Brighton & Hove Albion’s data-driven recruitment model is renowned as a conveyor belt for young talent — but it did not carry as much weight as normal in developing Bart Verbruggen into one of the best young goalkeepers in the world.Painstaking analysis of Verbruggen’s performances as an unproven 20-year-old with Anderlecht and a decision made by former head coach Roberto De Zerbi launched the process that has led to Verbruggen establishing himself at the age of 23 as Brighton and the Netherlands’ No 1, with a soaring transfer value.Brighton’s recruitment method for goalkeepers kicked into gear in the summer of 2023 to fill a vacancy after reaching Europe for the first time with a sixth-placed finish in the Premier League under De Zerbi in 2022-23. They scoured Europe for a replacement for Robert Sanchez after the Spaniard fell out with De Zerbi over losing his place to Jason Steele.Verbruggen, a product of the youth system at NAC Breda in his Dutch homeland, had made just 17 starts for Anderlecht at that stage in Belgium’s top-flight Pro League.“The one area where we and the club didn’t have the same confidence in the data was goalkeeping, which meant a bit more responsibility fell on us in terms of subjective opinions and watching goalkeepers, because we didn’t have as much data to fall back on,” Brighton’s former goalkeeper coach Jack Stern tells The Athletic.“Of course, we used data. We had our own data model for goalkeepers through working together with the analysts, but it wasn’t data-led like other areas of recruitment at the club.“That meant there was a bit more responsibility on me, the other goalkeeping coaches, the goalkeeping scout we hired and the analysts to make sure we knew every young goalkeeper in Europe.Bart Verbruggen saves from Dan Burn of Newcastle United in October 2025 (Richard Heathcote/Getty Images)“We had three areas: a starting goalkeeper, one that would fill a spot (number) two to three and then prospects out of the academy or maybe a young number three that could progress. In terms of man hours and watching, that was a huge part of the job, because we had to make sure ‘You are the best goalkeepers in Europe for us’, doing reports on them, reports of lots of games.“Some goalkeepers we really honed in and looked at — you were watching every game, doing reports, sometimes me and two others. The best example of that over my time there was Bart Verbruggen. When we signed Bart he had only played 20-odd games for Anderlecht. He was kind of under the radar, but was just coming on to the radar. We identified Bart quite early. He was still playing in the reserves for Anderlecht or the youth team when we first started watching him. Then we were watching every game by the time he had come into the first team.”Confident that Verbruggen was a good fit for De Zerbi’s style of playing out from the back in and out of possession, Stern then faced the task of convincing now-Tottenham head coach De Zerbi.