Brighton & Hove Albion CEO Paul Barber has admitted that the club is “prepared” for head coach Roberto De Zerbi’s departure.
The Italian took over as Seagulls manager in September of last year, succeeding Graham Potter, and has since taken the club to new heights while implementing an appealing brand of football and developing several highly rated young prospects.
De Zerbi successfully led Brighton to their highest-ever Premier League sixth place finish last season, qualifying them for the Europa League for the first time in their history.
Brighton‘s form recently dipped ahead of the November international break due to an injury crisis, but they are still in contention to qualify from their Europa League group and are fighting at the bottom of the Premier League table.
According to a recent report, Man United‘s incoming minority shareholder Sir Jim Ratcliffe intends to replace current manager Erik ten Hag with De Zerbi, while Real Madrid has reportedly identified the Italian as a possible replacement for Carlo Ancelotti, who is expected to take over as Brazil manager in the summer of 2024.
Despite Brighton‘s intention to keep De Zerbi, who is under contract until June 2026, Seagulls chief Barber has admitted that several top clubs are keeping an eye on their manager.
“Good players and good staff will always be looked at by competitors, and we’re prepared for that, realistic about it, and try to plan for those eventualities,” Barber said at the 2023 Soccerex event in Miami.
“It was a difficult period when we unfortunately lost Graham Potter to Chelsea because you don’t want to lose your head coach one month into the season.” We always have a short list of coaches we would consider moving to if we had to, and Roberto was at the top of that list.
“Things have gone really well so far; we’re enjoying what Roberto is doing for us and what this team is delivering.” Roberto has done an outstanding job, and I don’t believe anyone in world football hasn’t noticed the way he and we play.
“The biggest conundrum with our model is that the better we do, the more vulnerable we become, because people see what we’re doing, how we’re doing it, and who’s doing it for us, and they want them.” We’ve seen it many times before, whether it’s Alexis MacAllister to Liverpool, Moises Caicedo and Graham Potter to Chelsea, Yves Bissouma to Tottenham, and staff we’ve lost along the way, Dan Ashworth to Newcastle.
“But I take that as a big complement to the progress we’re making and it’s incumbent on me to make sure we’ve got succession plans in place to manage and overcome those bumps in the road, because at the end of the day every football club will lose players and staff at some point, we just have to make sure we’re ready and prepared for it when it happens to us.”
When asked if Brighton have a replacement lined up if De Zerbi leaves, Barber replied, “Absolutely.” That’s part of constantly looking at the top 20 or 25 positions in our club and identifying who’s vulnerable to being taken by someone else or who may simply want a change in lifestyle, and making sure we know who would come in to replace them if that happened.
“That could be an internal or external appointment, but the important thing is that we know who it would be.” There’s nothing worse than being faced with a change and then having a gap because you didn’t do your homework on who would replace that person. Preparation is essential.”
“We protect ourselves as far as we can contractually and financially,” he said. “And also we try to create an environment where our best people want to stay with us, and that’s served us well over many years now, but we’re also realistic when they want to move on.”
De Zerbi has won 26, drawn 12, and lost 18 of his 56 Premier League matches as manager of Brighton, who are currently eighth in the table, one point behind Newcastle United in seventh and seven points adrift of the top four.
Leave a Comment