Chris Hughton sacking: why Brighton have done the right thing

Be careful what you wish for.

It's a warning which is always trotted out when a club, possibly punching a little above their weight, make a decision to change manager in the hope of improving the club.

Alan Curbishley and Charlton is the one which is always mentioned.

Charlton were a mid-table Premier League side and some supporters wanted more. A better brand of football. Something different from what they were watching every week.

Now Charlton are in Sky Bet League One. Be careful what you wish for.

Those doomsday predictors never mention the times when replacing a safe pair of hands works out for the best.

Liverpool could have stuck by Brendan Rodgers - he was not doing a terrible job - but they are unquestionably in a better place for hiring Jurgen Klopp.

Southampton were ridiculed in some places for sacking Nigel Adkins and replacing him with a man who could barely speak English in Mauricio Pochettino.

Adkins is now in the Championship, Pochettino is in the Champions League final with Tottenham.

Brighton may well get relegated next season and if they do many will inevitably say they were wrong to get rid of Chris Hughton, not least because he seems to be a fantastic human being.

Hughton, however, has been in football all of his life and will know the brutal nature of the business.

Brighton need a new dynamic. It may not work, but they need one anyway after winning just two Premier League matches in 2019 - and one of those was 1-0 at home to Huddersfield.

Albion totally lost their attacking intent.

One shot at home to Southampton and Bournemouth, two against Cardiff and Newcastle at the Amex. That's just not enough to win matches regularly and they finished the season averaging fewer than three shots on target per game.

Cardiff gave the relegation dogfight a proper go but Brighton were just hoping their rivals would not be good enough and that's no way for a club to aim for relative long-term success.

Some felt brave Brighton performed well to keep Manchester City to just one goal in their FA Cup semi-final defeat last month, although in some respects it's better to lose by three or four to nil trying to win rather than trying to keep the score respectable.

Look how Swansea attacked City in the quarter-final. That was real sporting bravery.

The architect of that magic performance was Graham Potter, the man who is supposedly the number one target for Albion chairman Tony Bloom, and a fine appointment he would be.

As one of the world's most respected punters Bloom knows all about the potential risks and rewards involved in taking chances and sacking Hughton is a gamble worth taking.

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