Alireza Jahanbakhsh @ Brighton & Hove Albion | 2018-2019

[KasraKhan]

Nice team goal by Nantes. No fault of JB.

[Tehranto]

ARJ with a beautiful slide tackle to take the ball away, kept it in play and ran down the right flank. He should have passed it but he wanted to beat the Nantes man coming from midfield, but he fouled him.

[Mamad Gorgu]

Jahanbakhsh is absolutely destroying them.

[PEJ]

First time ever watching Brighton. It’s going to be a long year in the EPL.

[KasraKhan]

Final time. JB didn't have much involvement.

[Mamad Gorgu]

First time ever watching Brighton. It’s going to be a long year in the EPL.

You've never seen them play against other teams in the EPL?

[KasraKhan]

First time ever watching Brighton. It’s going to be a long year in the EPL.

Why do you say that? You realize this was a friendly, right? BHAFC will be fine.

[persian_pooya]

First time ever watching Brighton. It’s going to be a long year in the EPL.

You're being quick to judge. First of all it's a friendly and having news guys in the squad takes time to judge. Regardless they overpowered a respectable Nantes side tonight. besides I watched a few games from them last season and they actually play impressive football, they defend well as a team and move the ball around nicely. They're not at all a kick and chase team. I think with the additions they have made this summer they will have an exciting season! We have to be patient with Jahanbaksh getting minutes though, because guys like Knockaert and Gross (in case Jahanbaksh is considered for atm) have been doing well. so first few games I expect him to get 15/20 minutes per game. And if he does well than those minutes could increase and he could potentially start after a while. I would say he could realistically start by the 4th or 5th game if he impresses in the limited minutes he gets in the first few games.

[The]

Jahanbakhsh is absolutely destroying them.

Alright, let's not go overboard. He basically had one nice tackle and a run after which he gave the ball away.

Not bad, really didn't have a chance to get involved. He's the type of player that wears the opponent down as the game goes on, so not really an ideal player to bring on in the last 20 minutes of the game.

Brighton seems like a decent team.

[PEJ]

I might have been too reactive. However I did watch most of the second half and it looked like the familiar bezan ziresh. No semblance of possession. Hope you guys are right about this team.

[Nokhodi]

I might have been too reactive. However I did watch most of the second half and it looked like the familiar bezan ziresh. No semblance of possession. Hope you guys are right about this team.

If you're expecting them to play Man City style, then you'll be waiting all year.
They're not going to play that style. They're not a rich team financially and their attempt every year is to do better than the last.

[persian_pooya]

I might have been too reactive. However I did watch most of the second half and it looked like the familiar bezan ziresh. No semblance of possession. Hope you guys are right about this team.

There's your problem. You watch one half off football and suddenly you're nervous about Brighton? On the contrary Brighton actually played really well in the first half. You could start by going back to watch the first half and then maybe watching a few premier league games from last season to then be able to make some sort of an assessment. Sorry don't mean to come across as a dick but I've seen too many posts on here where people give shortsighted opinions. It's also disrespectful to Brighton and Hove Albion and to our new English members on here to blurt out on no bases that they're a poor team.

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[Keano]

Our players in England end up with “Prince” title. Hossein Kaebi with Leicester “prince of Persia” and now ARJ [emoji16]


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[PEJ]

There's your problem. You watch one half off football and suddenly you're nervous about Brighton? On the contrary Brighton actually played really well in the first half. You could start by going back to watch the first half and then maybe watching a few premier league games from last season to then be able to make some sort of an assessment. Sorry don't mean to come across as a dick but I've seen too many posts on here where people give shortsighted opinions. It's also disrespectful to Brighton and Hove Albion and to our new English members on here to blurt out on no bases that they're a poor team.

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No hard feelings. We are all adults here. But make no mistake that every Iranian on PFDC is a JB fan, not really a Brighton fan. When JB leaves Brighton, no one here is going to care what happens with that club. I don’t come here posting and take into account if I am hurting the feelings of fans of these clubs. Let me ask you a question. You have 2 options. Option 1 is that JB blows up this year but Brighton is in the relegation zone or near the bottom at the end of the year vs JB sucks it up but Brighton ends up in the top 4 in the table? You know every Iranian fan here will pick option 1 and every Brighton fan will pick the other.

