Fabian Hurzeler insists he has no “fear” of losing key players with Carlos Baleba the latest high-profile name to be linked with a move away.
Manchester United reportedly put in an opening bid for the 21-year-old only to be told he has a £105m price tag on his head, but the Old Trafford club are said to be mulling over a second bid.
If Baleba does leave, he would be the latest in a long line of Brighton players to be sold on for big profits, and Seagulls boss Hurzeler said he had concern about losing key members of his squad.
“No chance. I don’t feel fear,” Hurzeler told the BBC.
“I’m not afraid of anything because the only thing we can do is be the best version we can be every day, work as hard as we can.
“All the other things we can’t influence, so we really have to focus on us.
“For sure, we can’t spend the money like the big teams, but one of our biggest values is togetherness. And if you stay together, if we try to push our limits and increase the boundaries, then I’m sure we can compete with the big teams.”
To Brighton’s credit, they have survived losing big players before, with the likes of Moises Caicedo, Marc Cucurella, Ben White and Alexis Mac Allister all moving on, with the club finishing no lower than 11th since 2022.
For those reasons, Hurzeler was confident that his team can compete this season, even with their most recent loss of Pedro to Chelsea for £60m.
“It’s not easy, but we proved last season that we are a very competitive team,” the league’s youngest manager said.
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“Without Joao Pedro, for sure, he was an unbelievable player. But we can’t replace him with one player, we can replace him as a team. And that’s our focus.”
Fabrizio Romano tweeted on Monday that United “plan for new talks for Carlos Baleba in the upcoming days.”
The Italian reporter also said the club believe the player is keen on the move, but a deal with Brighton “remains very difficult.”
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