Transcription
Brighton have had three different managers in the past 5 years. They've sold hundreds of millions of pounds worth of players, and they have a wage budget which is below the Premier League average. So, all of this begs the question: how do they keep being so good, and how far can this team go? Well, I'm joined by JJ Bull and football tactics writer Liam Tharm to find out.
Now, Liam, let's start with you. Now, most people will know who Fabian Herzler is by now, but they might not know exactly what he's doing on the pitch, different to previous managers. So, how would you define his Brighton team?
I think one of the most interesting changes is how they're now more similar to how they played under Graham Potter than under Roberto De Zerbi. So, if we take a look here, this is the shape Graham Potter used in his final games at Brighton. He started playing a sort of a variation of a 3-4-3, and over the course of about three seasons, played some various back four shapes. He was really tactically flexible, but he ended with a three-box-three formation, which really got the best out of the players that he had at the time. And the big success within this really was the double pivot in midfield, which was Alexis Mac Allister and Moisés Caicedo, who could be really aggressive and they could sort of break lines. It was great because often they played against a midfield three, and that meant they could overload them. They had an extra body in midfield. The two number 10s could come up nice and close to the striker, who was often Neal Maupay, that would drop in and play back to goal. And one of the real successes was the wing-backs, who were Solly March and Leandro Trossard, that people might know as wingers. Graham Potter never really a fan of wingers, played them on their opposite side. So Solly March, as a left-footer, played on the right-hand side, which might have made him a bit awkward when defending, but when he got up high, was nice and aggressive, could cut inside. Same Leandro Trossard down the left-hand side.
What then changed when De Zerbi arrived?
So, De Zerbi completely changed the system. He brought in the 4-2-3-1 that he'd used really well at Shakhtar Donetsk. He's very much a man wedded to that system, whereas Graham Potter had been more about fitting the system around the players. De Zerbi said, "I'm going to fit the players to the system." So, he kept that sort of double pivot in midfield of Mac Allister and Caicedo, but switched to a back four. And really, his big focus was a lot of short, deep build-up, really trying to get the opposition to press them high and hit the space in behind. So, a lot of the time, they'd be building up with six players really deep, which would be the back four, the two players in midfield, at times they'd drop in, the number 10, they'd drop in, the number nine, and play with the wingers basically up on the touchline, which created sort of a slightly funny-looking shape. But the real focus was on playing through midfield, often sort of these up-back three patterns that we see, where you're trying to go into the pivot, either bouncing it back to the centre-back or to the other midfielder, and then trying to play forward into one of the front four. There were some long passes at times when opposition teams went really aggressively against them. Often, if they pressed them man-for-man from either the centre-back or from the goalkeeper, they might go all the way in behind. It was a great pass that we saw a lot from Jason Steele to Kaoru Mitoma, using his pace to get in behind the defensive line.
And then Herzler, what changed?
So, we still see this shape sometimes from Fabian Herzler, but there's a lot less focus about always playing through the press and not always playing through centrally. It seems to quite like these chipped passes out from the goalkeeper to the fullback, so they can try and escape down the sides. There are still passes into the midfield, but often these are sort of bounced straight back, and then they'll tend to build out wide. There are not as many of those passes where we see it into the pivot and trying to bounce and play through midfield.
So, basically, fewer risks overall?
So, here's an example of how we now might see Fabian Herzler's team playing up against a mid-block. So, once they've got through the press and the opposition have sat a bit deeper, what they tend to do now, actually, is split the centre-backs a little bit wider, and often they'll tend to drop, actually, a midfielder between the two centre-backs, which gives them a little bit more coverage. Obviously, this isn't something De Zerbi would have done because he wanted that double pivot in there to try and work those combinations. Herzler is basically prepared to sacrifice that and say, "I'll have a little bit more control at the back. I can then push my fullbacks on, sometimes inside. I can play with my wingers really high and wide." And it also gives a lot of license for João Pedro, the number nine, who likes to drop in, receive, and play on the half-turn. Sometimes, if he does that, the number 10, especially if it's Julio Enciso, who's a bit bigger, a bit more physical, he can almost take João Pedro's place. You then do sort of end up with, at times, a bit more of a 3-2-5 that we commonly associate with top teams and how they like to progress play.
