Albion’s recruitment set-up has earned praise far and wide of late.

They have hit a rich seam of under-priced playing talent from around the world and have developed it with good coaching.

Much of their research is based on what is known as the algorithm, a way of finding and evaluating talent.

Plenty of clubs collect lots of date but it is what you do with that informaton which counts.

Albion chairman Tony Bloom appears to have found the right formula.

The recently-published club accounts revealed the club paid Bloom’s company Star Lizard £3 million last season for consulting services.

Now De Zerbi has told how it is very different to what he has come across before.

The Seagulls boss was asked about similarities in the way he and Brentford, under head coach Thomas Frank, had gatecrashed the upper reaches of the Premier League.

De Zerbi said: “In the transfer market, we work the same way. In style of play we are very, very different.

“Data are totally different. I'm getting used to working with algorithms in another way in the transfer market, and I'm getting used to appreciating this way.

“I didn't know it before. I spent a lot of time studying new players on video but now I understand there is another way to find players.

“I don't know about Brentford, but we are very good at finding players like Mitoma, Mac Allister, Ayari. It's different from my knowledge.”

De Zerbi said that method of finding talent was an eye-opener after experiences in Serie A and Ukraine.

He added: “At Sassuolo and Shakhtar it was totally different.

“I had one of my team who gave me a player's name and I studied the players, but without numbers, without data, only on video.”

De Zerbi has clearly been convinced by the Albion recruitment model, both from seeing it in action and working the results.

But he also wants his own say.

He said: “I believe in myself and I want to watch the player.

“I want to understand of that player has the right quality, the right characteristics to play for us.

“But there is another way. I don’t know which is the best way but in football there isn’t only one way in terms of style of play.

“You can win the game playing for the second ball, playing long ball, or set-pieces, for example.

“Brentford are very strong in set-pieces or on counter-attack.

“But you can lose the game in this way.

“And you can win the game with ball possession, commanding the play.

“There isn’t only one way.”