Latest news with #BrightonAndHoveAlbion
New York Times
an hour ago
- Sport
- New York Times
One Premier League CEO's bid to save England's ‘lost boys' from ‘toxic online ideas'
Paul Barber is the chief executive of Brighton & Hove Albion, a Premier League club whose accounts show a profit of nearly £200million over the past two seasons. It's not all about money, of course, but things are very healthy: Barber has been at the club since 2012 after previously working for the Vancouver Whitecaps, Tottenham Hotspur and the Football Association and, in April last year, Brighton's owner Tony Bloom tied him down for a further six years with a contract until 2030. Advertisement In his childhood years, however, Barber says things threatened to spiral after his parents split up when he was 13. 'I went from being a kid in the top quarter of the class to being disengaged, disinterested, not turning up for lessons, playing truant, getting into scraps (fights), and losing my sense of direction and purpose,' he tells The Athletic. 'That was partly because my dad left home and I didn't have that real male role model in my life any more. 'My mum was working three jobs to make sure there was food on the table and clothes on the backs of myself, my younger brother, and sister. I shut myself off from pretty much everyone and everything. It was such a short period from being a kid who was well balanced and engaged in every sport to being completely disengaged from everything and everyone.' It is this experience that led Barber, in his role as non-executive chair of the charity Football Beyond Borders, to spearhead a new group, the 'Lost Boys Taskforce'. It wants the UK government to help 'save a generation of boys from toxic online ideas by providing trusted adults'. It follows the national discussion that gripped the UK in 2024 when Netflix released Adolescence, a four-part drama delving into the 'manosphere', and followed a family whose lives are torn apart when a 13-year-old schoolboy is arrested for killing a female classmate. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer met the creators of the show and young people to take in their views on how young men can be supported. Barber, in a press release, warned: 'At a time when toxic influencers like Andrew Tate are filling the void for so many boys, it's clear that too many young men feel isolated and directionless. That's a ticking time-bomb, not just for them, but for generations that follow.' The search for direction is taking young men to dark corners of the internet — in 2023, for example, the third-most Googled person in the world was Tate, a self-proclaimed sexist who has described women as 'intrinsically lazy' and said there was 'no such thing as an independent female'. Advertisement The taskforce features representation from politics, business, sport and education — including English Football Association CEO Mark Bullingham, England men's national football team assistant manager Anthony Barry, actor and documentary-maker Ross Kemp, Iron Man triathlete John McAvoy and England basketball player Kofi Josephs — and is asking the government to fund training for 10,000 'trusted adults' in education and sport settings. The group says 630,000 young people in England do not have a 'trusted adult', by which it means a person outside their family who they feel safe to confide in. As Barber puts it: 'There's a need for such people that sit alongside parents… they need to be able to listen without making a judgement, to understand what's going on in that young person's life. 'The most important thing with a trusted adult is being there consistently and when you are there, being present. Unless you listen, unless you understand, unless you relate to that challenge that they're facing, you can't help them.' Dr Alex Blower, author of the book Lost Boys: How Education is Failing Young Working-Class Men, has also founded Boys' Impact, a network seeking to address the gap in education outcomes for young men. He says there was a noticeable spike in concerning conversations and incidents following the pandemic, which took children out of schools, increasing online dependency and limiting social interactions. This year, the Centre for Social Justice published a report entitled Lost Boys: State of the Nation. Citing the UK Office for National Statistics, it said 15.1 per cent of men aged 16-24 between July and September 2024 were not in education, employment or training. This represented 550,000 individuals, an increase of 150,000 since before Covid-19. The report also described Britain as 'suffering a pandemic of fatherlessness', saying that 2.5 million children — one in five of all dependent children — had no father figure in the home. Advertisement In Barber's case, matters never became so extreme. His life was placed back on track as a teenager, but it took an intervention by a teacher and a football coach. 