Double shirt update. Oh Bob, you tease…

We’re very much in the mindset of ‘tools downed’ at the moment. Certainly for the short term, if not ongoing. A recharge over the summer very much the order of the day. That said, life at Brentford continues ever onwards, with Nottingham Forest now confirmed as the final team in next season’s Premier League. This, following their play-off final victory at the weekend. A feeling we can still relate to with enormous smiles. Has it been a year already?

Congratulations and all that but at Brentford there’s only one subject on everybody’s lips. Aside from Christian Eriksen or rumours surrounding the right back position. That, of course, being next season’s kit. We already know from Jon Varney that the club have decided to retain our current home version into next season. But what of the away / third kits?

Again, our chief exec has suggested that the away shirt will appeal to those in mind of the late 80s/ early 90s. Hummel fractals? Chad stripes? A bit of Spall blue on blue? Or a cryptic clue to put one in mind of Matthew Benham and his transfer hints? So a sash, then.

Could we see some combo of these next season?

Now, Kitman Bob has come out and offered up his opinion. Certainly, as much as he can say. Namely that:

I have to say the new away kit is by far the best I have seen.

I have to say the new away kit is by far the best I have seen 😍.

— Big Bob (@Boblar10) May 29, 2022

Not my woods, Carol. The words of Bob Oteng. Just to be sure, there’s even an emoji. Yes. An emoji. Bearing in mind we’ve already been offered up the brown / orange (the shirt which launched a thousand emojis – albeit not all of them good) and the black with silver and white trim, that’s a HUGE statement. Next season’s away is better than both of these. Better than the black and yellow. Better than the white rowing club colours.

Here’s to this going live. Whenever that may be…..

The other kit related news is on a topic closer to home. Namely the auction of the limited edition Brentford shirt Top Trumps which we created last month. The pack raised £65 for Rob Rowan’s CRY Memorial Fund – a figure which I’m blown away by, considering ‘regular’ packs cost around a fiver. With a second sizeable donation already being made, that’s another huge shout out for the generosity of Brentford fans.

The money has been donated already – you can see that (and the link) here. In the shorter term, I do have another pack left behind. If anybody would like this, please DM me on Twitter (@NickBruzon) or message here with your offer and I am sure we can figure out a way to do this. The only proviso being that it will be on the same terms as the previous auction i.e. funds donated to Rob’s Fund.

Or how about just dropping a few quid anyway? We all know what Rob did for the club and the regard in which he is still held. Cripes, we’re about to start a second season in the Premier League. For that reason alone….

Until then, here’s waiting on the club to show us the new shirts. No rush, Bob…

Nick Bruzon

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One for the Brentford shirt nerds / collectors *

Let’s cut to the chase. There’s no Brentford season review e-book this year. Thank goodness, came the cry. After 7(seven) years of doing it and raising charity funds, time has caught up. Besides, if you are truly bored its all here or in the programme and other sources. Just not handily packaged up.

That said…. anyone looking to get their hands on something special and contribute to a great cause can still do so. As we did a couple of years ago (with the Griffin Park supporter specials) an extremely limited edition pack of Top Trumps has been created. This time around – Brentford shirts. Thirty of the great (and not so good) ranked and packaged in a bona fide pack of Top Trumps cards.

And you can bid on them now – here. Any money raised from the sale (and they do have a bid so we’re looking to get at least 99p) will go to Rob Rowan’s CRY fund. There’s no charity closer to all of us at Brentford and so regardless of the quality of the end product, know that whomever wins these will be doing something amazing.

You can also find the link to Rob’s page here. We donated last year’s ebook sales whilst some of the recent donation are, frankly, stunning.

Thanks for your time and I’d be so grateful if anybody was able to get involved.

(*Delete as applicable)

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/354071339924

Nick Bruzon

Robert Rowan

Nick Bruzon

Where did all the noise come from?

Exciting times. Brentford now know we’ll be first up in the Premier League. Our opening game, the visit of Arsenal to Lionel Road, now brought forward for TV and will be played under lights on Friday 13th August. A fixture list already bristling with early season promise – Liverpool, Chelsea and Leicester City all due in TW8 before the clocks change – now sees the third placed Bees with an opportunity to top the pack and send Arsenal bottom of the fledgling table. It’s going to immense. We all loved Griffin Park, no question, but if we learned one thing last season it is that our new home at Lionel Road is a cauldron of noise. Just ask Bournemouth. And that was with 4,200 present. Imagine the noise when full? Imagine walking out of there on the Friday night, sitting at the top of the Premier League… One can dream.

How did we get here? That’s not something posed in any metaphysical sense but more asked to reflect on how we are even able to entertain the lunacy that is us talking about topping the Premier League. Our little bus stop in Hounslow could be sitting above the likes of Liverpool, Champions of Europe Chelsea and the other 17 (seventeen) illustrious names we’ll be playing. I mean, we are already but points in the bag are ten times better than alphabetical order. All we need to do is beat Arsenal. Easy. In theory.

And to answer the question….well, it’s that time of year once more. Season review time. As ever, the collected ‘Last Word’ posts aswell as all the match day programme blog columns (not previously published online) have been collated in e-book form for our 2020/21 retrospective.

A look back at the strangest of Championship seasons. One played out in mostly silence (barring the ‘200’ we smuggled in for the QPR game) from that opening fixture against Birmingham City in September through to the play-off final at Wembley and beyond.   

The latest volume is available now for kindle and other e-book reader devices / apps from the Amazon store. You can get it here. 

Normally the few quid it raises is then given to the Brentford FC Community Sports Trust although things are a little different this time around. Should anybody be kind enough to download a copy, any and all monies received from this / previous volumes will be going to Rob Rowan’s memorial fund. 

There can’t be anyone associated with Brentford who isn’t aware of Rob’s work as Technical Director or his tragic passing from an undiagnosed heart condition at the age of just 28. His family have been supporting CRY (Cardiac Risk in the Young) since his passing, a charity whose aims include preventing young sudden cardiac deaths through awareness, screening and research aswell as providing bereavement counselling for affected families. 

Rob’s memorial will fund future screenings to allow young people between ages of 14-35 to be checked for free (something the government doesn’t currently support).

A first screening was held at Syon Park back in 2019 although the pandemic has meant that these have been unable to be held since. The next intent being to hold a full weekend in Fife, Scotland, and another in Brentford (hopefully at the new stadium) allowing over 400 young people to be screened. Dates for those are hoped to be known soon.

It would be fair to say that Rob’s vision played a monumental part in helping us reach the holy grail of top flight football. Without him, who knows where we’d be?  For anybody wanting to know or more about CRY or donate directly, you can do so, here.

Nick Bruzon