Bees have to settle for another point as Birmingham lose (but win the sack race).

Brentford 1 Reading 1. Eight league games down and the Bees still to register a win. Yet a point was, at the least, sufficient to take us above a Birmingham City side who lost their sixth successive game and consequently sacked manager Harry Redknapp. Oh please, stop sniggering. And with basement club Bolton Wanderers losing again, it puts even more significance on our own trip to the Macron this Saturday.

What can you say about our own performance at Griffin Park? Well, the first half was as good as the second was poor whilst referee Tony Harrington….

And if you’d like to read more whilst helping the Brentford FC Community Sports Trust …. the rest of this article can now be found in the Kindle e-book Ten Times Better. Brentford FC Season review: 2017/18. Inspired by ‘that’ interview it contains the least bad of these columns in one, handy volume as it looks at our own campaign as well as wider divisional life and the promotion / relegation races.

As a bonus there’s a whole host of new material. New that is, for my pages. Specifically, all the programme articles submitted (both home and away where, if nothing else, you can get the original versions of both Birmingham City and Millwall).

In addition, There Is No Plan B. Brentford FC Season reviews: 2013/14 – 2017/18 takes us all the way back to the start of this latest leg in the journey. That penalty. League One. Harlee Dean was a hero. Jota was something we thought happened to the temperature for one week in July. Alan Judge had joined on loan whilst the Marinus Experiment was something nobody had contemplated. Bringing things bang up to date by the inclusion of this year’s volume alongside the four previously published campaign round ups, it has five seasons in one weighty tome. As weighty as a download can be, that is.

Relive the memories. See how often the same material gets regurgitated. Remind yourself about the likes of Betinho, Martin Fillo, Javi Venta and Marcos Tebar. Certainly, if there’s no Marcos Tea Bar at Lionel Road it will be an opportunity missed.

All proceeds from any sales will go to the Community Sports Trust. For less than the cost of a half / pint respectively, they may help while away some time on the commute. By the pool on holiday. In the bathroom. Who knows? It will certainly do some good for the Trust, whose work has been well documented at Griffin Park but you can read all about it on their site.

And if that wasn’t enough, I’ve been given something very special. A 2017/18 third team shirt with Lewis Macleod’s squad number on the reverse in the EFL typeface. Anyone with half an interest in Bees kits will know that these were never made available in the club shop.  Anyone who has read any of this before will know what a kit nerd yours truly is so when I say this is rare, take that in good faith!

To be in with a chance of owning it, download a copy of either before the end of June 2018 and you’ll go into a draw to win this. Just DM/tweet me (@NickBruzon) a copy of your purchase confirmation mail and I’ll add your name to the list before selecting a random Bees fan to win this on July 1st.

 

Reading were the latest visitors to Griffin Park

 

The Bees had to rely on themselves rather than the officials

Clem’s gut reaction says it all

 

A point sees the Bees rise above big spending Birmingham

Nick Bruzon

Walsall, Chelsea and Eastleigh add to FA Cup excitement – even for Brentford

A Christmas party meant I missed the FA Cup third round draw and ‘the big reveal’ as to who ball 7 (seven), Brentford, would be up against. A subsequent, and furtive, check of the Internet revealed a somewhat low-key headline on the BBC website: Arsenal host Sunderland. It was a title that suggested a tepid draw and, after seeing we’d been given a home time against the winner of the Chesterfield / Walsall tie, the phone went back into the pocket until this morning.

That was then. This is now. Having slept on it and reviewed the draw with fresh eyes, I have to say it looks somewhat more exciting than on first glance. Exeter City v Liverpool, Eastleigh v Bolton and Chelsea v Leyton Orient or Scunthorpe all seem made for TV and a potential ‘upset’. They have those classic FA Cup ingredients of an unfancied side hosting a ‘bigger’ team that, on paper or current form, are the candidates for the proverbial giant killing.

Hopefully we’ll be served up one of these rather than the tedium of an Arsenal v Sunderland or Norwich City v Manchester City. The sort of game we get week in, week out on Sky and BT but which the BBC, given their dearth of live games, will be itching to show. Anybody that wants to see that will be there – us ‘regular’ fans will be much more interested in seeing whether the likes of Chelsea or Exeter City can cause an upset and reach the fourth round.

