The Secret Behind Brighton, the Premier League’s Smartest Team

He cited the example of Moises Caicedo, an Ecuadorean who was brought in as a 19-year-old in 2021 in preparation for the eventual sale of midfielder Yves Bissouma. Had Brighton tried to recruit a replacement after selling Bissouma, Barber said, it probably would have faced paying a higher price, or rejecting one it could not afford.

“There’s nothing worse than doing a big transfer out with funds coming and then going to the market,” he said. Barber can name-check a string of other players already on the club’s books, ready to step in if a similar situation arises, and a line of savvy signings; Brighton, for example, has something many bigger clubs do not: a World Cup champion (the midfielder Alexis Mac Allister).

There are other ways to beat the big clubs to a player, too. Evan Ferguson, a prodigiously gifted 18-year-old striker who had made his professional debut in Ireland at 14, picked Brighton over a host of Premier League suitors in January 2021. He did so, he said, after the club promised him a place on its under-23 squad, which he saw as a more direct path to earning Premier League minutes than a potentially longer (and less assured) route through a top club’s youth teams.

Within a year after joining Brighton, Ferguson had moved onto the first team. This season, he has become a key player in the second half of the campaign. “Here,” he said, “if they think you’re good enough, they’ll give you the opportunity.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/14/sports/soccer/brighton-chelsea-premier-league.html