West Upper Seagull
Well-known member
A fair assessment of GP’s achievements over these 4 seasons however the only thing I would disagree with is that he didn’t exceed any of the aims that you’ve highlighted. In season 3 with us he had a bit of luck because we were on a downward spiral with a shocking run of results from January to March - what stopped the rot and turned it around was that game at Arsenal, and specifically his decision to give Caicedo his first start and finally drop Maupay and give Welbeck a start. Those 2 players then remained in the team for the rest of the season and that’s what rescued GP in terms of his aim of finishing top 10. And let’s not forget that at half time of the final game against West Ham we were sitting 13th in the league until we turned the game round in the second half.Swansea season: no one in their right mind thought Swansea could come 10th, in fact after the transfer window closed many Swansea fans thought they'd do a Sunderland and finish in the bottom and get relegated. So, minimum expectation according to who exactly?
Brighton season 1: you tell me what the team looked like in CHs final six months... GP gets the job with the mission to keep the team up, change team the style of football and make use of the academy. Plenty of pundits and people here thinks the team will get relegated: it doesn't.
Brighton season 2: ambition is to get closer to the top 10, continue developing the style of play, continue to introduce academy players. While the points tally isn't much better than in season 1, the performances certainly are on an entirely different level, and by nearly every metric - aside from putting the f***ing ball in the net - Brighton is a top 6 team performing at a level that has not been repeated before or after. Despite the miniscule improvement in regards of points, the team has taken very far steps forward
Brighton season 3: the aim is top 10, TB says before the season. Style of play is already good enough going into the season, as is the youth development. However, despite decent results, the quality of football is poor until December and it looks worrying, but additional edge is added when Alexis has bulked up by January. Some poor/very poor results follow in February/March but by the end of the season, quality of football is top notch, targeted league position is reached and development of youths keeps progressing
Four seasons in football, reaching and sometimes exceeding the aims aside from two aspects (points/position in Brighton s2, and quality of football for a number of months in s3). Perfect? No. But far better than most other managers who on average fail to reach ANY of their clubs ambitions and get sacked within 2 years.
All of this in sometimes dire/poor conditions (dire: Swansea season with like 10 proven first team players, Brighton season 1 with a slightly boosted team compared to the one that had done f*** all of use in the Pl for 6 months, poor: Brighton season 2 when covid had ripped the economy apart and prevented the club from really being able to rebuild).
This should have been the season where he could have pushed on and exceeded aims and expectations but he jumped ship at the first opportunity. As much as it was gut wrenching at the time, i don’t blame him for taking that opportunity - but I bloody well dislike him for the way he conducted himself in taking that opportunity and asset stripping us in the process, and for that reason I am very happy to watch Chelsea implode and so hope we finish above them this season. I believed this was going to completely de-rail our season, but Tony has really pulled it out the bag with his appointment of RDZ where I genuinely feel we’ve had an upgrade and a got ourselves a better manager and with some charisma thrown in too for good measure.
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