And Herzler's similarity to Potter is born out in the numbers as well, isn't it?
Yeah, I think that's a real reflection of the principles. I mean, people can look through here and sort of look at the numbers themselves, but the thing that stands out the most to me is the number of 10+ pass sequences per game. So, those are unbroken chains of long pass and sequences. It's virtually cut in half from what De Zerbi was using, so it just goes to show how less frequently they're using those. And also the goal kick launch rate, which I think is kicking goal kicks 40 yards or longer. The shift really from Graham Potter, and this was as was a couple of seasons after the goal kick law change, so maybe they were still getting used to that as well as other teams in the Premier League. But they've kind of gone from an approach of "smash it, definitely don't smash it" to maybe "let sometime smash it." And they've found a real sort of, I think, happy medium somewhere in the middle.
Cool numbers, Liam. I like those numbers. Now, JJ, that's what's happening on the pitch and with the numbers, but what about off the pitch? Because specifically, what I want to understand is, I know Brighton are amazing in every way. We all know Brighton are amazing. It's almost annoying to hear how good Brighton are in every way. But I know every football team wants to be good and sensible and smart. What is the main difference between Brighton doing it well and then other teams who maybe not doing as well as Brighton?
Well, as you might expect, the main difference between Brighton and everyone else is lizards and robots, right?
Right.
Let me introduce you to a man called Tony Bloom. He owns Brighton. Tony Bloom, aka the Lizard, is a professional sports gambler, poker player, gambler, betting man. Is that actually his nickname?
Yes.
Okay. He's very, very successful. He's a professional math wizard and gambler. He made his fortune in sports betting. He owns a company called Star Lizard, which is very good at betting. I'll come into that in a second, right? But he's called the Lizard because of the very cold, calculated way that he plays poker. So, he makes all his decisions based on probability and maths, like a robot. And that's kind of what you need in that situation because he doesn't do things based on hunch or feelings. He does it with a cold, calculated style of a lizard or a robot.
So, like Star Lizard, what they do is they make bets based on this really complicated, complex, secret, very secret algorithm with huge data points that they draw in to try and find value in hidden things. And he runs it, basically runs it like a hedge fund. So, people put money in, they bet on things, and that's how they make their money.
Yeah, that's also basically how he runs Brighton. Now, Star Lizard is the site. This is what they say: "We take analysis of sport into a completely different league through a combination of innovation and critical thought. We make the best sporting predictions in the world." Wow.
They use maths to make the best sporting predictions. Yeah. And that can apply to all sorts of things. You have to remember that humans are weak. So, by analyzing player performance and external factors like the weather, this is what they do, they can exploit market inefficiencies. So, what they do is, weather?
Yeah, they take all sorts of stuff. So, there's all sorts of things that are in there to try and find any hidden value. They're trying to beat the bookies, basically. They're outsmarting the system.
That's kind of it, yeah. So, we apply it to Brighton and why they work so well. So, Paul Barber is a Chief Executive at Brighton & Hove Albion, and he has said a few things. Here's some of them. I've got this is not his voice. "A lot of clubs will spend a lot of money having hundreds of scouts across the world." That seems pretty normal, yeah, looking at players and reporting back. "We tend to take a different approach, which is a positional need. We actually need, for example, a left-sided defender. We then use our data to match up the attributes that the coach is looking for with the players that we think would be available at a certain price in certain parts of the world." They're shopping in different markets, you see. So, they can't shop in the same markets as the big teams. They have to find value elsewhere, like Ecuador or Colombia.
Name a country.
Joe. Brazil. Brazil is a big one. England. Another big one. Yes, there we go.
Paul Barber also says, "Then we use our own eyes on scouting to verify the data to make sure that what we believe the data is telling us, what it actually is." The eye test, yeah.
