What happened to the strategic partnership with Hibs?
It took just 42 days for eyebrows to be raised about the strategic partnership between Brighton and Hibs. The link was announced on May 17th 2021. On June 28th 2021, the Albion lent highly rated young left back Alex Cochrane to Hearts on a season long loan.
As far as consummating a partnership goes, strengthening your partner’s arch rivals is an interesting way to go about it.
Rather like getting married and then six weeks later jumping into bed with the person who bullied your new wife at school.
Most Brighton fans appear to have forgotten about the strategic partnership with Hibs. That was the case at WAB Towers, at least until Edinburgh popped up as a potential UK summer holiday destination for its easy access to haggis, whiskey and Tenants.
When the link up was initially announced, both clubs seemed pretty excited about the prospect. Albion technical director Dan Ashworth – before he started accepting a wage from a nation state who dismembers its critics – spoke in glowing terms about the benefits it could bring.
“We want to share ideas and knowledge, with a focus on player development opportunities for both clubs, which could include training or playing opportunities for younger players, and friendly matches between various age groups,” Ashworth told the official Albion website.
“Both Hibernian and ourselves believe there is a real benefit in the partnership. Each club has a plan and identity, but it is clear we share some ideas, aims and ambitions, and we know how we want to achieve those.”
Hibs sporting director Graeme Mathie said: “Although there are a number of wider benefits to both parties, our conversations have focussed most specifically on player development.”
“This partnership allows us to plan for how a player might potentially go from Hibernian to Brighton, or Brighton to Hibernian, as two new and exciting options on an ambitious roadmap. It gives all our young players a pathway to aspire to play at the highest level of the game.”
“We will work towards offering a number of different experiences for players and staff, whether training together or swapping best practices, staff idea sharing across all departments at both clubs, friendly matches and potential player exchanges.”
For supporters, a trip to Edinburgh to watch Brighton in a pre-season friendly sounded very amicable. Much better than spending a July Saturday in Reading, as the Albion have sentenced fans to this summer.
The player development aspect also looked interesting. Hibs had just finished third in the Scottish Pub League, qualifying for the Europa Conference.
Young Brighton aspects could head north of the border, play for the third best team up there and experience continental football.
Until Hibs got eliminated from the competition at least, which as it turned out was in the third qualifying round against the might of Croatian side Rijeka.
We wondered who would end up at Easter Road. Could Aaron Connolly get his career back on track by playing and scoring regularly in the SPL, in between visiting Edinburgh’s version of Shoosh! for a few bottles of VK?
How about Jayson Molumby, who had endured a tough 2020-21 season in which he struggled at Preston North End? Was the SPL the next stage in Taylor Richards’ development after hitting double figures from midfield on loan at Doncaster Rovers in League One?
No, no and no. Instead, Brighton sent Cochrane three miles away from Easter Road to spend a year at Tynecastle Park. Maybe someone at the Albion had confused green with claret and accidentally sent Cochrane to the wrong club? Mix ups do happpen.
Scotland’s Daily Record newspaper certainly seemed amused by the deal. Rather than focussing on Hearts picking up an England Under 20 international, they opened their article on the deal with: “Hibs announced a new strategic partnership with Brighton & Hove Albion but Hearts have signed one of the Seagulls rising stars on loan.”
Cochrane was not the only Brighton player heading to the SPL, either. Two weeks earlier and the Albion had shunned Hibs, sending Teddy Jenks to Aberdeen.
Then on the final day of the summer transfer window, Lars Dendoncker joined St Johnstone. A quarter of SPL clubs had a Brighton player on loan in the first half of the 2021-22 season but somehow, Hibs who the Albion had a strategic partnership were not one of them.
The reason for this? According to Hibs chief executive Ben Kensell who was appointed to the role two months after Brighton and Hibs announced their link up, the strategic partnership never really existed.
Kensell told the hibs.net supporter podcast in November 2021 that he had never seen any evidence of formal links and that he had no dealings with Paul Barber, Ashworth or anyone at the Albion in his first four months in the job at Easter Road.
When asked how partnerships with the likes of Brighton worked, Kensell said: “Interestingly, I can’t really know how they work because they haven’t really been prevalent since I’ve been at the club.”
“So I don’t know what was really agreed among clubs. I haven’t had anyone from Brighton reach out. I wouldn’t say there is a strategic relationship between the clubs. It was before more time, but I haven’t seen any evidence of that.”
Probably not helping the situation was Mathie leaving Hibs at the end of September. With the man who helped broker the partnership with Ashworth and Brighton gone from Easter Road, the slow (non-existent) start to the relationship was never likely to gather pace.
And so the strategic partnership enters Albion folklore. Like the missing 1983 FA Cup prize money and how exactly someone can misplace a 64ft by 32ft supporter flag, what happened between Brighton and Hibs and whether there was even a relationship there will remain one of the great mysteries in Seagulls history.