View from the terrace – Chelsea almost came unstuck at Griffin Park in 2013

And then, as ever, we have the subplot at Griffin Park. With Dean Smith having left Walsall to takeover at Brentford last week, the chance to renew acquaintances so soon is the sort of opportunity that only this oldest of cup competitions can throw up. A tie that, at the start of the campaign wouldn’t have got the fans overly excited, suddenly has an additional layer of intrigue.

Who’d have thought two weeks ago that a second round replay between The Saddlers and Chesterfield would have so much interest from all at Griffin Park? If nothing else, it may send our one decent twitter hashtag, #BeeTheDJ, into meltdown. Certainly if this early contender from the weekend is anything to go by.

A song too far for #BeeTheDJ?

On a more practical note, this does mean we’ll have three home games over a six day period with the visits of Middlesbrough (Tuesday) and Burnley (Friday) immediately afterwards. And if the cup was to go to a replay it raises the prospect of four games in the space of just over a week.

For that reason alone, I’d expect Dean Smith to shuffle his FA Cup pack – regardless of the opposition. But when you have the likes of Sam Saunders, Andy Gogia, Josh McEachran and Jota currently on the bench, that’s no bad thing. Hey, we might even get a chance to see Lewis Macleod by that point (subject to leaf fall).

That said, one can only hope that the lessons from the earlier season debacle in the Capital One Cup have been learned. Marinus Dijkhuizen put together such an inexperienced and rejigged team that we were lucky to escape with just a 0-4 thrashing. From League 2 Oxford United. Three goals down within twelve minutes meant Brentford were, at one point, staring down the barrel of a bracketing.

Using the squad is one thing but this, on a pitch that was very much looking like the Somme despite having hosted less than two hour’s competitive football, was the polar opposite. In retrospect, it’s a miracle Marinus lasted beyond the end of that first week.

Still, that’s all in the past. Things have only moved onwards and upwards. We’ve got a home tie and that, for me, is all you can ask for in the Cup.

The rest is down to Dean and the eleven players he picks to start this one.

Marinus looked a lone figure as the carnage unfolded against Oxford

Nick Bruzon

Ifs, buts, maybes, favours and Championship excitement.

What a Championship week this is shaping up to be. Saturday’s win saw Brentford become the last team in our league to keep a 100% record for January whilst the FA Cup saw famous victories for our promotion rivals Derby County and Middlesbrough against Chesterfield and Manchester City respectively.

Then, last night, we had the FA Cup draw with Derby given an eminently winnable tie at home to Reading whilst Middlesbrough have the tantalising prospect of being able to test themselves at Arsenal’s library. Aside from the draw giving these two Championship teams an excellent chance of progression to the quarter finals (or round of 8 as FIFA would probably call it) , there is huge impact on Brentford, too, starting tonight.

To read the rest of this article, season 2014/15 is now available to download onto Kindle (and other electronic reading device) in full. Containing additional material and even some (poor) editing, you can get it here for less than the cost of a Griffin Park matchday programme or Balti Pie.

Thanks for reading and all your comments over the course of the season. For now, I need to make more space on the site for any follow up. However, ‘close season’ will continue in full, further on.

Brentford, Birmingham, Fulham and Clem. But who were the winners?

Birmingham City and Clayton Donaldson returned to Griffin Park on Saturday in a game where, perhaps, Brentford can count themselves unlucky not to have finished with all three points. With Birmingham a man (thanks, Mr Madley) and a goal up, they sat back in a second half that saw a Brentford side who, by all medical logic should have been dead on their feet, just push harder and harder for the draw and, almost, the win.

I’m not going to sour this fine performance with an overlong rant about Madley…..

To read the rest of this article, season 2014/15 is now available to download onto Kindle (and other electronic reading device) in full. Containing additional material and even some (poor) editing, you can get it here for less than the cost of a Griffin Park matchday programme or Balti Pie.

 Thanks for reading and all your comments over the course of the season. For now, I need to make more space on the site for any follow up. However, ‘close season’ will continue in full, further along.

Clem makes a point as he finally earns one – as seen on the BBC Football League Show