So, if I tell you that there are 10 bananas outside, would you believe me?
The data says so, but I can't say outside. Got to check it to make sure. There you go. Yeah, okay. Got it.
So, puny Earth things have feelings. Machines don't. But you need to then apply different character profiling to them to make sure they work within your system. Paul Barber has spoken about why the machines will never win. "The final part of the jigsaw for Brighton is the character profiling. Is this person going to travel well to the UK? Are they going to be able to settle well in the UK culturally? Is he a good fit for them? Remember, these players are often like 20, 21 years old, 19. How are they going to adjust? What are their parents like? How are they going to adjust to different situations? Do they speak the language? Are they smart boys? Are they going to cause trouble?" Sure.
So, they apply all of this thinking, all of this like poker knowledge and sports gambling knowledge to find players. And what they do is they have three separate categories. They have players for now, which would be players like Danny Welbeck, James Milner, any others that would be.
Right now, it's like good internationals. That was Adam Lallana for a period as well. That's a good example, yeah.
So, like players that help improve the squad, bring them up a little bit, bit of experience.
Yeah, exactly, yeah. That's what you want in the squad. You know, you're setting standards and you want players for now and the future. And I would say Carlos Baleba is a good example of that.
Yeah, it was a great example. Kaoru Mitoma previously as well, yeah.
And yeah, but did he come in and was he ready straight away, or did he have a little bit of time for?
He had a little spell. So, that's another thing they do, right? They bring players in for the future. So, some players are ready straight away and they can come in, they can just perform immediately. Ansu Fati is one example. I think one players for the future, they've got this young Greek lad called Stefanos Tzolis, who has really good numbers when you look at his very basic numbers like goals and goal contributions.
Now, the other thing that makes it work with Brighton is they have a play style identity. So, the whole club runs in a certain way, and they make sure there are consistencies throughout. So, they have coaches that help them develop. They put players on loan, like Liam. So, that's really important. You make sure they're ready for the first team eventually, but you sign players with high resale value. So, even if they don't make the first team for Brighton, they still are going to make you money when you sell them on, and then you can invest those funds that you make in those players on even better players to raise the level.
This is from Blue City Brain. "Brighton has spent £247 million in this season so far." That is a lot of cajones. That's a lot of cajones. And to get there, this has taken a long time. This is their net spend. So, £194.2 million. The most of any team. Still top. Still top. So, they're selling lots of players for a big amount of money, but they've been doing this for a long time because their scouting is so good, and they've been able to sell them for multiple times what they were bought for. And that is important. But they have, like the banana stand theory, there is always money in the banana stand. When they sell a player, there was always a player ready to replace him. That is the idea. Either at the club or in their scouting pipeline, thanks to the algorithm, the robots have it.
And they apply Moneyball principles. So, Moneyball is obviously the thing that everyone knows about and how that works. But the idea is that if you receive the value for a player which is above what your club values them at, you sell them, no matter if you want to keep them or not, because they're not going to be worth any more than that value. You sell them.
Caicedo is a good example, right? Good player. A lot of money to sell them for. Yeah.
Kudus as well. They're smart with their contracts. So, they often put players on quite lengthy contracts. For for so it's not always lengthy by some teams now, but they tend to tie them down well and say, "Look, we don't expect you to necessarily see out that full contract, but it means you're worth money when it does come. When a club comes in and says, 'We want you,' well, you have to pay up."
Yeah, exactly. And they make all the decisions based on data, including the coach. So, they play more robot thinking to this. Here is Tony Bloom himself. Again, not his voice. "I wouldn't talk about it as a gamble at all. He didn't see it as a gamble at all. He didn't see it that way." And he gambles, exactly. He takes appropriate risks. Knows when to make the risk. "We look at everything. We put a lot of effort into the appointment of any head coach, like other clubs do. And we think Fabian is the best fit for the football club. He's the least risk option we had." Which is a really fun thing to say about the guy who, you know, obviously won the Bundesliga, but comes from the second division in Germany.
