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Club insider reveals how Bournemouth sold their best players and got better
Tom Weber
- 15 Nov 2025 19:46 GMT
- 6 min read
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Tim Bezbatchenko, president of Black Knight Football Club, has revealed how Bournemouth sold their best players in the summer and somehow managed to get better this season.
Black Knight is the multi-club network of American billionaire Bill Foley, who owns Bournemouth and has stakes in Lorient in Ligue 1, Moreirense in Portugal and Auckland FC in the A-League. Until recently, Foley was also the minority owner of Hibernian in Scotland.
In his role as president of Black Knight, Bezbatchenko oversees and coordinates the relationships between the clubs in Foley's network, supervising everything from recruitment to infrastructural improvements.
The 44-year-old, who previously worked in and for MLS, recently appeared on the Business of Sport podcast to talk all things Black Knight, Bournemouth and soccer in the US.
Naturally, Bezbatchenko was asked how the Cherries managed to improve this season despite selling three of their four starting defenders as well as other stars in the summer transfer window.
Bournemouth's player-trading model explained
In the previous transfer window, Bournemouth sold young centre-back Dean Huijsen to Real Madrid, his partner Ilya Zabarnyi to PSG and left-back Milos Kerkez to Liverpool.
Additionally, starting goalkeeper Kepa Arrizabalaga returned to Chelsea from his loan (and has since joined Arsenal), Dango Ouattara joined Brentford, Philip Billing returned to his native Denmark and a few more fringe players were also offloaded, all to the tune of €238.4 million.
Despite this, Bournemouth are miraculously on course to enjoy an even more impressive season than last, when they recorded their joint-highest finish of ninth in the Premier League.
The Cherries are currently again in ninth place, but prior to losses to Man City and Aston Villa, they were actually second in the Premier League table.
Bezbatchenko attributes Bournemouth's success to several key factors. For one, succession planning starts well before players are actually sold, sometimes several windows in advance. Moreover, Bournemouth's track record of selling stars is becoming a boon for the club.
It illustrates to potential recruits that the South Coast outfit will help them improve and then not stand in their way if bigger clubs come calling, gradually improving the calibre of players they are able to attract.
"Acquiring a player in early or mid-preseason is so important, and you'll see coaches and teams who are really focused on predominantly doing all their work in the summer because the player has time to adjust. They have time to get their life in order before the season starts, and then once the games start, they can just focus on them.
"During the winter window, it just has to be accelerated because you're looking for that player to maybe step in right away. Or, if you're really ahead of the game, you'll be acquiring in the winter so they get six months ahead, so they're prepared for the following season.
"That's a club who's one or two windows ahead, and I think those are signs they got things right because they're ahead of the window, they're already doing the succession planning.
"Maybe they have a right-back they're looking to sell, they bring a player in in the winter window, and then the player is ready to go in the summer, and they're already ahead of the plan.
"One of the biggest benefits of doing player-trading and sending players to those clubs is the knock-on effect it has for our recruitment team because those players see that there's a pathway for me to realise my potential.
"So that is the consistent message from Tiago [Pinto, managing director] and Simon [Francis, technical director] when they're getting on phones and on meetings with players. You're pitching these players, you're recruiting talent, just like if you're recruiting a CEO or a VP of finance.
"You have to do interviews, and you're talking to players. A player wants to hear what the plan is for them. What's the pathway? Will you consider a sale of the player if someone comes knocking on the door? I think that's the message we're sending. [Selling to] certain clubs? Absolutely.
"But you have to do it year in, year out. This is the first real summer where we've taken that step to be a club that is looking to sustain success while trading players and acquiring new players.
"Clearly, with players like [Bafode] Diakite, [Adrien] Truffert, [Djordje] Petrovic, so far these players have stepped in and the recruitment team has done a tremendous job to allow Andoni [Iraola] to keep his style of play and to still win.
"The time when you would have to keep talent is when you want to have a go at Champions League, and maybe you're in Champions League and your goals as a club and the opportunity that Champions League presents matches the players.
"The players' agents and the players will say, 'We don't want to go anywhere because we can realise our dreams, we can achieve our goals right here in Bournemouth.' And I think that's where we want to go.
"It's not going to happen overnight, but how can we become a club where we're viewed as a destination? Fans and viewers may laugh at that because they might not see AFC Bournemouth as being that."
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