It would not be a Brighton managerial search without some madman nobody has ever heard of whose most recent job was in Eastern Europe or Scandinavia suddenly riding high in the betting market… hello, Henrik Rydstrom.
When Graham Potter slithered off to Chelsea, unknown ex-Shakhtar Donetsk head coach Roberto De Zerbi seemed to appear from nowhere.
Not many Albion supporters could claim to have been aware of his talents before Tony Bloom opened negotiations with De Zerbi over the job.
Likewise, Kjell Knutsen. One of De Zerbi’s apparent rivals for the position last time around, the Norwegian has been in the management game since 1995 and yet was barely known outside his homeland until being heavily linked with the Seagulls.
Having missed out to De Zerbi, Knutsen might well be in the frame again to become the next head coach of Brighton. He would be the sort of left-field appointment the Albion have become renowned for.
But the past 48 hours have seen a new name from the Nordic countries appear in the race. Henrik Rydstrom has climbed to third favourite with some bookmakers. And it has not taken much for Seagulls supporters to get behind the current Malmo manager.
Just an hour or two reading about this crazy Swede with a chaotic style of play attempting to reinvent European football has convinced many Rydstrom is the perfect man to become the next head coach of Brighton.
Who is Henrik Rydstrom?
Rydstrom has a shiny bonce, which instantly endears him to WAB. Every single bald manager of Brighton has been a dazzling success hugely popular with fans. We are talking Russell Slade. We are talking Steve Gritt.
Bloom though will presumably be basing his appointment on more than just hair. Or lack of it. A particular type of footballing CV is necessary to impress the Albion owner.
What makes Rydstrom so fascinating is that his playing career does not scream innovative manager. He spent virtually his entire career with Kalmar FF, making his debut in 1994 and his final appearance in 2013. Over those two decades, Rydstrom played 802 times.
He is described as being a tough defensive midfielder. One of those reliable yet unspectacular players who did the dirty work, allowing the better talents to thrive. All whilst being a good leader and club captain. Like ordering Charlie Oatway from IKEA.
When Rydstrom hung up his boots, Kalmar retired the number eight shirt in tribute. They could not have known at the time that his impact as a manager would go onto be even greater than as a player, to the point he is now considered one of the most innovative coaches in Europe.
Rydstrom as Kalmar manager
Between 2014 and 2021, Rydstrom worked his way through various coaching roles with Kalmar Under 17s, Under 19s and the first team setup.
He took his first senior managerial role with IK Sirius between 2019 and 2020 before returning to Rydstrom as head coach. Which is where the fun really began.
Under Rydstrom, Kalmar went from the bottom half of the table to the top four in two seasons. What really caught the eye though was how they played.
There has been a quiet revolution in South America for several years now against the European-style of holding positions in an attempt to exploit space. Rydstrom was the first head coach to fully embrace it in Europe.
Rydstrom had long been obsessed with removing fear from his players and making football fun. He studied the methods of Marcelo Bielsa and soon became inspired by Brazilian manager Fernando Diniz and his entertaining, free-flowing Fluminense side who play without any real set positions.
Rather than players remaining in fixed areas, spread out across the pitch to stretch and switch the play, this new-style pioneered by Diniz effectively involves as many teammates as possible flocking to where the ball is.
“The team go wherever the ball-carrier needs them, like a swam of bees protecting their queen,” is how The Independent describe it.
If it sounds like total chaos, that is because it is. But it is the sort of chaos opponents have no answer to. The other team cannot predict and therefore stop what a Rydstrom side is going to do because the Rydstrom side do not know themselves.
Imagine Valentin Barco and Kaoru Mitoma charging from left to right at the perfect moment, linking up with Simon Adingra and Julio Enciso.
A whirl of passes, a change in tempo later and the opposition are overloaded as the Albion break though. You essentially create a four-on-three or five-on-four situation where the ball is located om the pitch, rather than trying to work possession into space on the other side of the pitch.
There is though method to the madness. Patterns of play, knowing when to overload and when not to are all worked on during training.
Rydstrom himself describes it: “It is not that we just go out and play, do your thing – it is really drilled. We try to create chaos but we have a structure in that, and then you need to get the players to understand that.”
Rydstrom at Malmo
Rydstrom had done enough with Kalmar to be offered the prestigious job of Malmo manager ahead of the 2023 Allsvenskan campaign.
Malmo are the biggest club in Sweden, where coming second is considered failure. When Rydstrom took over, Malmo had just finished seventh. Total failure.
The jumped needed for a title challenge was massive, let alone for a manager with very unique ideas over how the game should be played. To implement totally alien tactics and deliver the success Malmo demand was considered an impossible job.
Come the end of the 2023 season in November and Malmo were Swedish champions. Rydstrom then added the Swedish Cup to the Malmo trophy cabinet earlier this month, hammering Djurgardens IF 4-1 in the final.
Similarities between Rydstrom and De Zerbi
Playing in tight spaces is the most obvious similarity between the way Henrik Rydstrom plays and Brighton under De Zerbi. The Albion mastered the art of keeping the ball with risky, one-touch passes to draw in an opposition.
They would then break through newfound gaps quickly using inverted wingers to create chances at the other end. DeZeriBall at its free flowing best through the second half of the 2022-23 season provided a glorious sight.
A squad accustomed to the somewhat unique demands of DeZerbiBall should in theory be suited for making the the transition to how Rydstrom plays . It will certainly take less for Rydstrom to implement his style at Brighton than it did at Malmo.
And Rydstrom is that a good a coach that he turned Malmo into champions within a year. Brighton could potentially hit the ground running from day one of the 2024-25 Premier League under Henrik Rydstrom.
The similarities do not end there either. Although the willingness to ignore traditional set positions means formations become kind of redundant, he has favoured 4-2-3-1 at Malmo. The same as De Zerbi.
As much freedom as he allows players, Rydstrom also likes his two centre backs and two holding midfielders to provide structure and retain defensive shape as best possible.
The idea of intelligent footballers such as Lewis Dunk, Jan Van Paul van Hecke and Pascal Gross through the spine of a Brighton side managed by Henrik Rydstrom is ridiculously exciting.
So too the freedom he would afford the likes of Mitoma, Enciso and Simon Adingra. With fixed positions out of the window, players can move into areas where they best help the team.
As a Sky Sports feature on Rydstrom puts it: “Although its proponents would doubtless disagree, positional play can be seen to restrict creativity.”
“If a coach had peak Pele, Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi in the same side, would one be stuck out on the wing?”
Will Henrik Rydstrom be Brighton manager next season?
Both Bloom and Paul Barber have spoken about how Brighton have to try and be innovative to compete against clubs with bigger budgets.
You cannot get more innovative than a style of play alien across Europe. Other than in Sweden, where it has already swept Malmo to a league and cup double.
In Brazil meanwhile, Diniz delivered the first Copa Libertadores in Fluminese history, alongside two other trophies in the space of 18 months.
The chaotic tactics deployed by Diniz and Rydstrom clearly work. But what about in the Premier League?
With such a strong South American contingent at Brighton, the Albion appear the most suitable club to take the plunge and find out.
Brighton are not averse to unknown, out-of-the-box appointments and Henrik Rydstrom certainly fits that bill. I would happily take the risk on him as the next Albion manager. And not just because he has a shiny bonce.
