Adam Lallana's playing days are coming to an end – but Brighton ...

Brighton & Hove Albion are planning to add another experienced campaigner to the squad next season, with Adam Lallana’s playing future up in the air.

The idea is for Lallana to stay at Brighton in a coaching capacity when he chooses to end his playing career.

The 35-year-old will decide on that further down the line, as Roberto De Zerbi’s side continue to fight on three fronts in the Premier League, the Europa League and the FA Cup. Lallana says: “I’m not sure if this will be my last year playing, but that is a conversation for later in the season.”

Brighton are strong advocates of maintaining a core group of players with a wealth of experience behind them at big clubs to give valuable guidance to an essentially young squad. Most of their recruitment is based on signing prospects between the ages of 18 and 22 with room for growth and high resale potential.

The pattern was repeated in the January transfer window with the capture of 19-year-old Argentina Under-23s left-back Valentin Barco from Boca Juniors.

Lallana joined on a free transfer in July 2020 after six years at Liverpool. Former England team-mate Danny Welbeck arrived on the same basis three months later via Manchester United, Arsenal and a contract cancelled at Watford by mutual consent. James Milner took the same route as Lallana last summer from Anfield to the Amex Stadium following eight years at Liverpool.

Brighton are looking towards the next old head they can add to the group. Jordan Henderson would have fitted the bill in the January transfer window without the toxicity surrounding the 33-year-old midfielder’s switch to the Saudi Pro League last summer to Al Ettifaq. Henderson ended up instead at Ajax in January after abandoning his controversial move to the Middle East.

Brighton owner-chairman Tony Bloom and deputy chairman and chief executive Paul Barber are big believers in the value that characters such as Lallana, Welbeck and Milner add behind the scenes.

Each one of them brings something different to the mix: leadership qualities (Lallana), an example-setter for a batch of young forwards (Welbeck), and constantly demanding high standards on and off the pitch (Milner).

Bloom and Barber believe their value outweighs the toll of injury absences in the latter stages of careers. Milner, 38, has missed the last three matches with an injury sustained early on in a 4-0 defeat away to Luton Town.

Welbeck, who is on course to agree another new contract, was absent for nearly two months between October and November with a hamstring injury. His in-game value has been emphasised by two goals and one assist in his last five appearances.

Lallana, meanwhile, has not played for longer than an hour in a game since September across 21 appearances this season in all competitions, including nine starts, because of niggling injuries.

He is still capable of contributing to a high, if truncated, level when he plays, as he showed in his first start of the year in the 2-1 defeat away to Tottenham Hotspur.

His class was still evident in the No 10 role against Spurs, a position he has been used in most of his recent performances, before making way for Ansu Fati after 57 minutes. Lallana was then absent from the squad again for the 5-0 thrashing of Sheffield United.

Before the Spurs outing, Lallana came off the bench with 18 minutes remaining of last month’s 5-2 win away to Sheffield United in the fourth round of the FA Cup.

De Zerbi brought him on to help the team over the line with a 4-2 lead, which Welbeck stretched in the closing stages. After that, Lallana made an 88th-minute appearance as a substitute in the 4-1 home win over arch-rivals Crystal Palace.

While Lallana’s minutes on the pitch have become increasingly sporadic, his coaching involvement has been expanded in training sessions with the first team and the under-21s, as well as with England under-21s — all with encouragement from De Zerbi.

Manager and player have a strong relationship. Lallana, speaking in an interview with The Athletic in March last year, said De Zerbi has “just made football (make) so much more sense to me”.

Jurgen Klopp’s departure from Liverpool at the end of the season adds an intriguing element to the bond between De Zerbi and Lallana. De Zerbi’s name was quickly thrown into the hat as a potential replacement for Klopp when the German announced in January that he would be leaving Anfield at the end of the campaign.

That was inevitable considering how De Zerbi has Brighton playing an appealing and successful brand of football, although Bayer Leverkusen head coach and former Liverpool midfielder Xabi Alonso appears to be the firm favourite to take over.

The hierarchy at Brighton is not daft. They know they have a highly-rated head coach who is sure to be linked with most of the big jobs that become vacant, including Barcelona, where Xavi is also leaving at the end of the season.

It is the price Brighton pay for progression. They went through the process of appointing De Zerbi after Graham Potter went to Chelsea in September 2022.

They could not, however, have catered for Klopp’s shock announcement, bringing forward his exit when he was expected to see out the new contract he signed in 2022 through to 2026. It does not require a big leap in the imagination to think that De Zerbi might want to take Lallana with him to Anfield if the Liverpool job was offered to him.

There are lots of ifs and buts attached to that scenario — as there are over whether or not this will be Lallana’s farewell season as a player. Brighton are keen to still have him around, whatever happens.

(Top photo: Gareth Fuller/PA Images via Getty Images)