B for…: What’s going so right at Brighton that they upended Arsenal 3-0

Owner Tony Bloom with an innate instinct for players and horses, whose Brighton are currently third on the Premiership table is unfazed by his teams falling apart when the nucleus is dismantled, and he loses players to bigger clubs. Brighton simply keeps rebuilding, building over the debris, every season, on an endless loop

Brighton players celebrate after third goal during the English Premier League soccer match between Brighton & Hove Albion and Arsenal in Brighton, England, Saturday, Sept. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

5 min readSep 21, 2026 10:57 AM IST First published on: Sep 21, 2026 at 10:57 AM IST

Tony Bloom was just another intrepid young trader from Brighton for bookmaker Victor Chandler when the 1998 World Cup came around. When his employers were calculating the odds for the potential winners, Bloom advised them to wager their entire profit on France winning the tournament, rather than on favourites Brazil or the Netherlands. France, as it unfolded, hammered Brazil in the final. “The odds on a home win were massively underpriced,” he explained his rationale that was hiding in his employers’ plain sight. Bloom’s fame blossomed and pierced through the ceilings.

Eleven years after his career’s magic moment, he brought his favourite club, Brighton Hove and Albion, then struggling in League One and ploughing through their games on a converted athletics track at Withdean,. By then, his reported worth was estimated to be around a billion pounds (it is around 3 billion now). Much of the wealth owed to the firm Starlizard (“we answer the most interesting questions in sport,” reads the website), which offers specialised online sports betting advice using detailed and complex statistical models, thus providing more accuracy than the average bookmaker. His clientele includes football clubs, billionaires, and elite footballers, clandestinely placing bets. The biggest client, reportedly, is Bloom himself, who punts in different names and ID cards. He earned a nickname, too—the Lizard, for his composed decision-making nous on the poker table.