Rush to write off Evan Ferguson is foolish

This time last month, Evan Ferguson was going to be the next big money departure from Brighton. Chelsea and Manchester United were set to embark on a bidding way for the record-breaking Irish teenager tipped to become of the best strikers in the world.

Opinions change with the wind in modern football but even by the standards of a player going from good to shit, the speed with which Ferguson has been written off in some quarters is astonishing.

Viewpoints vary from Brighton should cash in on Ferguson this summer because he isn’t actually very good to hailing him as the next Aaron Connolly. Yes, really.

Whilst it is true that Ferguson has given a number of below par performances through 16 appearances without a goal, any comparisons to Shooshh‘s former number-one customer are more wild than Connolly’s lockdown lifestyle.

Ferguson burst onto the scene after the World Cup winter break with three goals and two assists in four matches against Arsenal, Everton, Liverpool and Leicester City.

If he had then faded out of the first team picture, claims Ferguson is merely a flash in the pan would carry more weight.

As much was written on WAB when those goals against Arsenal and Everton made Ferguson the youngest player to score in back-to-back Premier League matches since Federico Macheda for Manchester United in 2009.

Treat the emergence of Ferguson with cautious optimism we said, just in case his career follows the same path as Macheda. Or Connolly.

But instead, Ferguson kept scoring. He became only the fourth 18-year-old to hit a Premier League hat-trick with his treble against the Saudi Sportswashers in September, joining a club including Chris Bart-Williams, Robbie Fowler and Michael Owen.

Ferguson’s 11 top flight goals in 2023 equalled Wayne Rooney’s record for most by a teenager in a calendar year. The same Rooney who went onto become Manchester United and England’s leading goal scorer.

When the goals were flying in and Ferguson was winning points for the Albion and helping the Seagulls soar into the semi finals of the FA Cup, he earned comparisons to some of the best strikers ever.

The media in Ferguson’s native Republic of Ireland described him as the Irish Erling Haaland. Former Tottenham Hotspur and Aston Villa boss Tim Sherwood compared Ferguson to “Alan Shearer in his pomp”.

A one-time youth coach said Ferguson “always had a touch of Marco van Basten” about him. “Going to be the next Duncan Edwards” was the opinion of Mark Beard, Ferguson’s manager with Brighton Under 18s.

Brendan Rodgers settled for “a fantastic player” after Ferguson crashed his 88th minute header past Leicester to secure a 2-2 draw for the Albion at the King Power Stadium last January.

Gary Lineker suggested Ferguson as the forward Spurs should sign when Harry Kane moved to Bayern Munich. Jamie Carragher hailed Ferguson “the real deal.”

In amongst all the records, the accolades and the praise, it is easy to forger that Ferguson is still only 19-years-old.

And – unless you are Rooney or Owen – dips in form are part and parcel of the development process every future superstar goes through.

Take Kane for example. Approaching the age of 21, the man who broke Rooney’s record as leading England goal scorer had been on a loan odyssey involving spells at Leyton Orient, Millwall, Norwich City and Leicester.

Kane did not become a first team regular for Spurs until the 2014-15 campaign, aged 22. Look at the career path of Kane and you realise time is very, very much on the side of Ferguson.

What this run of 16 appearances without a goal does prove is that Ferguson should not leave Brighton this summer, no matter who comes in and how much they offer.

Despite a small minority writing him off, the vast majority of Albion supporters are accepting of Ferguson’s dip.

We are realistic enough to know it happens. So too are Roberto De Zerbi and the club. Ferguson will be given the support he needs, free of pressure, to rediscover his form. And he will be a better player for it.

This would not be the case if he embarked on 16 scoreless games at Chelsea or Manchester United. Instant success matters more than anything else to those clubs and their fans, rather than the progress and improvement of good, young players.

Just ask Moises Caicedo, who has gone from being one of the best defensive midfielders in Europe at Brighton to looking like a lost boy on the end of constant ridicule since joining Chelsea.

Ferguson has the potential to become one of the best strikers in the world over the next decade. The key word in that sentence being potential; this spell of three barren months showing he still has much to learn and work on.

There is nowhere better to do it than the Albion. Ferguson is too good a player not to start scoring again, just as he is too good a player to have his career stalled or go backwards by moving to the young player graveyards that are Stamford Bridge of Old Trafford.

All Brighton need to have with Ferguson, as the great Take That once said, is a little patience.