Buzzing

Nick Brown

Description

Seventy-four years is a long time to wait. A whole generation of supporters has come and gone since Brentford were last in the top division of English football. Now, under the astute management of Thomas Frank, the Bees are back in the big time. The 2021/22 season has seen the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United visit the Community Stadium, the dreams of years past now a reality. A lifetime of gazing up the football ladder and wondering what it would be like to be in the top tier has become a reality. So how would their trip into the unknown go? Would the Premier League turn out to be the land of milk and honey or would the dreams turn to nightmares? Follow their progress in this season-long diary of the highs and lows of the biggest season in the history of Brentford Football Club. Only one thing is certain - whatever the season would bring for the Bees, the players, staff, supporters and everyone connected with Brentford Football Club would be buzzing!

Informations

• Publié par: Pitch Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 15 août 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781801503075
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2022
Pitch Publishing
A2 Yeoman Gate
Yeoman Way
Durrington
BN13 3QZ
www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
Nick Brown, 2022
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A CIP catalogue record is available for this book from the British Library
Print ISBN 9781801501521
eBook ISBN 9781801503075
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CONTENTS
Prologue
Pre-Season
Season 2021/22
Epilogue
Season 2021/22 Statistics
Photos
PROLOGUE
THE WORLD was a very different place in 1947 to the one in which we now live. The slow recovery process after the Second World War was under way with prime minister Clement Attlee two years into his tenure after Winston Churchill winning the 1945 Genereal Election. The school-leaving age was raised to 15, child benefits were introduced and the National Health Service was still a year away from being founded. King George VI s daughter Princess Elizabeth married Philip Mountbatten, the newly appointed Duke of Edinburgh, in a ceremony at Westminster Abbey. Five years later, Princess Elizabeth would become Queen Elizabeth II and go on to become Britain s longest-serving monarch.
Elsewhere, outside of British shores, the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered by Bedouin shepherds Muhammed edh-Dhib, Jum a Muhammed and Khalil Musa in caves near the Khirbet Qumran on the north-western shore of the Dead Sea in Israel; the Cold War began as US President Harry S. Truman signed an Act of Congress to stop the spread of Communism, with the National Security Act creating the CIA (the Cold War ended in 1991); and in New Mexico, the American army issued a press release stating that they had recovered a flying disc from a crash site in Roswell, quickly retracted the statement and insisted it was nothing more than a conventional weather balloon, thus starting the Roswell Incident rumours and conspiracy theories.
And 1947 was also the last time that Brentford Football Club played a match in the top flight of English football.
Rewind 58 years to 1889. A new recreation park was opened in the town of Brentford and the local rowing club got together with the cricket club to decide how best to utilise the new facility. An application to use the ground was submitted to the Chiswick Local Board but their board meeting failed to reach a conclusion. The founders of the rowing club, Archer Green and John Henry Strachan, chaired a meeting of club members to decide whether they would form a new football or rugby club and when put to the vote, it was the round ball that was decided upon. Brentford Football Club was born and it was decided that their colours would be the same as the rowing club s colours - salmon, claret and light blue. Newly elected club president Edwin Underwood promised to allow them the use of a field behind the offices of the Local Board as their home ground. The new club s first official match was played on 23 November 1889 against Kew and ended in a 1-1 draw. The honour of being the first goalscorer in Brentford s history belongs to T.H.M. Bonell.
Brentford led a bit of a nomadic existence early on and made the first of their many moves to Benn s Field in Ealing, west London, and entered the West London Alliance League for the 1892/93 season. They finished the campaign as champions. However, after not being awarded a trophy, they decided not to defend their title, resigned from the league and continued on playing friendlies and entering cup competitions.
In 1896 they were elected into the London League. Their first season saw the club finish as runners-up in the second division and, following promotion, they also secured second spot in the top division at the end of the next season. That year also saw the club achieve a cup double as Brentford won both the London Senior Cup and Middlesex Senior Cup.