Exactly. And is the youngest Premier League manager ever. To consider that person the least risk option, you have to assume there's some maths there.
Well, exactly. I don't know what the maths is, but you look at so many different factors, even probably like the tactical style he has. And it comes all back down towards data and algorithms again.
This is Paul Barber, the Chief Executive, who also said, "Their interpretation of that data, the algorithms we use to source through the data and find the players, is unique to us." So, Brighton's is unique. That's what they have. That was his voice this time. That was his voice. But that's not to say that other clubs are not building up their own data sets and their own methodologies. Because here is an interesting point. I think about Brighton, other teams will catch them up. And Barber kind of agrees. It's a question of who is more effective and who will be more effective going forward, because other teams can do this. Other teams can develop their own algorithms. And you could build an algorithm to work out how many bananas I have outside.
Is it four?
Yeah. I told you earlier it was 10. Your algorithms failed.
And so, in conclusion, the reason everyone can't do exactly what Brighton are doing is because Tony Bloom and the way they run the club is essentially kind of like what Guardiola does on pitch. Stuff he's unique. He's doing things that other people just can't do because he has a unique skill set. And that, that is relevant. I think what we see on the pitch is a result of 16 years of work behind the scenes, like an incredible math gambling genius applying things with really clever thinking, data, algorithms, robots combined together. Because the conclusion as to why Brighton are doing things differently to everyone else is... Oh, I had a picture of a lizard and a robot there, but that's the reason. Yes.
Thanks, JJ. Okay, that's interesting, isn't it? Now, JJ's mentioned a lot of stuff there about lizard and robot, but also we've heard about the recruitment process, we've heard about the maths, we understand how complicated the process is that brings these players in. But there's more to be said here, isn't there? Because it's not just that Brighton are great at finding good players, it's that they're good at bringing them in as well. Once they've come in, what are they doing?
Well, I mean, there's a great virtuous cycle to that, right? You can look at the example of Moisés Caicedo and Alexis Mac Allister, where they've now got pedigree and saying, "Look, we can prove to other players in South America." They've signed now, I think, a second player from out in East Asia as well, with Kaoru Mitoma having come from there initially. So, they say, "Look, we've done this before. We've brought these players over. We've got this pathway now." They're making more links with other clubs. Tony Bloom's got a minority stake now in Melbourne Victory, as well as well. So, they're, I think, globalizing just at a really, really good level. You just spoke about how smart they've been over sort of past 15, 16 years. They built the Amex when they were still in League One, so before they'd even made the Championship. And actually, it all fell into place that they got promoted for their first Championship season in the Amex and have since expanded that. They put a lot of money into the training ground as well, and that's, you know, a state-of-the-art facility there. So, they built all the foundations then to develop those players and have that way of working. So, they're very prepared to be, I suppose, nonlinear or very specific with the development. So, some players will go out on loan, where, you know, Moisés Caicedo went to one of the lower teams in Belgium to have a season there, and then he came in at the back end of the 2021-22 season and slotted straight in and was perfect. So, there's no sort of set, you know, way of doing it, saying it has to follow this pattern. I think they're one of the first clubs to have a loan manager as well. And I believe Gordon Greer, now, who was formerly at the club as a player and formerly a captain, is now in that role. So, they're great in terms of getting former players in either in academy coaching roles or as part of the club. So, they've got that continuation there.
And we see this can actually bear out in terms of a starting 11 that we can make of players that they've sold in the past five, six seasons. And pretty much all of these have come through either in terms of being brought and then flipped for more money, or you've got examples of Robert Sánchez, Ben White, who came through the academy, sort of a slightly older age groups. Cucurella is a great example, where he was bought in for, I think, just under £20 million from Getafe, after one season he was flipped for almost sort of four times that. Graham Potter found a great role for him playing as a left centre-back in a back three. He'd been signed as a fullback, but again, this was, you know, coaches being adaptable, saying we can make sort of a system fit around players. You've of course got the example of Caicedo too, who was signed really cheap. I think Manchester United sort of declined buying him initially when he was out in Ecuador, and he then went for sort of over £100 million. And this starting 11 alone comes out with over €400 million. So, as JJ was saying, they kind of banked a lot of cash over a big period of time and then went out and spent big in the summer because they felt that window was there. And you can maybe see that now with Manchester City sort of struggling a bit more and Tottenham, United being in the bottom half. So, they've, it looks so far, at least, like they've cashed in at a really good time.
