception. – He is the only one who cannot go, said Barber. Brighton signed De Zerbi because he has a style of play similar to that of Potter. – We don’t want to build a stable of players that is designed for one coach, and then he leaves, and then we have to build a completely new stable for another coach. Our challenge is to develop from coach to coach with roughly the same stable, said Barber. Journalist Brian Owen recalls that Brighton have often thought outside the box when choosing coaches. Bloom has gambled on Gus Poyet, who had never worked as a head coach before; Oscar Garcia and Sami Hyypiä, who had never worked in England; and Potter, who had spent almost his entire coaching career in Sweden. De Zerbi had worked in Italy and Ukraine. According to the website The Athletic, Brighton should have considered Kjetil Knutsen, the successful coach of Bodø/Glimt, before they went for De Zerbi. – If you just copy what the big teams do, but with less money, then you will never succeed, says Owen. The man in black who sees red De Zerbi has been a revelation. The Italian with the spike weld always wears black, and is one of the most active coaches on the sidelines in the Premier League. Last season he received four yellow and two red cards for protests and slapping his lips. Brighton play like a big team, with a lot of possession and high pressure. De Zerbi wants them to “lure” the rivals forward into the pitch, so that Brighton have more space to attack. He asks the players to step on the ball with the sole because he believes it tempts the opponents to press. Manchester City’s genius coach, Pep Guardiola, says he studies De Zerbi to learn. – He is one of the most influential coaches of the last 20 years, says Guardiola. A REVELATION: De Zerbi has taken Brighton to new heights, that even Guardiola is impressed. Photo: Alastair Grant / AP This summer, Brighton lost a new group of stars: Alexis Mac Allister left for Liverpool, before Chelsea bought goalkeeper Robert Sánchez and golden boy Caicedo. The latter cost them NOK 1.5 billion. But Brighton are in sixth place, four points behind the top. They are fighting for a place in the Champions League. Even Bloom says he is surprised at how good they are. The downside is that De Zerbi is being linked to big clubs such as City, Juventus and Real Madrid. Barber dreams of a time when Brighton manages to hold on to its best. But until that happens – if it happens – the question is how long they can lose their heroes and still hang on at the top. Supporter leader Ronny Aukrust says that one cannot expect more than sixth place. That alone is a small miracle, and if the team manages to establish itself among the top 10, he says, then they should be well satisfied. How long does he think Brighton can keep this going? – I don’t know, says Aukrust. – I just hope that the caramel lasts a long time.
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The football team that sells its best players – and gets even better – news Sport – Sports news, results and broadcasting schedule
