Brighton are at the start of a new journey, and things WILL go wrong, but we should embrace that.
Brighton have entered the international break at a good time. As both manager Roberto De Zerbi and captain Lewis Dunk have admitted; the club is in a ‘strange’ spot.
Results are mostly going their way so far; but the slickness in passing and fluency has dipped slightly compared to last season. This, of course, should not come as too much of a surprise. Albion lost the core of their team last season in Alexis Mac Allister for £55m (including add-ons) to Liverpool and Moises Caicedo for a British Record Fee, of £115m.
Despite this being a part of growing the club as a business, naturally, performances are going to not be as fluent as they once were.
Brighton faced a tough final run-in before the break. Aston Villa, Marseille, and Liverpool always seemed like an uphill task: and, despite the Villa collapse, they recovered very well at both Marseille and Liverpool. Historically, Albion have not been comfortable in recovering situations.
As seen at Villa, goals hit them very quickly, and players looked often quite lost and confused as to what had just happened. In Marseille, the same thing happened. Liverpool? Again. A strange phenomenon for a side that is so well-drilled.
VAVEL exclusively asked De Zerbi why they have struggled to ‘comeback’ into games when falling behind in the recent past.
“At Villa Park, it was a very different game, a strange game; because we conceded 3 goals in 12 minutes. In that moment of the game, we didn’t understand what we did. In Marseille, it was different.
“We conceded 2 goals in 1 minute, but other than this we played better than Marseille – I think the result was fair but maybe we deserved more in terms of result. I think the problem with Marseille was the beginning of the game. We were not able to come inside of the game.
“I spoke this morning in the meeting with the players: we have to improve in the beginning of the game, and right solution to come inside of the game. We conceded two goals and we were still in the dressing room. The beginning of the game can help us to take the right way, the best way.”
Interestingly, De Zerbi mentioned the idea of ‘not knowing’ shortly before the same thing happened again against Liverpool at the Amex. Albion took the lead and were in cruise control heading to the break, as Simon Adingra caught Alisson off-guard.
The team were dominant, with chances to extend the lead, before a third consecutive collapse, when a defensive nightmare ended in the Seagulls heading into the break 2-1 down.
The likes of Kaoru Mitoma and Pascal Gross were given an element of criticism from some fans, and De Zerbi had answered their questions before the game even kicked off…
He told VAVEL: “Mitoma, Gilmour, Pascal Gross, and Lewis Dunk, are maybe the most important players – but they are still players. They can suffer if the rest of the team is not playing well. They are one part of the team. I think he can suffer the performance of the team in general.”
Players, are players. It doesn’t matter how good, or bad they are. When the team is struggling, the ‘team’ is struggling. Seemingly, not easy to understand at time when in a moment of frustration from a fan’s point-of-view.
Moments like this are bound to happen under Roberto De Zerbi. His side has been relentless since his takeover. Convincingly sweeping away big, strong sides like Manchester United, Liverpool (last season), and Newcastle a few weeks ago.
Athens acted as a humbler for the Albion, a shock defeat that not many saw coming. A very appropriate wake-up call to European football. The knowledge that things will not be as easy as some may have thought, with a squad very inexperienced at this level of football, and more importantly, ‘learning on the job’ every week.
Maturity and trust will form within the squad, whether that will be sooner or later; as proven last season. Under the Italian, it should be well-known to ‘trust the process’ and that most of these players need to learn Roberto’s way gradually. Mistakes will happen, that is part of the fun of innovation. It takes time.
Collapses will be down to the common fatigue across the squad, mixed with inexperience. The reality is, that Albion are no longer used to losing! A sentence any Brighton fan never thought would be the truth at the top level of football. The most important aspect to take away from the recent results is the bounce-back ability, which was questioned only a month or so ago.
20 (before pull-outs) Albion players headed out for the international break, before returning home to face the Champions of Europe at the Etihad, and Ajax in the Europa League at the Amex. Things have changed.