I mean, why do you think this team will finish in the Premier League? Pretty good, huh?
That team would finish medium-high. Medium-high. I mean, so it's worth saying when you look at it all down there like that, it looks like an incredible team, doesn't it? And the figures involved are kind of mind-boggling in some cases. Having said that, some of these players have been kind of rubbish at the, you know, the club that they've moved on to. I wonder if you had any thoughts about that, because I feel like there's a bit of a pattern that once a player's left Brighton, they're not as good as they were at Brighton.
Yeah, I think maybe some of these players, Caicedo, Mac Allister specifically, I know maybe there's been more critique of Caicedo than Mac Allister, seem to really fit the system really well at Brighton, or have the system slightly molded to them, I suppose. When a big part of what Brighton do, even on the pitch and with the coaches, and that's true with De Zerbi, Potter, and Herzler now, is sort of working on player development. Because they don't necessarily need to win every single game, or they realistically going to say, maybe we can't beat the big six every time we play them. So, part of their mold is, "Look, we've got these talented players, we need to find ways of working with them because we're really succeeding and, you know, we're rising up the league more consistently, but we're still, as part of our business model, going to have to sell players." And they're really accepting of that. They don't sort of seem to fight it. Obviously, Tony Bloom's a professional gambler, so always seems to get the maximum sort of amount that he can and all the right clauses, and you can see that in some of the fees that they've paid. And I think that contributes too. You look at probably the low expectations you have of someone like Moisés Caicedo going from Ecuador to the Premier League at 19 or 20 is virtually on the floor. And then you say, "Okay, well, now slap a £100 million-plus price tag on him." And, you know, record transfer. I think people go, "Well, you've got to be 10 out of 10 every week." That probably the jump goes right from zero to 100 of what people expect from the players.
Yeah. Can I just separate myself in the comments before you pile on? I don't think all of these have been rubbish.
Just to... I don't either. I think some of them have been rubbish.
Interesting. Liam, now, do you know what else is interesting? Whatever Phil Hay has to say at any time he chooses. FIFA has made jolly hard work of pulling together the 2025 Club World Cup. We're almost there, finally. Albeit with one of the 32 participants, Mexico's Club León, expelled from the competition already because of multi-club ownership reasons. We are, though, starting to get a glimpse of why so many clubs are willing to accept this addition to an already morbidly obese fixture list. This week, FIFA released more details of its $1 billion prize pool and revealed that the overall winner will take away $125 million for four weeks' work. To give that some context, it's 10% of Real Madrid's earnings for the 2023-24 season. So, absolutely massive. And for all the skepticism that's been about this tournament, I get the sense that in future, clubs are going to be killing themselves to participate in it. We bring you these stories and all the biggest lines from the world of football every day, Monday to Friday, in The Athletic FC newsletter. Join us by signing up at the link below. Hey, thanks, Phil.
Now, back to Brighton. JJ, the question in my mind is, we all know they're good. Yeah, everybody's saying they're good, they're saying it all the time. We all know. Well done to everybody involved. But what is the end goal? Presumably, is to become an elite team, which I think they're currently not. Can they be? And B, what can they see? Can they see? And B, what is even an elite? Like, what do we even mean when we say an elite team in order to decide whether they can be one or not?