'Those guys spotted this change, they realised something was up,' he says. 'I hadn't told anyone my parents had split. No one knew. No one understood. But these teachers knew me well enough to say: 'Hang on. Something happened there. We need to get to the bottom of it'. Rather than punish me, they said: 'Let's understand what the hell is going on?'. 'I was one example back in 1980, because now there are 630,000 versions of me, and rather than playing truant and maybe getting into one or two scraps, some of these kids are in gangs, they're carrying knives, they're getting murdered, they're committing murder.' While generalisations can be dangerous, trends are visible. That Centre for Social Justice report also detailed that 76 per cent of children in custody, for example, said they had an absent father. In Britain, one in four boys aged 10 to 11 is obese, while teenage boys are grappling with body-image concerns. The impact of online harm is also laid out: the average age at which a child first sees online porn is 13, while one in 10 see it as young as nine years old. A National Centre for Gaming Disorders was established in 2020, and 90 per cent of its users in 2023 were male. Dr Blower explains that young people are reeled into the 'manosphere' by browsing for subject areas that may ordinarily be deemed positive, such as wellness, fitness, motivation, sports or gaming. Bad actors, he explains, 'use positive things as a hook to begin to engage young individuals in content aligned with misogynistic views'. He makes the point that sport can offer young people a focus, and trusted adults from within sport can often be more relatable than a teacher. Yet it also seems justified to ask whether men's professional sport is doing everything it can to address attitudes towards women and perceptions of masculinity. Last month, for example, former Mexico striker Javier Hernandez apologised after releasing a video online which claimed 'women are failing' and 'eradicating masculinity'. While Barber cannot be expected to answer for the global game, he can speak more generally on football's approach towards creating more mindful men. Advertisement 'It's a really fair point,' he says. 'Clubs in the Premier League and the Championship are increasingly recognising they have a role to play in education. 'We (Brighton) bring in outside organisations to help educate players, for example, on how to conduct themselves in a situation in a nightclub where there's an attractive girl that they are talking to; how do you conduct yourself, what's appropriate, what's not appropriate? The trouble is, unless you've been told or educated by your parents or an elder sibling, then you don't know what you don't know. 'For a long time, there's been this assumption that every young person who goes out into the adult world knows how to behave. It's a naive assumption, because there are a lot of things you have to learn about being an adult. We have to bridge the gap. 'A lot of Premier League clubs, ours included, spend more money on player-care departments. We need to help young men and women develop as humans and provide them with life skills. We definitely haven't got all the answers. We haven't got everything right. We understand we've got a role to play.' A UK government spokesperson told The Athletic the state is investing £88million ($119m) 'in opportunities for boys in a major expansion of youth services and real-world opportunities to reconnect young people with the world around them'. Barber says the task force is seeking £5million in funding over a three-year period to train 10,000 trusted adults, which could come from a combination of private and public money. It also requires support from the Department of Education so that trained personnel, who will be subject to safeguarding checks, can access the system and support children. 'This isn't something where the government is going to flip a switch and everything's going to change,' says Barber, 'but someone has to start something if we're going to see change. Advertisement 'If you go back to Adolescence, which was a drama, you look at a stable family; husband and wife, a sister, a young lad. They think they have a good kid doing well at school and sociable at home, but they did not realise he was lurking in dark corners on the internet. 'It could be anyone's 13- or 14-year-old who goes down that path. A trusted adult may be able to stop it.' Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle
Yahoo
a day ago
- Sport
- Yahoo
Tottenham Hotspur Are Showing Interest In Premier League Playmaker: One For The Future?
