3 reasons why Brighton can gain promotion to the Premier League this season

Chris Hughton

Known as a ‘Championship specialist’, the former Tottenham defender has guided both Birmingham City and Brighton to the play-offs, won the division with Newcastle United and also kept both the Toon and Norwich in the Premier League, despite being sacked by both clubs while being outside of the division’s relegation places.

Capped 53 times by the Republic of Ireland, Hughton took his international and domestic playing experience onto the training field as he coached Spurs for 14-years until 2007 when he took up a role as a first-team coach at Newcastle.

When he took over the Albion on New Year’s Eve in 2014, Sami Hyppia had left the side in 22nd place before caretaker Nathan Jones steadied the ship and the team sit just outside the drop zone on goal difference compared to Millwall.

A little over 18 months on, and on the back of an encouraging season last year, where the Albion were agonisingly beaten by Sheffield Wednesday in the play-offs after almost going up automatically, Hughton has assembled a good, yet slightly flimsy, squad which has a good mix of youth and experience.

His indisputable game management ability means that he is able to react to situations in order to give his side the best possible chance of winning, while he also reacts well to major tactical problems, such as being outnumbered in midfield for large parts of last season.