Having said that, all of the Brighton fans here have been classy and very informative. However I don’t find it insulting when I stated that i “thought” they don’t play affective football. The proof is in the pudding with their results the past few years. I hope I’m wrong and will watch their games intently as possible.

[persian_pooya]

No hard feelings. We are all adults here. But make no mistake that every Iranian on PFDC is a JB fan, not really a Brighton fan. When JB leaves Brighton, no one here is going to care what happens with that club. I don’t come here posting and take into account if I am hurting the feelings of fans of these clubs. Let me ask you a question. You have 2 options. Option 1 is that JB blows up this year but Brighton is in the relegation zone or near the bottom at the end of the year vs JB sucks it up but Brighton ends up in the top 4 in the table? You know every Iranian fan here will pick option 1 and every Brighton fan will pick the other.

Having said that, all of the Brighton fans here have been classy and very informative. However I don’t find it insulting when I stated that i “thought” they don’t play affective football. The proof is in the pudding with their results the past few years. I hope I’m wrong and will watch their games intently as possible.

Thanks for carrying on the argument in a mature way even though I may have come across too strong which I apologize for. With all due respect I don't see how your question relates to our argument though. Really what triggered me to post was you mentioning you thought of Brighton and Albion as being poor based off one half from a pre-season friendly. We have to remember that new players, tactics or formations are always being used in friendly matches so you cannot use them to measure the strength of the team. And I think it's even more of a mistake to judge the performance on one half, because I think if you had watched the entire game your perspective may have been different, and it's even possible you would have not made that comment. I'll give you another example Iran were abysmal for parts of their pre-world cup friendly against Turkey, but in the world cup they showed they can hang with the best and were inches from finishing 1st in their group. And also it's important to note your post stating Brighton are poor was not the trigeer to my comments and me wanting to carry on this conversation. Your comment was just the tip of the iceberg for me, because I've seen many members here sort of dismiss Brighton & Hove Albion as a weak club and not fitting for Jahanbakhsh since he should have signed with a "bigger club". I couldn't disagree with this more and believe members who have spoken like this have spoken out of shortsightedness and not taken the time to really look into and analyze the club. I actually believe Brighton is the perfect fit for Jahanbakhsh at this time and if you finish reading my post you'll understand where I'm coming from.

So to start off since you mentioned every Iranian member on here is a JB fan and not really a Brighton fan. Well of course we all love Jahanbakhsh and all of our national team players more than anything, but we can simultaneously be ardent supporters of Brighton & Hove Albion. Besides having a love for Jahanbakhsh and Iran's players I am also in love with football. And because of this I have turned into an ardent supporter of Brighton & Hove Albion because anyone with love for the sport would be turned on to them after hearing their story. I've posted a few times on the Brighton forums and received a lot of positive energy and welcomes. One fan even took the time out of his day to send me pages of detail on the club and videos that show the history of their club. I'll share with you one of the private messages I received.

I received this a couple days prior to when Jahanbakhsh joined the team:

“The spirit around this club is special, I know all fans will say it about their club, but for us it's particularly true. Others may have already explained our history (and that video showed it a bit) but to sum it up, we went through a time of unbelievable hardship.

After nearly beating Manchester United in the FA Cup final, we were relegated, and in the following years we nearly dropped out of the football league completely. After barely surviving, we had no home, because the owner sold the stadium. In the end Brighton fans had to travel 100+ miles just for home games, so if you were a Brighton fan back then, you needed to be committed. We knew it was us who were going to keep the club alive, not the owners at the time who had nearly killed the club. That kind of experience brings you together as fans.

So a group of fans took over the club and we moved to a small athletics stadium in Brighton (Withdean stadium). To be honest, most other clubs looked down on us because of where we played. We fought a very long fight to get a new Stadium in Brighton. The massive change for the better came when our new owner Tony Bloom came in and bought the club. We were on track to get a new stadium anyway, and he agreed to pay for it, and he has since paid also for a new state of the art training facility and academy, one of the best in the world. - The best part - he is a lifelong fan and his family have been involved in the club for a long time. He isn't an owner for profit or for fun, he is an owner of the football club he loved since he was a child.

