Texas-born Fabian Hurzeler was appointed Brighton coach on Saturday and became the youngest manager in English Premier League history.
The 31-year-old German succeeds Roberto De Zerbi at Brighton after signing a contract to 2027.
Hurzeler, who has joined from St. Pauli in Germany, was born in America and moved to Europe when he was two.
He was the second youngest coach in Germany when appointed by St. Pauli at the age of 29 years, 11 months, in 2022.
“He has already shown in a relatively short space of time as a head coach that he is one of the most innovative coaches working in football, and we are looking forward to getting ready for next season,” Brighton deputy chairman and chief executive Paul Barber said.
Hurzeler led St. Pauli to promotion to Germany's top division last season in his first full year in charge.
He takes over at Brighton after De Zerbi left at the end of the season.
Brighton was 11th last term, having secured its highest ever Premier League finish, sixth, the previous year to qualify for the Europa League.
“Brighton have a unique history and a bold vision for the future so I am truly excited to be part of the project,” Hurzeler said. “The club has made incredible progress over the last few seasons and the aim is to continue building on that success.”
Brighton has been successful in appointing emerging coaching talent in the form of Graham Potter and De Zerbi previously.
“From the start of the process to appoint our new head coach, Fabian was always a standout candidate and one who had caught our attention with his exceptional work at St. Pauli over the past eighteen months," chairman Tony Bloom said. “He has a style of play that aligns with how we want a Brighton and Hove Albion team to play, and I’m confident it is one our supporters will appreciate and enjoy."
James Robson is at https://twitter.com/jamesalanrobson
AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
FILE - St. Pauli coach Fabian Hurzeler is lifted by fans who invaded the field after their team won 3-1 during a second division, Bundesliga, soccer match between FC St. Pauli and VfL Osnabrueck, at the Millerntor Stadium, in Hamburg, Germany, on May 12, 2024. Texas-born Fabian Hurzeler was appointed Brighton coach on Saturday June 15, 2024 and became the youngest manager in English Premier League history. (Axel Heimken/dpa via AP, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — Fortnite says it's now unavailable on Apple's iOS globally because the tech giant blocked a bid to rerelease the popular video game for iPhone users in the U.S. and Europe — marking the latest twist in a yearslong feud.
Apple pulled Epic Games-owned Fortnite from its app store back in 2020, just two years after the widely-popular, multiplayer survival game had launched on iOS and garnered millions of users. iPhone players in the U.S. have been locked out since, although Apple users in the EU had been able to download the game through an alternative store over the last nine months.
Following years of a tense litigation, a recent court ruling was set to clear the way for Fortnite to finally return to iOS users in the U.S., too. But the video game said early Friday that a move from Apple has prevented that — and, as a result, Fortnite says it's now dark on iOS globally.
“Apple has blocked our Fortnite submission so we cannot release to the U.S. App Store or to the Epic Games Store for iOS in the European Union," Fortnite wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. “Sadly, Fortnite on iOS will be offline worldwide until Apple unblocks it."
In a statement sent to The Associated Press, Apple said it had asked Epic Sweden to resubmit the app update “without including the U.S. storefront of the App Store so as not to impact Fortnite in other geographies.” Sweden is where Epic’s developer account for its alternative app store is based.
But, Apple added, it "did not take any action to remove the live version of Fortnite from alternative distribution marketplaces.”
Epic did not immediately respond to a request for further comment.
In the U.S., Epic filed an antitrust lawsuit against Apple back in 2020, alleging the technology trendsetter was illegally using its power to gouge game makers. After a monthlong trial in 2021, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers ruled against most of Epic’s claims, but ordered Apple to loosen its previously-exclusive control over the payments made for in-app commerce and allow links to alternative options in the U.S. for the first time — threatening to undercut sizable commissions that Apple had been collecting from in-app transactions for over a decade.
After exhausting an appeal that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, Apple last year introduced a new system that opened the door for links to alternative payment options while still imposing a 27% commission on in-app transactions executed outside its own system.
Epic fired back by alleging Apple was thumbing its nose at the legal system, reviving another round of court hearings that lasted nearly a year before Gonzalez Rogers delivered a stinging rebuke last month — which held Apple in civil contempt and banned the company from collecting any commission on alternative payment systems.
That ruling cleared the way for Epic to finally return to the iPhone app store in the U.S., a reinstatement the video game maker was anticipating before Apple’s latest move.
Fortnite's availability in the EU, meanwhile, is under an alternative store for iPhone users — now called the Epic Games Store. Apple cleared the way for this last year under new regulatory pressures. Prior to Friday, Fortnite and other Epic games had been available for download on iPhones using this store in the EU since August 2024.
Before the companies' prolonged legal battle, Epic launched Fortnite on iOS in April 2018. Between then and its August 2020 removal, 116 million users accessed Fortnite on iOS devices, company filings note — raking in a daily average of about 2.5 million players, which represented about 10% of Fortnite's total daily traffic at the time.
Liedtke reported from San Francisco.
FILE - Shoppers look at Apple products in the Apple Store at the Walden Galleria in Buffalo, NY, on Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File)
