[CASE STUDIES] Why Brighton & Hove Albion FC is the King of the Transfer Market?

To understand the importance of Data Analysis in Football nowadays, today let's talk about the successful case of Brighton & Holve Albion FC and why they are the current kings of the transfer market.

First of all, Brighton is the only Premier League club that has earn money in the last 5 years with a positive result of €116.21 milllion.

Despite having lost the likes of Ben White, Yves Bissouma, Marc Cucurella, Leandro Trossard, Alexis McAllister or Moisés Caicedo over the last couple of seasons, as well as their head coach Graham Potter, Brighton & Hove Albion are currently on the top of the Premier League after two matches (8 goals and 2 goals conceded) and qualified for the UEFA Europa League due to his brilliant performance last year. It is a feat which has been made possible by great transfer business in football, with star players like Evan Ferguson, Kaoru Mitoma, and Julio Enciso having slipped seamless in to replace and improve upon every one of their departures that have provided them with copious amounts of money.

But what are the key facts that make Brighton's recruitment so good?

1) The significance of selling players: In transfer windows, how to sell players is as important as buying them. So if some clubs offer you a higher price for a player that his market value, after negotiating with them and making its transfer value grow, the best thing you can do is sell it (like the case of Moisés Caicedo).

2) Anticipation: Brighton & Holve Albion's CEO, Paul Garner, confess that they are ready for any possible departures, having a list of replacement for each player of the squad, even for executives, the coach and the staff. The best proof was the Graham Potter’s replacement, Roberto de Zerbi (current Brighton’s coach) who arrived only 11 days after the departure of the coach. Also with the footballers, which have already the replacement in the squad (substitutes who are participating regularly in the team and being ready to be starters players) before selling the key players, if not the rest of the clubs could know that Brighton have received a big amount of money after selling thier key players and probably that they are desesperate to find a new replacement.

3) The relevance of Data Analysis: Tony Bloom, majority owner and chairman of Brighton & Holve Albion, is poker player and owner of Starlizard, a company who is like a kind of high-end consultancy that uses complex statistics methods to detect what are the bests bets to do in order the fees offered by the betting companies. To sum up, they try to find opportunities in the betting market thanks to a secret Big Data Method which is also used for Brighton’s scouting team, which is not focused in covering specific geographic regions or competitions like other clubs do, rather in specific positions with particular abilities what helps to find future potential talents.

4) Young player at secondary markets: Sometimes, English players are more expensive due to the former player quota that the PL make to achieve, 8 players of the 25’s squad must be former players. So, the shortage of quality English players cause that these players are most expensive (Grealish, Rice, Mount, etc). That’s why Brighton search and buy young players in secondary markets like Argentina (Facundo Buonanotte bought with 18 years old and McAllister with 20), Ecuador (Moisés Caicedo bought with 19 years old) or Paraguay (Enciso bought with 18 years old), where the players’ market value is lower than in England. They combine this method of signing young players with signing some veteran players with a free transfer like James Milner (37), Adam Lallana (35) or Mahmoud Dahoud (27), allowing for spend money in young players that they would sell in the future for a higher price, multiplying his value in a few years.

5) Players persuasion: For convincing all these young players is crucial the Brighton’s project, where the club guarantee them that they are going to be treated very well, they will have minutes in Premier League, and they will become great players when then, maybe they have the possibility to move for other club. The geographical position of Brighton, with a better wheather and quality of life in comparision with other English cities, and the great investement in the Amex Stadium and new training facilities is a plus.

Therefore, the key of success of Brighton & Holve Albion FC is to understand that they have a selling club role and being loyal to his philosophy, helped by the Data Analysis, his brilliant recruitment method and his bargaining ability in the transfer windows, they have achieve to be one of the current leading clubs in Europe buying and selling players.

By Jorge Expósito.

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