Brighton success will mean a long a summer of transfer rumours
Brace yourself, we could be in for a long couple of months. The summer transfer window has not even opened yet and the rumours have already started with several Brighton players being linked with moves to the Albion’s Premier League rivals.
This ultimately is the price of success. When a smaller club like Brighton prove themselves capable of going toe-to-toe with the best teams in England over the course of a 38 game season, it is only natural that bigger clubs begin circling like vultures.
A top 10 finish delivered playing a brand of football which is suited to the European Super League Elite Six mean that those clubs will naturally look at the Amex for talent to cherry pick.
It also means that the rumour mill will spend most of the summer concocting transfer stories involving Brighton players heading to pastures new.
No “in the know source” would ever consider linking Bernardo or Alireza Jahanbakhsh with a move to Manchester City or Liverpool after helping Brighton finish 17th in the table.
Marc Cucurella or Leandro Trossard moving to the Etihad Stadium or Anfield on the other hand with the Albion on the cusp of the Europa Conference League is far more realistic.
Ah yes, Cucurella and City. The Daily Mail has reported that Pep Guardiola wants to take the wild-haired Spaniard to the blue half of Manchester for a fee of £30 million.
It is obvious to see why Guardiola would be interested in the Albion’s Player of the Season. Bald Pep is no doubt jealous of Cucurella’s flowing locks, along with the small matter of Cucurella’s technical brilliance, versatility and the way he has taken the English football like the proverbial duck to water.
There seems little chance of Brighton selling for the £30 million being quoted, however. Cucurella is under contract until 2026, so Brighton are under no pressure to sell.
His performances in his debut Premier League season also demands a bigger fee. Combine his defensive numbers with his attacking numbers and he has been statistically the best all-round full back in the league in 2021-22.
Cucurella sits third for most chances created from open play by a full back, behind Trent Alexander-Arnold and Andy Robertson. He has made the third highest number of tackles after Tyrick Mitchell and Stuart Dallas.
At 23, he has only going to get better. If City can spend £41 million on someone like Nathan Ake, they can certainly stretch to at least £60 million for a player like Cucurella with the potential to be world-class when he hits his prime.
Still, at least the £30 million valuation in the Daily Mail was more realistic than the rumours that Spurs were going to offer Brighton £17.5 million to transfer Cucurella this summer.
There is no way on God’s green Earth the Albion are cashing in a £2.5 million profit on the £15 million paid to Getafe last summer for Cucurella. Who writes this stuff but more importantly, what are they smoking? Because I definitely want to try it.
Tariq Lamptey has also been the subject of a disparaging valuation when linked with Spurs. According to GiveMeSport, Tottenham are preparing a £16.2 million bid for the right back.
Yes, Lamptey has had some injury troubles. But £16.2 million for a player who on his day can tear apart any left back in the Premier League?
File that one under complete bollocks as well – Tony Bloom is not selling one of the jewels in the Albion crown for that little.
Who else might we see linked with a departure over the coming weeks and months? It probably is a little too soon for Moises Caicedo to find himself subject of summer transfer rumours but if he carries his form of the past seven games into 2022-23, it will not be long before his name joins the circus.
Injury has dampened down talk of interest in Adam Webster. His winter form though had him mentioned for a possible England call up and piqued the interest of Chelsea.
In terms of commanding goalkeepers comfortable in possession with the potential to improve, you will not find many better than Robert Sanchez.
Thankfully, there are no real vacancies for number ones amongst the bigger clubs both in England and Spain currently. Should that change, you can expect Sanchez to be amongst those linked with a move.
And then there is Leandro Trossard. He was said to be attracting the attention of Barcelona back in December and has finished the season strongly.
Selling Trossard had looked like it might be on the cards as he prepares to enter the final year of his contract. Andy Naylor revealed in The Athletic earlier this week however that the Albion have an automatic option to extend by another year, which lessens the chances of the Vampire of Genk having to be flogged.
One player who does seem likely to depart is Yves Bissouma. Brighton have to sell this summer or risk their star midfielder walking away for nothing in a year.
To not receive anything for an asset who would be worth £60 million were it not for his contract situation is an outcome that a football club who lost £53 million last season surely cannot allow to transpire.
Bissouma has been linked with the world and his wife over the past two years. Manchester City, Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal, Real Madrid, Paris Saint Germain and, er, Aston Villa.
Villa are the only club to have tabled a concrete bid with their offer of £35 million in January. It would be disappointing to see Bissouma move somewhere outside of the European Super League Elite Six, but if it is a choice between losing him for nothing or getting cash in the back in exchange for seeing him in a Villa shirt, then Brighton should accept the £35 million.
Brighton fans may bristle at the relentless transfer rumours suggesting star Seagulls will leave the Amex this summer.
And it is taking the piss a bit to suggest that someone like Cucurella is worth only £17.5 million or that the Albion would go weak at the knees and sell him to the first bigger club who come calling.
But the fact that Brighton players are subject to such Chinese whispers should be taken as a huge compliment of what has happened at the Amex.
The Albion spent their first four seasons in the Premier League warranting little attention for never finishing outside the bottom six. In that time, Ben White was deemed the only player anybody felt worth paying a big-money fee to sign.
Now though, Brighton are a club firmly on the radar of world football. To see Albion players linked with the biggest clubs in the world is a much better situation to be in than wondering how to get rid of the likes of Jahanbakhsh, Bernardo and Jurgen Locadia.
Before releasing them all on frees. There is no chance of that happening with the current crop, although it would not be a surprise to see a newspaper suggest it given their penchant for undervaluing Albion players.
Cucurella for £17.5 million, FFS.
