Roberto De Zerbi wants Brighton to 'catch the moment' and finish above Liverpool and Chelsea in the race for Europe

The Albion boss showed his ambitious nature when asked about the possibility of playing with the continent's elite in Friday’s press conference before the Fulham game.

De Zerbi said: “If you have a group of players like Brighton it’s not too difficult. When I speak about fighting to arrive in Europe I’m not showing arrogance but because I believe in my players.

"Every day I see their attitude and quality and I know very well the level of my players. I’m able to analyse the games well and in the last period we are playing fantastic football and creating a lot of chances, and defending very well."

Despite losing 1-0 to Marco Silva’s side at the Amex Stadium on Saturday (February 18), Albion are still in with a real shout of qualifying for one of Europe’s big three competitions (Champions League, Europa League and Europa Conference League), sitting in seventh place after 22 games.

At the end of the season, those in the top four will qualify for the Champions League and fifth place will enter the Europa League group stages for the 2023/24 season, alongside the FA Cup winners, while the EFL Cup holders will qualify for the Conference League.

If either or both of the FA and EFL Cup winners finish within the top five, the next-highest ranked team in the league will qualify in their place, meaning Albion may need to just finish where they currently are in order to play in Europe next season.

Failing this, De Zerbi’s side could enter the Europa League via winning the FA Cup, being one of the last 16 teams still left in the competition.

Many managers, working at clubs the size of Brighton, have downplayed talk of European football when their team has made as strong a start to the season as the Seagulls have, but De Zerbi is embracing it.

The Italian never shies away when asked about competing against teams such as Chelsea, Liverpool, Tottenham and Newcastle, all of whom work with much bigger budgets and larger playing squads.

De Zerbi said: “In the dressing room, I decide our target and I hope the players believe in me when I speak.

“Football is very nice because on the pitch you can be with money or without money the same. There are 22 players, one ball, and you have to fight to win. The shirt is not important, it’s important what you have to do on the pitch.

“I think for the moment we deserve our place in the table.”

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The Brighton boss said his team now have to ‘catch the moment’ in the second half of the season, as an opportunity for Brighton to play in Europe does not come about very often.

De Zerbi numerously refers to the quality of his current side, containing a number of top-level players which are reportedly being sort after by a number of big clubs, as the main reason for why the Seagulls are being mentioned in the Europe conversation.

The midfield duo of World Cup winner Alexis Mac Allister and Moises Caicedo are in line for big money moves in the summer transfer window, while the form of Karou Mitoma, Robert Sanchez and Solly March has taken the Premier League by storm, alongside the battle-proven quality of Lewis Dunk, Pascal Gross and Adam Lallana.

Albion have also been helped into their current position by a number of external factors as well, mainly the poor starts that Chelsea and Liverpool have made to their campaigns, which sees them both below Brighton in the table.

The poor form of the some of the league’s biggest teams combined with current quality of Albion’s team will not last forever, therefore creating ‘the moment’ which De Zerbi is so keen to catch.

When asked about challenging the Premier League’s big boys, De Zerbi said: “Not for two, three or four years in a row but you have to catch this moment. Because we have MacAllister, Caicedo, Mitoma, Sanchez and Dunk at this moment in his career. Also Gross and March. So, we have to be ready to catch this moment and then push. And the, we’ll see.

"Yes, it's a consideration [the poor form of Liverpool and Chelsea], but we have to think only of ourselves and focus on what we have to do and what we can do better, focusing on the team but also individuals.”

De Zerbi will not allow himself or his team to get swept away in the hype though. There is still a lot of work to do, as evidenced by Saturday’s defeat, and a long way to go in the season.

The Italian’s many focus from now until May is the quality of his sides performances, rather then the results. He was happier after then 1-1 draw with Crystal Palace then he was when Brighton knocked Liverpool out of the FA Cup in the last minute and after their memorable 4-1 win against Chelsea in November.

The 43-year-old believes quality performance will be the key for his team becoming a more consistent threat at the top half of the table for years to come.

The long-term goal is more important to him then the short-term ones. In his reality, qualifying for Europe this season would just be an added bonus, his first aim is to get Brighton playing his way and doing it well.

De Zerbi told SussexWorld: “I can help my players to believe in themselves and to continue to play with courage. We have to be focused only on the quality of the performance and not on the result.

"It is dangerous of us to only think of the result. We must think about the right way to arrive at the result and to show our quality. We have very good players who are young but with a lot of quality.

"We have to understand the results at the end of the games, not before. I like to work with pressure but I don't want the players to play with too much pressure. We have to play, we have to follow the perfection, in our style of play and to make our fans happy, but not only from the result, but in how we can follow the result and how we can fight and how we can play football.”

Whether or not Brighton quality for Europe this season is still very much up in the air. However, what is for sure is that the club has a manager who believes he can them there one day.