Well, I have categorized it, and I think an elite team is one that has great players, they have a great manager, they compete and win in elite competitions. That's kind of the basic one, right? And the influential rivals. Okay, so maybe that would come into it. And I think one way of looking at this more basically is, if you look at video games, who are the best teams? They have the ones who are five-star rated or have average ratings of like 85 plus, if you're looking at EA FC or FIFA. So, what I've done is I went through the old EA FC or FIFA ratings to see what Brighton were, because much like Brighton assembled loads of data to assign values to players and teams, so do computer games. That's what the data scientists do. They go and find values and they attribute them to players, they give them attributes, and then they become a number.
I feel like FIFA and EA is always like about two years behind, though. You know, a player will be really good, and then two years later they'll go, "Wow, all of a sudden, well, maybe I'll incorporate that into this bit in a while."
Please continue.
So, if you have Brighton in the Championship, overall rating was a 72. That was in 2016, so it was FIFA 17. Then FIFA 20, they were up to a 76, and now they're up to 78. They're slowly improving. They are improving in their rating according to the data people. But as an example of how this works overall, how they get to the elite level. Pascal Groß is a very good player for Brighton. He was a very good player for Brighton. He's a very good player indeed.
Yes, indeed. He was also a very good player when he was playing for Ingolstadt 04.
Mhm. In the German second division.
Yes. Yeah. So, what they'll have seen, if they go through like basic FB Ref graphics, for example, is that in the year 2014-15, he had 23 goal contributions. So, he pops up instantly there. We look at that very basic statistic. Their algorithm goes way deeper than that, but they will have valued him at a certain rating. Now, in FIFA 15, which is that year, he was rated as a 73. But clearly, he is not. They had most potential as a 76. They are kind of wrong.
But who sees the potential? Brighton did. And since he signed for Brighton, he has created more chances than every other player except Kevin De Bruyne in his time in the Premier League. Did you know that?
No, I didn't. But that's pretty good. Pretty...
I did. It's really good. Yeah. He's a great example. I think they had a dossier of something like 50-odd pages. He said there were things on there that they told me about me that even I didn't know. When JJ brought the quotes from Barber earlier on about sort of the personal life, the family, that yeah, that is a great example of them using that to a really, really good level. And over, sort of, he didn't go for much money to Brighton. Dortmund, but they said, "Look, you've given us sort of seven seasons, six seasons' worth of well, chances created, number one, and consistency, and his prime as well, right?" So, they got for now, developed. And so now, like EA have him listed at 79 this season at Dortmund. Last season he was 80. So, clearly much better than they predicted he would be. So, that's an example of how you get to elite. You need players that can get you to the elite level. But they see players others don't see as elite, as already elite. That's why they move for loads of money. And now it's worked for them so far. Getting into elite, you can see that like this is their league finishes since, well, Tony Bloom came in in 2009. So, 2008-09 is before his time.
Mhm. He came in, hired Gus Poyet. He was the manager for a bit. They promoted under Poyet, didn't they? And then he left eventually. Chris Hughton came in in charge and rescued him from relegation in the year 2014-15, which is the year that our friend Pascal Groß is very good. Groß arrived, and boom, they start climbing up the table. So, like they start applying all these, they're applying all these data points and algorithms in their scouting, they're looking for managers that suit what they want to do, they excel, they improve, they get better every single year. Chris Hughton leads them to the Premier League. He's replaced. First of all, was it Potter who replaced him? Potter came in. Yep. At the start of 2019-20. That's the one. There we go. So, that's what happened. And then you can see they're steadily growing. It follows the sort of same up and down of what you had there. It's basically they're run it like a hedge fund. It's running like the S&P 500. They're basically climbing all of the time. Some years you'll go back down, but over 10 years you'll always go up.
