Bye bye Billy? Despite his status as a first choice midfielder for Brighton last season, the Albion are open to the idea of selling Billy Gilmour this summer if the right offer comes along.
Italian giants Napoli have already had an £8 million bid rejected. Whilst ridiculously low, the Serie A outfit were believed to be merely testing the water.
They are expected to come back in with an improved offer. Reports suggest Brighton would sell for around £12 million, a fee which many Seagulls supporters have expressed surprise about.
Gilmour made 41 appearances in all competitions last season, mainly partnering Pascal Gross as one of the two defensive midfielders in Roberto De Zerbi’s 4-2-3-1.
Rarely do you see a first choice starting midfielder aged only 23 leave a Premier League club for such a low amount.
That Brighton are willing to consider offloading Gilmour though is telling that he may not feature in the plans of Fabian Hurzeler.
The new Albion head coach played 3-4-3 at St Pauli with one of the centre backs pushing forward to operate as the holding midfielder and turn it into a midfield five.
If Hurzeler deploys the same setup at Brighton, it is hard to see where Gilmour fits in as a defensive midfielder. In terms of the two central midfielders, he would presumably be behind Gross, Mats Wiefer and possibly Carlos Baleba in the pecking order.
Should Brighton get a deal for Inter Miami’s Diego Gomez over the line, Gilmour falls further down the list. It is possible he could be fifth choice central midfielder by the time the season starts.
That would not be good for Gilmour’s career; aged 23, he needs to be playing every week. Nor would it be good for the Albion in terms of moving Gilmour on in future.
If Gilmour spends 2024-25 sat on the bench, his value decreases. The club might therefore consider this summer to be the highpoint in terms of how much they can extract for him, making it an obvious time to cash in for a profit on the £9 million paid to Chelsea in 2022.
Central midfield was also highlighted as one of the biggest problem areas for the Albion last season. There was a noticeable gap in quality between Gilmour and Alexis Mac Allister and Moises Caicedo, who occupied the holding roles in 2022-23.
De Zerbi frequently talked of the issues in the middle of the park. Although being criticised in public is the club’s worst nightmare, they do appear to have listened to the fiery Italian.
Wiefer has been signed already. Gomez is said to be close. And Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall would be a Brighton player right now had Todd Bohely and Chelsea not done their usual trick of copying the Albion’s homework.
With so much transfer business focussed on the middle of the park, Brighton are acknowledging it as a problem area.
And the unfortunate truth for Gilmour is that if the Albion aspire to challenge for European football again, they probably need a better player than him operating through the spine of the team.
Baleba has the potential to develop into a Yves Bissouma-style talent. Wiefer arrives with a lofty reputation. Many in the Netherlands were surprised the Albion were able to sign him for ‘only’ £25 million. Gomez has been hailed as the Paraguayan version of N’Golo Kante.
Billy Gilmour was a good option for Brighton last season. Bar the ridiculous red card against Everton and a couple of matches were he went missing when the Albion were ripped apart through the middle, he didn’t put a foot wrong.
It might just be that the Seagulls’ relationship with Gilmour has reached its natural conclusion. Brighton can surely do better than £12 million, though.