In a recent post on X, renowned journalist Sebastien Vidal mentioned that Tottenham Hotspur are showing interest in Brighton and Hove Albion playmaker Facundo Buonanotte this summer. It has been revealed that Spurs are eyeing a move to secure the services of the Argentine youngster in this transfer window. Buonanotte's Impressive Loan Spell In English Football Buonanotte enjoyed a decent loan spell at Leicester City last season after he produced a series of impressive displays for them in the final third. The 20-year-old found the back of the net six times and earned three assists in 35 matches for the Foxes in the previous campaign across all fronts. The Argentine talent caught the eye at times in the opponent's half as he averaged 2.13 shots per 90 minutes in the Premier League. He was even accurate when distributing possession in the final third based on his pass success rate of 76.4% in the English first division (stats via Buonanotte's current contract with his parent club Brighton will run out in the summer of 2028. Hence, it won't be easy for Spurs to get a deal done for him on the cheap in this transfer window. LEICESTER, ENGLAND – DECEMBER 03: Facundo Buonanotte of Leicester City is challenged by Aaron Wan-Bissaka of West Ham United during the Premier League match between Leicester City FC and West Ham United FC at The King Power Stadium on December 03, 2024 in Leicester, England. (Photo by) Tottenham Hotspur Are Showing Interest In Buonanotte: Is He A Prospect For The Future? Buonanotte is a good dribbler with the ball at his feet and can make a few driving runs with it in and around the opponent's penalty area. He can strike the ball with power from long range and has got the vision to engineer some inviting chances for others around him up top. However, the Argentine whizkid is still quite raw and would need time before he can be a consistent performer in the Premier League. He is primarily an attacking midfielder but can also serve as a right-sided wide player if told to do so. We can expect Buonanotte to bring more quality and depth to Tottenham head coach Thomas Frank's frontline. He is good enough to serve as a decent squad player for the North London club in the coming seasons. At 20, the future looks quite bright for Buonanotte as long as he continues to improve with each year. He is undoubtedly a prospect to watch out for in the future, so Spurs would be wise to snap him up this summer.
New York Times
3 days ago
- Sport
- New York Times
James Milner interview: ‘There's no hiding place now. Cameras in the dressing room? That can't happen'
The 24th season of James Milner's Premier League career began with a knock on the door of his hotel room at 5.15am on June 2, just eight days after the previous campaign had ended. He was on a golfing trip in America with a group of friends, but while the others were sleeping off their jet lag before the day's play, Milner and fitness coach Adrian Lamb were ready for work. Advertisement 'The 2025-26 season starts here,' Lamb told him with a grin — and so it did, a gruelling gym session representing day one of a 10-week build-up to the new campaign for the Premier League's oldest player. The Brighton & Hove Albion midfielder and Lamb go back a long way — to the summer of 2004, when the latter was taken aback by the sight of an 18-year-old Milner forcing his way to the front of the pack during a running drill on day one at Newcastle United under Sir Bobby Robson, an unexpected rival to the late Gary Speed's crown as the king of pre-season fitness testing. Milner's Premier League story goes back even further than that: as a 16-year-old, straight out of school, suddenly thrust into the first-team squad at Leeds United, training alongside his heroes, making his debut and then becoming the Premier League's youngest goalscorer nine days before his 17th birthday while still living with his parents. And look at him now, more than two decades later, five months short of his 40th birthday, 15 matches away from Gareth Barry's record of 653 Premier League appearances, counting down the days towards Brighton's opening game at home against Fulham on Saturday. He has come back for more despite spending most of last season on the sidelines, worrying that he might not even be able to walk again — never mind play again — after complications arising from knee surgery left him unable to move his foot for months. Pre-season was very different in those days at Leeds and Newcastle in the early and mid-2000s. 'You didn't get the balls out for the first two weeks,' Milner says. 'These days, you get your fitness from your football sessions on the pitch. Those sessions are intense, but it's a lot more ball-oriented as opposed to that base running on beaches and in forests, doing drills until someone was sick. Advertisement 'In those days, there was one fitness coach (at a club), two maximum. These days, you come in for pre-season and the first two days are pure testing: running tests, jumping tests, nutrition tests, blood tests, fat tests, balance tests, concussion tests, strength in your legs, your teeth, your eyes.' In his time at Liverpool, Milner was famed for winning the pre-season 'lactate test' — a brutal exercise which tests players' aerobic endurance and measures their lactic acid level — year after year. Having joined Brighton two years ago, he is no longer allowed to do some of the exercises — not to spare his younger team-mates' blushes but 'because of my age and because they're looking after me'. 