On deadline day of the last window, Brighton & Hove Albion reached an agreement with Lech Poznań to sign Jakub Moder, and offered him a five-year contract.
The Seagulls then allowed the midfielder to return to Lech Poznań on a season-long loan deal.
Over the past few weeks, reports in Poland stated Graham Potter’s side will cut short the 21-year-old’s temporary stay in the country, and on December 18th, Brighton confirmed the player has been recalled and will arrive at The Amex in January.
Dan Ashworth, the technical director of the Premier League side has given an interview to Meczyki, discussing the Poland international.
The Brighton official detailed how his side ended up securing Moder’s services in the summer.
“We began to observe him at the beginning of 2020, when he began to perform regularly for Lech. We liked him more and more with every match. He had the attributes we were looking for in a central midfielder,” Ashworth said.
“He’s very intelligent on the pitch. Feels comfortable with the ball at his feet. He has an excellent overview of the pitch and an awareness of the surroundings in which he moves.
“We found it was no use waiting any longer. We realised that his price may be even higher in the next transfer windows. We’re delighted to have finalised this deal.”
On November 24th, Interia Sport reported the English club wouldn’t have been able to sign Moder if they had not agreed to loan him back to Lech.
Ashworth hasn’t dismissed this claim, and explained why the midfielder was allowed to stay in Poznań until the end of this year.
“The season had already started here. It was October. It would take a long time for Jakub to settle matters related to the move and get used to his new surroundings,” he explained.
“So, we decided there was no point in breaking it and we would wait until January. We wanted him to continue to benefit from playing in Ekstraklasa and the Europa League.
“We were in touch with the club and the footballer all the time. Relationships were exemplary from the beginning. We met in Scotland when Lech were playing against Rangers in the Europa League. There was an opportunity to talk about the future and draw up a more precise plan for January.
“Before that, we also thought about many things. We asked Jakub to work on his English so that he would not have any communication barrier from the very beginning.
“On the other hand, we didn’t overload him with information on requirements. When a player is on loan, he must obey the rules of the club he is playing for. It cannot work on two fronts. This was also the case with Moder and Lech. We wanted him to focus primarily on his responsibilities in Poznań.”
Moder arrives at Brighton after managing four goals and two assists in 14 league appearances for Lech.