The 1898/99 season saw Brentford play in the Southern League and also make their first appearance in the FA Cup. The next few years heralded many changes both on and off the pitch. They changed their colours to dark blue and gold stripes in 1903, settled at Griffin Park in 1904, reached the third round of the FA Cup in the 1905/06 season before being beaten by Liverpool and again changed their colours, this time to gold shirts with blue sleeves, in 1909.
The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 disrupted Brentford s plans, as it did for pretty much the rest of the world. They took part in the London Combination League during the war and, after hostilities ended, resumed playing in the Southern League. In 1920, the Third Division of the Football League was founded and Brentford, along with their Southern League rivals, were the founder members. The club once again changed their colours, this time to white shirts and black shorts. They finished the season in 21st position and only remained in the league due to the other clubs re-electing them. In 1925, the kit changed once more, to the now familiar red and white stripes.
The appointment of Harry Curtis as manager in 1926 marked a turning point for Brentford. Slow but sure progress saw the team climb through the league structure and in 1935 they won promotion to the First Division. Ground improvements were made to Griffin Park that saw the capacity rise to 40,000 and the team responded by ending the season in fifth position, the highest finish in the club s history. The following season saw a sixth-placed finish and an FA Cup quarter-final appearance.
With the outbreak of the Second World War, the Football League programme was decimated and Brentford took their place in the Football League South and the London League, with the team being full of guest players. At the resumption of the league proper, they were relegated from the First Division at the end of the 1946/47 season and from that day on the club floated around the lower reaches of the Football League, occasionally flirting with the idea of promotion back to the big time but dropping away when it mattered.
Things began to change for the better in 2014/15 with Brentford reaching the play-offs for a place in the Premier League before being beaten in the semi-finals by Middlesbrough. Now established as a force in the Championship, Brentford toyed with promotion for the next few seasons, being regulars in the play-offs, and were beaten by Fulham in the play-off final at the end of the 2019/20 season and had to see their west London neighbours promoted instead of them.
Before the start of the 2020/21 season, Brentford moved out of Griffin Park after 116 years and moved into the all seater Brentford Community Stadium, just half a mile away. Another finish in the play-off positions once again saw them reach the final but this time it was Brentford s turn to triumph. Goals from Ivan Toney and Emiliano Marcondes earned a 2-0 victory over Swansea City to secure a return to the big time after 74 years.
An entire lifetime has passed since the Bees were last in the top echelons of English football. There are supporters who would have to ask their grandfathers what it was like to watch their club play against the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United. Since then, virtually every other team in London who have been part of the Football League has been in the First Division as was or the Premier League as is. The only exceptions are Barnet, Dagenham Redbridge and Sutton United, who have only amassed 31 years of league football between them, with the 2021/22 season being the first in Sutton s history.
So how will this momentous season pan out? Will they crash the party or will it be a step too far? Would the players who did so well in the Championship be able to cut it in the Premier League? Would manager Thomas Frank be out of his depth among his world-famous counterparts? Would the team struggle against the big boys or would they take everyone by surprise?
So many questions, but only time will tell. The only certainty is that whatever happens, the 2021/22 season marks a milestone in the club s history. After 74 years, the Bees are back in town.
PRE-SEASON
STRENGTHENING a squad after promotion to the Premier League is always a tricky business. What does the manager do? Does he show faith in the players who helped to get the club up, even though they may be untested at that level, or does he bring in lots of players with experience who have been there before? In the past we ve seen various clubs try out both strategies only for them to backfire and win nothing but a return ticket to the Championship. In preparation for the 2021/22 season Brentford visited a halfway house, bringing in four players who would realistically be looking for a first team spot along with one or two others with an eye on the future. The new first team squad members were Kristoffer Ajer, Frank Onyeka, Yoane Wissa and Myles Peart-Harris.
Ajer is a Norwegian international who had spent the last five years in Scotland with Celtic. A towering defender, he is used to playing in big games and winning things, having secured three Scottish championships, three Scottish Cups and three Scottish League Cups during his time in Glasgow. Midfielder Onyeka is also no stranger to winning medals, having won two Danish titles with FC Midtjylland, from whom he joined Brentford. The pacy forward Wissa joined from French club