'But I'm still covering a good distance when I play,' he says. 'The high-intensity running and top speed have come down a little, but I can still get about the pitch. And they say as you get older, the first couple of yards are in the head.' Did he ever question whether he wanted to carry on after last season's frustrations? Was there not a part of him that was starting to feel that, like Danny Glover's world-weary cop in the Lethal Weapon movies, he was 'getting too old for this s**t'? 'I always wanted to carry on,' he tells The Athletic at Brighton's training ground. 'But there were major doubts about whether I could. For a long time, I couldn't lift my foot up. That's probably enough for most people to have doubts about me. I can't really explain the feeling of trying to lift your toes, straining with everything you've got, and nothing is moving. 'Sean Duggan (Brighton's physio) did an incredible job looking after me all the way through. But with me not being able to lift my foot, we were both thinking it could be, 'That's it. Finished. Thanks for coming.' 'But we broke it down, took the time, worked hard to get the foot moving again and got the knee as strong as we could. It was a monumental effort on Sean's part to get me fit to come on at Spurs (in the final game of last season), and then the work has continued over the summer. I had literally a week off and then, from the start of June, I was straight on it again, trying to get ready for the season. Nothing changes.' Nothing changes? It is tempting to say that, since 2002, Milner has been the one constant in an English game that has changed almost beyond recognition. That 2002-03 season was the last time David Beckham played in the Premier League, the last Manchester City played at Maine Road, the last Chelsea spent under the ownership of Ken Bates before their history — and the entire ownership model in English football — was transformed by the Roman Abramovich takeover. Advertisement It is extraordinary to think that a player who played under a manager born in 1933 (Robson) is now working for one born in 1993 (Fabian Hurzeler). Likewise to think that a player who sat on the Leeds bench alongside former England goalkeeper Nigel Martyn (born 1966) for his Premier League debut in November 2002 — and immediately came up against a West Ham United full-back born in 1963 (Nigel Winterburn) — now shares the Brighton dressing room with a £30million ($41m) centre-forward born in 2007 (Charalampos Kostoulas). 'Mad, isn't it?' Milner says. 'We were working it out the other day and 15 of the lads here (Brighton) weren't even born when I made my debut — something daft like that. There are lads I played with at the start of my career whose sons I'm now playing with or against: (Bournemouth forward) Justin Kluivert, I played with his dad (Patrick) at Newcastle; I played with (Derby County midfielder) Bobby Clark at Liverpool and played with his dad (Lee) at Newcastle; (Brighton winger) Tommy Watson's girlfriend is (former Leeds full-back) Ian Harte's daughter.' This season might even bring him up against Arsenal's 15-year-old prodigy Max Dowman, who was born on the final day of 2009 — by which time Milner was already an England international with more than 250 senior appearances to his name at club level. Without wishing to make him feel even older, Milner was probably already in his thirties at Liverpool, retired from international football, by the time Dowman first heard his name or found his image in a packet of football stickers. It is one thing to break through early. It is quite another, having done so, to stay on the Premier League treadmill for 23 seasons and counting. It is often suggested that modern sports science has normalised longevity, but it isn't really true. Players such as Cristiano Ronaldo (40), Luka Modric (39), Lionel Messi (38) and indeed Milner are freakish exceptions. Should Milner appear in the Premier League after his 40th birthday in January, he will be only the fifth outfield player to do so and the first since Ryan Giggs and Kevin Phillips, both of whom were born in 1973. Greater professional standards and advances in sports science might have helped to increase players' longevity, but set against this is the increasing speed and physical requirements of the modern game, which in many cases seems to shorten careers at the highest level, particularly among early starters. Milner puts his longevity down to a combination of good fortune — he was an outstanding athlete from an early age — good influences (starting with his parents), good habits and a willingness to make sacrifices. As a teenager breaking into the first team at Leeds, he decided alcohol would not be part of his life. His unstinting dedication to his trade has at times seen him described as boring. So many hugely talented players