Brighton have made a habit of being at the cutting edge of the zeitgeist so it shouldn’t surprise us they’re leading the way in the tactical confusion beginning to spread around the Premier League.
Fabian Hürzeler is a perfect example of an irony twisting the Premier League out of shape: the death of the visionary at a time when clarity of vision has never been more important for survival.
Hürzeler embodies the ultra-flexible coaching of 2026, the righteous move away from ideologues and towards the post-modern tactician: the manager who surveys the end of history and splices together ideas from across the spectrum.
But as attention spans weaken and tenures get shorter, those with a singular idea of how the game should be played tend to be given more chances to prove themselves.
It’s easy to clarify what Ange Postecoglou or Roberto de Zerbi stand for, easy to summarise in a couple of sentences their tactical principles and, therefore, easy to buy into something visible from day one.
These are the people given time and patience. They are also the people most likely to be found out early by a division scouted and picked apart at frightening speed.
The more likely you are to be given time, the less likely you are to be deserving of it.
The Hürzelers of this world aren’t so easily pinned. There is nothing to grab onto, nothing tangible to point at and call a plan, no visible process in which to trust.
Nobody knows quite how to talk about Brighton. They are mid-table in everything they do, from goals for and against to the underlying numbers analysts pore over to find meaning.
When Brighton are winning matches this makes Hürzeler an example of true progressive football that goes beyond the labels of ‘DNA’ that used to be so fashionable.
When Brighton are on a losing streak, they are seen as bereft; a great big void where an idea ought to be.
The negative talk around his tenure and the booing that rang around the Amex after the recent 1-0 defeat to Crystal Palace capture the situation neatly.
In the midst of a six-game winless run pundits are questioning what on earth Hürzeler's Brighton are supposed to be, and yet if they had won just six more points this season – had turned just three of their ten draws into victory – Brighton would be in eighth and all their problems would vanish into thin air.
Comparing Brighton to Bournemouth helps illuminate the issue.
Andoni Iraola’s exciting football makes Bournemouth media darlings, yet with just six points separating the sides all we have to do is reverse a single result for both clubs and they move level with each other.
Both clubs have consistently lost their best players. Both have spent heavily on a few gems and a few duds. But one manager is being touted for the top jobs in Europe and the other is reportedly on his last legs, on the basis of a six-point swing – and, more importantly, a collective capacity to talk about and intellectualise Iraola.
Hürzeler is not spoken about in that way, and so we empathise less with the mitigating factors explaining his situation.
Carlos Baleba has been a shadow of himself since his head was turned in the summer, Brighton have consistently failed to provide Hürzeler with a reliable goalscorer, and Kaoru Mitoma’s fitness issues have weakened their attack.
Those three factors alone, all outside the manager’s control, must be worth the six points that separate a poor campaign from an excellent one, at least in terms of how the league table looks.
It will not be seen that way by Brighton supporters, who instead project onto Hürzeler's team an aimlessness that really just reflects the club’s unavoidable middling place in the food chain – and the absence of a tactical identity that can be boiled down to a few buzzwords.
It is Hürzeler's greatest strength. It will also be the reason for his downfall.
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