Exactly. Sure. And we can't give financial advice, to be clear. So, all the players they've signed this season, there's every chance that all of the players they've signed become way higher rated than they currently are in video games or in scouting circles, because Brighton see the hidden value that other teams don't. Other teams don't take the risk on them because they don't have the same safety in, I guess, probability in numbers. What they're looking at. So, like getting to the elite, they need to sign these players because better players are what you need to get better. Clearly. Off-pitch, you need like simple things like a top-tier training ground, a modern, massively profitable stadium, or Amex, as I think it should be called. You have to consistently flirt with a league title. I think that's a bit away. You need even better players to get to that level. But look at Atletico Madrid, it's something similar, and they managed to now, they're constantly there, and now you'd say they're an elite team, whereas maybe in the past they... And they can compete for the same big players now in the transfer market. Yeah, later stages, European elite competition, not the lower division ones. And also, you need the best players to see them as a destination, not a journey. Because Brighton's business model, copied by everyone around the world, as you buy, though you sell high, you sell it to the players, you come to this league, you come to my club, you will have a watching eye of everyone, you'll get better, you'll get a bigger move. They should be the big move.
But on-pitch, to be elite, you need to control games, I think, tactically, technically, and physically. And this is where I think the players they're bringing in are making a huge, huge difference. Because you can see, like, especially the Man City game recently, two-all draw. I think you saw all of that. You saw like physicality, you saw real technical quality and control, and like tempo controlling, basically. But you need to be able to evolve tactically and stay ahead of the rest of the chasing pack. One of the ways you can do this in football and stay ahead of everyone else is by controlling things that expose risk, like second balls. The second ball is someone hits the ball forward, it gets knocked into the middle from a header, the second ball is loose there. That's one example. Whenever it's loose, you want to try and win that, and that's when you basically got a dice roll, and you want to try and move odds into your favor, almost like you're playing poker. And so the fourth best team this season winning second balls is Brighton. The teams above them are Man United, Liverpool, and Man City, who I would argue have better players, even if their Brighton wins are valued higher, you know? But you see this other graph I've got here. This one shows more aerials typically mean fewer second balls won. But you can see the percentage of second balls won to the right is really high for Brighton. But also aerial duels per game is high. So, they are able to mix it up. They can mix with teams who are physical, they can mix with teams who are playing on the ground, like Man City, because Man City are very good at playing with the ball on the ground. They don't really have it in the air. Brighton are competing with all these other teams. They're already kind of getting to the elite part by managing risk. All the things we're talking about. And you see there's a lot of different play style things that have changed over time. One of the things you see now is that the field tilts very high, and their high line is very high. So, they're playing a high line, they're trying to control games in the opposition half. This is how elite teams play.
JJ, I think it is at the moment. You have to be versatile. You have to change. But as an example, things that Liam was talking about earlier, so the way they play, the formation, the way they build up, they've got, they're finding solutions to play against other teams. But also, like against Man City, I've not gone, I'm not getting any arrows here to show you, but you can see this is Brighton playing against Man City, really high line, playing aggressively against the team they're playing away from home as well, which is super relevant because that's hard to do. Yeah. And what they try and do is find vertical passes. They want to play forwards. They and they'll win the second balls, but they'll play forwards. So, the pass here isn't really on to number 25, I think it's Diego Gómez, he signed in January. So, this ball is just fired through lines, breaking lines, like Liam was saying earlier, breaking the lines with a pass. They can turn instantly. They've gone past the first line of Man City pressure. That's really hard to do. They manipulate space. They can do that. Then he runs towards the goal. That's technical proficiency. They're playing the right mentality, attacking. Eventually runs towards the final third, runs into a bit of a block. Okay, they go backwards. Don't want to lose the ball, keep possession. You want to minimize risk. Goes backwards. They're happy to recycle the ball. And he launches a long diagonal pass towards this area here. It drops. I think they win the second ball, and suddenly you get a chance against Man City. So, you're in all sorts of risk, you're taking like gambling risks, you're minimizing the chance you're going to lose the ball and turnovers, because the thing that you have to remember with Brighton is why they're so good is because of lizards and robots.