fall victim to pitfalls of one type or another early in their careers. Even among those who make it to the highest level, many seem jaded by the time they reach their late twenties or early thirties. You don't have to think too hard to come up with examples of those who have either lacked a Milner-type mentality in the first place or who, whether sated by success and riches or weighed down by negativity, seem to have lost it somewhere along the way. He is diplomatic when it comes to other players' career trajectories — 'every situation is different and everybody is different' — but as a senior professional, dating back to his days at Liverpool and even before that at City, he has often felt compelled to take young players aside and spell out both the size of the opportunity and the number of pitfalls that lie ahead. Advertisement 'You've got to want to do it,' says Milner, whose drive was evident when working with him on his book about life as a footballer in 2019. 'You've got to have the love for it and the drive to do your best every day, season after season. The drive is probably the one reason I'm still playing. That thing of, 'I don't really feel like it today', I've never really had that. 'It's not easy when you're injured and you're in the gym every day, doing your rehab, or when you're getting up stupidly early on holiday to train. But if I didn't have the drive to do that, it would probably be time to retire.' As a 16-year-old playing and scoring for Leeds in the Premier League in 2002, Milner was earning £70 a week and still required to perform all the duties of a first-year apprentice — 'cleaning the first-team players' boots, picking their dirty kit up off the dressing-room floor'. With his first win bonus, he went out and bought 'my own phone line, my own Sky (satellite television) box and my own TV' for his childhood bedroom. It is a world away from the scenario faced by the Premier League's teenage stars today, many of them multi-millionaires while still in their teens. In some ways, Milner feels the integration from academy to Premier League is smoother these days for young players such as Ethan Nwaneri, 18, and Dowman at Arsenal and 16-year-old Rio Ngumoha at Liverpool. 'They're having proper training sessions at academies three times a week from eight years of age, playing tournaments all over the world in front of big crowds, getting used to it,' he says. 'It is more natural in some ways. There's all the support they have in academies these days. They're treated as professionals from a very early age. 'But the money, the social media, the hype… I don't think any of that makes it easier. It becomes so easy to get ahead of yourself. It's all thrust on them so early and there's no hiding place for them, just because they're amazing at football and playing first team at 16, 17, 18. Advertisement 'Everything is so public. There is talk about having cameras in dressing rooms, which for me is an absolute no-go. That can't happen. 'Some people are wise beyond their years, like (Brighton's 20-year-old midfielder) Jack Hinshelwood, but you have others who might be equally talented who have had a different upbringing and different journey and they're expected to grow up in public and somehow not make mistakes. 'They're on holiday, trying to get away from the pressure of it, and people are there with camera phones, recording their every move. And it's going to grind you down. Then you get criticised, which is obviously a lot harder to take. And maybe it can get to that point where, for lads who have had all that from the start of their career, with that buzz and that energy, it starts to become a bit tiresome. 'And then if you're not getting a proper break in the summer, that becomes even harder. That's another topic in terms of how many games people are playing. Every other year, players should get a full rest in the summer. But instead, it's more and more games, less rest. With the Club World Cup and all of that now, it's getting ridiculous. 'If you're expecting players to play from 18 to 32/33, when are they going to get a break? Everyone will burn out. It's going to become completely impossible.' If there had been no way back last season, if the doctors had told him it was over, would Milner have been able to make peace with that? 'One hundred per cent, yeah,' he says. 'I don't think it would be the ideal way to finish any career, but I've been incredibly fortunate. I've played two careers, really. Some people are lucky enough to get eight or 10 years in the Premier League. I've had… what's this? Season 24? Last season was unfortunate, but what have I got to moan about? You get to 34, 35 and you start to think, 'If it ends at any point now, I can't complain'.' Advertisement He was extremely grateful for the offer of a new one-year deal at Brighton at the end of that injury-ravaged campaign. He doesn't know whether this one will be his last. 'But if it is — maybe, maybe not — it would be nice for it to be more positive than last year was,' he says. What does he still hope to achieve? 'It's about being part of it and contributing to the team,' he says. 