His leadership has also led to us having an amazing recruitment policy, it's another reason that the atmosphere and vibe around the club is so good, because we are very very careful about the players we bring in. The club researches not just the quality of the player, but the character, they speak to others who have worked with and played with a player, they make sure the person is the right fit as a person. That isn't always how football clubs work, but in my opinion it's one of the reasons for our success, the team are so close and work so hard for each other and for the manager. Oh and then there is the manager, also a brilliant signing. One of the nice guys in football, respected by everyone, and a very good manager.


We also have a really amazing CEO, Paul Barber, who used to work at the FA (and for Tottenham), and he is also very well respected in English football and has great top level experience, he has also been key to our success.

I can't do justice to all the things which have brought us to this great place as a football club, but the relationship between the Owner, the CEO, the manager, the players and the fans, is amazing.

One of the reasons I really hope we can sign Jahanbakhsh is that he seems a perfect fit. As a player he looks an amazing talent, but I have listened to some interviews with him, and as a character he seems a perfect fit for our club. Very humble, very professional, a good head on his shoulders.

Whatever happens, I will wish him the best and keep an eye out for him next season, I hope it's for us though!”

Thanks for coming here, it would be great for us to have lot's of new Persian fans if the deal goes through.

(Also this video explains a little more detail about the history of what we have been through together over the years) "


Link to the video they shared with me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0pjrlLYO6E


What this member shared with me really triggered my interest for Brighton & Hove Albion and made me look further into the club. This club is built on passion and love, in fact that is literally how it survived as you saw above. This type of passion and love for a team is the first element for success. Couple that with an owner who was raised as a Brighton supporter and an effective consistent staff and you've got the perfect ingredients for club that can reach great heights. The coaching staff spearheaded by Hughton took over in 2014 and used the means they had to carefully improve the team every year until promoting to the premier league on 7 April 2017 entering the top flight of English football after 34 years. They did it rather convincing too going on an 18 game unbeaten run, and being in one of the automatic promotion spots for virtually the entire season. After that they went on to have an impressive first season back into the top flight of English football climbing to the upper have of the table for parts of the season, have the 8th best defense in the league, and beating the likes of Manchester United and Arsenal.

So make no mistake about it they had a successful first season back into the top flight. Along the way the club has recently started spending a relatively large amount of money on buying reinforcements. Their scouting staff along with the coach have been doing a phenomenal job. They started really splurging the cash after promoting the summer before entering the premier league buying high caliber players like Matthew Ryan (Australia's national team goalkeeper who just had a solid world cup), Pascal Gross who was one of their top performers last season, Jose Izquierdo (Colombian international who played for Colombia in the recent world cup and also had a successful and impact-full season after joining), Italian international Ezequiel Schelotto who also played a role in their strong defense last season among others. And this season they have continued to break their own spending records bringing in 8/9 high caliber signings over the past 70 days! Some of these new faces include the highly touted Yves Bissouma from Lille who has looked very good in their recent friendlies and I think will be an asset going forward for Brighton, along with other high quality players such as Nigerian international and defender Leon Balogun, the Brazilian Bernardo who has been one of RasenBallsport Leipzig's best defenders past few seasons in Germany, Romanian international Florin Andone who scored 21 goals the segundo in Spain in 2015/2016 before joining Deportivo La Coruna and netting 7 goals plus 3 assists at age 24 which is relatively young, and of course they have signed our own beast Jahanbakhsh among others. Another interesting player they have signed is Jurgen Locadia in the winter tranfer window last season from PSV. In just half a season in the Eredevisie he netted 9 goals and 2 assists which rivals Jahanbakhsh's stats halfway thorugh his season.

So guys this is a team that is to get excited about. It's evident that they have been on an upward trajectory since 2014 getting better each and every season. Additionally Hughton has a lot of belief in Jahanbakhsh as he's been chasing his signature for three years and has been inquiring about him weekly this past year. Combine a coach that believes in him, and a club that that has its fundamentals right without the high pressures of top 5 or even top ten teams then I think Jahanbakhsh can really use this season to get acclimated to the premier league and flourish. And because of everything I have written above I believe Brighton will better their position of 15th and finish in the top 10. Their main problem to me seemed to be their lack of depth last season as they started to drop a lot of points in the 2nd half of the season before turning it around towards the end with big wins against Arsenal and Manchester United. They also seemed to lack goals. So I think the new signings mentioned above will really help with these deficiencies and help propel the team forward.