So, how do they keep doing it, Liam? We've seen quite a lot of change in the first recent seasons, but the academy has been one of the most consistent parts. The head of academy, the under-21s lead, stayed the same. So, they've got that sort of really through the pathways that players are coming through and working with the same coaches. I mentioned before, they've had quite a few ex-players at the club, so Steve Sidwell, Calderón, former players and former captains have been back at the club. So, they've got that real nice continuation going on there, which I think is really important and people actually overlook sometimes. I think one of the biggest strengths really now is how they recruit coaches. We saw the quote about Fabian Herzler being the lowest risk option, but they're prepared, like they are with players, to look at coaches from sort of various different markets. So, Graham Potter was taken from Swansea, I think, after he had maybe a season or two there. They'd been relegated from the Premier League, he had a young team, sort of got them into a decent finish, and I think after Potter left, they then went on to sort of reach the playoffs. So, he built foundations there, and they went, "Oh, that's great. We trust that." And De Zerbi, completely different option, someone that had been in European football before, won titles and cups with Shakhtar Donetsk in Ukraine, had sort of had Sassuolo punching above their weight for a few seasons in Serie A. So, was saying, "Great, that's a different example, someone that we trust." Clearly, again, comes out in the data that they'll use that when looking at the managers, and not just the players. And then the same now with Herzler, and he kind of, I think, embodies that adaptability that they've had as a club in recent seasons. Now, in terms of his play style, and there are some great quotes from Pep and Brighton R.D. after the win away at Southampton, and he was talking about their approach, really. And stylistically, he said, "Of course, there are some changes with the high line." So, JJ mentioned the high line, that has become probably a bit less prominent now, later in the season, was a big thing early on. Herzler continued, saying, "We needed to adapt. I'm not a person who says because that's my philosophy or my idea, we have to force it." So, there was an example, a lot of people probably saw when they lost 7-0 away at Nottingham Forest earlier on the season. So, it was a, I think, not just a big defeat, but they also played really, really badly in the game. They were completely taken apart. And off the back of that, then went on a six-game winning streak and drew away at Manchester City. That was the first time that I think they'd taken a point from City at home in the Premier League, which, you know, they'd gone there with Potter before, they'd gone there with De Zerbi and been picked apart at a time. So, that was a great example. JJ spoke about the technical quality, tactical quality of sort of performing on the day and sort of being able to rise to the level. The quote from Herzler continues about, "It's about understanding the circumstances, understanding the demands of the Premier League." And that's what I try to do. "In some moments, your ego cannot be bigger than the conviction of the players, and therefore you need to make small adjustments without losing your identity and your principles." So, again, it comes back to that, we know generally how we want to play. It's the focus on recruiting of the young players that we can mold and we can adjust the system to. But he's clearly not working to say, "We need to play this formation or have to play in this style." And that's why to your point, I showed at the start with the numbers and the tactics, is he's kind of half Potter, half De Zerbi at times, and can swing sort of between the two as and when he needs to.
Okay, well, I mean, we know that Brighton's mission was to be a top 10 Premier League team. They are, right? Like, is their mission statement due an update? Do you know what they want now? Is it to be Champions League contenders regularly? Or?
Well, I mean, they're in the FA Cup quarter-final, so I'm sure they're looking at a bit of a cup run. Tony Bloom said, you know, that'd be a great thing to sort of actually achieve some silverware. I think they're very mindful at the same time of looking at other clubs around them that have been sort of more established, settled, you know, Premier League teams that, you know, West Ham had a few seasons in Europe and then sort of fell away for a bit and really had to restructure. So, I think they're quite mindful of, you know, if you look at it as a floor and a ceiling, you're now talking about, can you push it and go even higher? They want to keep that floor at a good level. And if you do start going too risky with your decisions and say, throw the money at certain players or, you know, I don't know, changing a coach or investing in a different way, you might risk it all falling away at the bottom. So, I think they wouldn't want to compromise being a top 10 club to try maybe get fifth or sixth consistently. I think there's still to be said for a club of that size that were only in League One, sort of, you know, 15 years ago, 16 years ago, only in the Premier League, sort of from, you know, seven or eight seasons. That they're quite content of sort of staying there. And it's, as we've said, incremental rather than sort of risking it, saying, "Let's all go at once for it." Yeah.
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