'That's always been it for me, to help drive the team and the club forward. I came here because I can see this club going places. This club is in a great position. We've got some great young players, a great young manager. 'The club's journey over the past 20 years or so has been incredible and I don't think it's beyond the realms of possibility to get into Europe again or win a trophy this season. There's so much potential here. We just need to keep pushing forward.' Is breaking Barry's record something he thinks about? 'Only every time I do an interview and I get asked about it!' he says. 'I keep hearing it's 15 games (to equal it). Fifteen games when you're 21 doesn't sound like much. But this time last year, I started the first three league games and then I was out for nine months. I might play every game this year or I might not get anywhere near it. 'It's one of those: if I get it, fantastic, but to be honest I would rather be remembered for winning every domestic trophy with two clubs (Liverpool and City) or winning the Champions League (Liverpool) or scoring in the Premier League for Leeds when I was 16.' Milner has had plenty of time to think about what might come next. At one point, he doubted whether he would be tempted into management or coaching, but he has earned his UEFA B and A Licence qualifications and, though he is yet to do the Pro Licence, he spent his time on the sidelines last season smartly, working closely with Hurzeler and his staff on an informal basis 'to give me a taste for it'. Advertisement 'I wasn't doing any actual coaching on the pitch,' he says, 'but I did a lot of stuff with the manager and the coaches — game prep, videos, stuff like that. I learned a lot from being in the meeting rooms and the manager was open to me giving my opinion on certain things. That was great, and hopefully I was bringing some value from his point of view as well. 'Whenever I do hang up my boots, I would still need that competition, whether that's in football, out of football, management, whatever other options there might be. I would fancy running a marathon or a triathlon or Hyrox, which combines running with sledge pulls and things like that. 'But whenever it is, I think a little break will be on the cards. It's been quite intense for 24 years or whatever, so I'll want to spend some time with my family.' The 24th season of Milner's Premier League career will involve a new shirt number: the No 20, which he will wear in honour of his former Liverpool team-mate Diogo Jota, who, along with his brother Andre Silva, died in a car crash in northern Spain on July 3. 'I loved the guy, absolutely loved him,' Milner says. 'Loved him as a player, loved him even more as a team-mate and a friend, absolutely loved him. Carlos (Baleba) wanted to change his number (Brighton's rising-star midfielder now has the 17 shirt), so the No 20 became available and it felt like the right thing for me to do. Every day when I put my kit on, I'll think of him. 'We were only together at Liverpool for three seasons and you might not have thought we had much in common — different nationalities, very different ages — but we hit it off immediately. Maybe it was because we were both so stubborn. Honestly, people say I'm stubborn, but Jots could give me a run for my money. 'He was an unbelievable guy, one of my favourite team-mates I've had in all my time playing. He was always up for a laugh, always winding people up. He was one of those you could put in any corner of the dressing room, next to any other player, and he would click with them straight away.' Advertisement They messaged each other the night before the tragedy. 'Nothing major, just checking in and asking each other how things were going,' Milner says. He was at Brighton's training ground when the terrible news began to circulate on social media that Thursday morning. 'Someone asked, 'Is that true?' and I didn't know at that point, obviously,' he says. 'I messaged someone at Liverpool to try to find out and… just horrific. Not many tougher days than that.' Liverpool arranged a charter flight to take a group of players to Portugal the next day for the funeral. Milner was determined to be there even if it meant a five-hour drive from England's south coast after training. In his attempt to make it to Merseyside, he ended up snarled in traffic on the M25, so he flew out from Luton instead. He is hugely grateful to Brighton, as well as to Liverpool, for allowing him to pay his respects. The footage of Jota's former team-mates arriving in his hometown of Gondomar late that evening, before the funeral the following day, is harrowing. Milner describes the whole experience as 'devastating' but says he felt 'privileged to be able to pay my respects with the other lads and to spend a small amount of time with his wife and his family, which was important. It's horrible to see a family go through that, but it's the least we can do, to show them we're there for them.' Milner looks and sounds like someone who still cannot believe what has happened. He keeps coming back to the same words: 'devastating', 'horrific'. At the same time, Jota's death has brought certain things into sharp context, about how fragile life — and within that, something like a football career — can be. 'It goes back to what we were saying about the season and life in general, about enjoying it, getting what you can out of it,' Milner says. 'As you go through life, you get these reminders that every day is precious. You only get one go at a football career. You only get one go at everything, so you've got to give it everything you've got.' Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle
Telegraph
4 days ago
- Business
- Telegraph
Manchester United target Carlos Baleba valued at more than £100m by Brighton
Carlos Baleba, the Brighton and Hove Albion midfielder, is valued by his club at more than £100m, although Manchester United are currently unwilling to buy at that level. The two clubs have not spoken directly about the player at a level that would suggest a deal is imminent with Baleba, 21, currently priced above what United would be prepared to pay this summer. He is the midfielder that United's Ineos hierarchy would wish to sign were they not operating within tight profitability and sustainability lines already. Brighton have made no moves to sell the player, who was a key part of their Premier League team last season, but as a trading club they would have to listen to offers at the kind of level that would get close to the club-record £115m fee Chelsea paid for Moisés Caicedo. Tony Bloom, the owner, would, as ever, have the final say on acceptable price. For United, Baleba is a player of great interest and is entering a period in his career where his value could conceivably climb again with another successful season – potentially putting him out of range. The club need a midfielder of his profile but ultimately it was decided to put resources this summer into signing attacking players, culminating in the £73.7m deal to sign the Slovenian forward Benjamin Sesko. Brighton are in a strong position thanks to such progress by the player early into his five-year deal, giving them the option of turning down offers this summer. There is an argument that United would be better served looking in the same European market for a player of similar promise, although few have done that as well as Brighton. They also have a number of options for his potential successor. Baleba has missed much of Brighton's pre-season with a knee injury sustained in June, but it is expected that he will be match-fit in time for the first game of the season against Fulham, having returned to training. Baleba will at some point be the next major Brighton sale given the range of his ability and the impact he made last season. He was another astute pick uncovered in France by the club's data analytics in the 2022-23 season. He was signed on the basis of just 21 senior Ligue 1 appearances for Lille, as well as 13 games for Lille B in the French fifth tier – the sum total of his European football experience at that point having left Cameroon in January 2022. His great appeal is his ball-winning skills as well as the energy and guile that means he can break out of midfield. His adaptability across a number of positions, and his left-foot preference, also raises the premium on him. United must make sales as well, with both Liverpool and Chelsea having done so effectively this summer – and Manchester City in previous years. Currently, United and Chelsea are some distance apart on their valuation of Alejandro Garnacho, the Madrid-born Argentina international, one of those cast out by Ruben Amorim. The 21-year-old is valued at about £30m by Chelsea, with a lower bid from Bayer Leverkusen in the previous January window serving as a benchmark. There is also hope that Rasmus Hojlund might generate a fee, although the Italian market for him is currently offering loans.
Reuters
01-08-2025
- Automotive
- Reuters
Milner to honour former teammate Jota with jersey number switch
Aug 1 (Reuters) - Brighton & Hove Albion's James Milner will don the number 20 shirt this season as a tribute to former Liverpool teammate Diogo Jota, who died in a car crash in Spain last month. Jota and his brother Andre Silva were killed in early July when their Lamborghini veered off the road and burst into flames in northwestern Spain. The Portuguese forward had worn the number 20 during his time at Liverpool, where he and Milner played together for three seasons before the veteran midfielder's move to Brighton in 2023. "Once I heard Carlos (Baleba) was looking to change his number and 20 was available, I wanted to do it as a mark of respect and obviously pay tribute to Diogo Jota," Milner said. "(He was) an amazing player I was fortunate to play with and a great friend as well. So it'd be a great honour to wear his number in the Premier League." Liverpool are permanently retiring the number 20 after consultation with the player's wife Rute and family. The squad number will not be used at any level, including the women's team and academy. The 39-year-old Milner recently agreed a one-year contract extension with Brighton and is chasing Premier League history of his own. With 638 Premier League appearances already to his name, he sits within striking distance of Gareth Barry's all-time record of 653 games.
