On a November evening in 2023, Roberto de Zerbi gathered his Brighton & Hove Albion players in the dressing room of the Amsterdam Arena ahead of their UEFA Europa League match against Ajax. He reminded them that more than 7,000 supporters had made the journey to the Netherlands — over 3,000 inside the stadium alone, with thousands more filling the city.

For a senior club official who has worked at Brighton for nearly three decades, the moment was overwhelming. "The royalty of European football," he said of facing Ajax. "From where we've come from, to be in that environment. It was a pinch-me moment." Brighton won 2-0, the peak of the club's first-ever European campaign.

A fight for survival

That extraordinary evening in Amsterdam stands in sharp contrast to what Brighton endured not so many years before. In 1995, chairman Bill Archer sold the Goldstone Ground — the club's home since 1902 — with no alternative venue arranged and no consultation with supporters. The decision, driven by mounting debts, sent the club into a prolonged crisis.

Brighton eventually left the Goldstone in 1997, having spent their final season there under enormous protest. During the last home game of the 1995-96 season, thousands of supporters invaded the pitch in fury, snapping both crossbars in the chaos. The club then spent two seasons playing 70 miles away at Gillingham before returning to Brighton in 1999 to groundshare at Withdean Stadium — a modest athletics venue with a capacity of just 6,000.

In 1997, the club came within 27 minutes of being relegated out of the Football League entirely. Former Football Association executive director David Davies, former chairman Dick Knight, and then-Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott — who overturned a rejected planning application for the club's new ground at Falmer — were among those whose contributions proved decisive in keeping Brighton alive.

The fan who refused to give up

Supporter and campaigner Paul Samrah identifies August 2007 — the moment planning permission for the new stadium was finally secured — as his most cherished memory as a Brighton fan. "After the years of campaigning, the days and nights I spent fighting for regime change and then for the stadium, the moment I heard we'd actually got planning permission — we'd won our battle," he said.

Samrah had lived through the bleakest era. "After the 1983 FA Cup final, players were sold, there was no investment, the Goldstone was decaying and the crowds were dipping," he recalled. "There was no continuity, no leadership, no direction. We were just rudderless."

The 1983 FA Cup final itself had delivered one of English football's most haunting moments, when Gordon Smith found himself clear on goal late in extra time — only for Manchester United goalkeeper Gary Bailey to save his shot. United won the replay.

Tony Bloom and the modern era

The Brighton that exists today is almost unrecognisable from those desperate years. That transformation is largely the work of chairman Tony Bloom, a Brighton-born entrepreneur who made his fortune in finance and data-driven gambling. Bloom, 56, became chairman in 2009 and oversaw the move into the American Express Stadium and the club's rise from League One to consistent Premier League contention.

Last season, Brighton averaged more than 31,000 fans per match. They have beaten Manchester United at Old Trafford in five of their last six visits, and they are now four games into their 10th consecutive Premier League campaign. This season, they have also begun a second European adventure, opening their UEFA Conference League campaign in the Norwegian city of Tromso.

Sporting director Mike Cave captured the scale of the transformation. "Anyone walking into Brighton today compared to even 15 years ago would not think it was the same football club," he told BBC Sport. "The club has been on an unbelievable journey."

Bloom's tribute to the fans

In the programme for the home fixture against Arsenal — which falls around the club's 125th anniversary — Bloom paid tribute to the supporters who refused to let the club die. "What got this football club through was the determination of its fans. The bucket collections. The protests. The refusal to accept the Albion should disappear," he wrote. "This anniversary belongs as much to those supporters as anyone. Quite simply, without them, we would not be here today."

Brighton & Hove Albion were formed in 1901. One hundred and twenty-five years on, they have never been stronger.