Brighton player says he made injury much worse playing for national side – Seagulls doctor picked up on it

Brighton & Hove Albion’s Jakub Moder has told Goal.pl that Fabian Hürzeler convinced him to stay at The Amex this season.

The Poland international hasn’t featured for the Seagulls this season. Brighton let a few midfielders leave and brought in three new players in the same position in the summer.

Moder is well aware of the competition at Brighton and it’s down to him to fight for a place under Hürzeler.

When asked about his prospects of regular minutes at the Premier League side, he said: “I think it’s good. The club brought in several central midfielders, but one of them was injured.”

“The coach himself told me he wanted me to stay. He wants me to fight for a place in the squad, so I have a signal that everything depends on me. If I look good, I’ll get a chance.”

Despite not featuring for Brighton this season, Poland manager Michał Probierz included him in the squad for September’s international break. The 25-year-old made substitute appearances against Scotland and Croatia.

The midfielder played through an injury in Poland’s Euro 2024 defeat to France in June. He revealed this when quizzed about positive things from the national team training camp this month.

“I’m glad I got the call. As the coach emphasised, I didn’t play for the club, I didn’t have a preparation period, so it was important for me to get minutes in the national team,” Moder explained.

“In the Euro match against France, I played with an injury, because it means a lot to me to represent Poland, and now the coach has helped me in my current situation. Now you have to fight to play at the club.”

He played the full 90 minutes against France, and this made his injury worse.

“Probably yes. A rupture of the quadriceps muscle. Every sprint, every kick caused it to tear more and more. At least that’s what the doctors told me. But I really wanted to play because it was important both for me and for the team,” he added.

However, the English club’s medical staff picked up on it.

“The [Brighton] doctor said that maybe I played in this match unnecessarily, but I had an individual goal that I wanted to give my all for the Euros. I wasn’t focused on anything else,” Moder said.