Thomas Frank's Brentford side promoted to the Premier League for the first time after a 2-0 win over Swansea in the Championship play-off final at Wembley; west London club return to the top flight for the first time since 1947
Wednesday 11 August 2021 18:22, UK
In the most unique and challenging of seasons, Brentford have gone one better than last season and been promoted to the Premier League after beating Swansea 2-0 in the Championship play-off final at Wembley.
Last year was supposed to be the year - the year the Bees would say goodbye to Griffin Park, their home of 116 years, in style. But last August, it was west London neighbours Fulham who pipped them to the top flight, with a 2-1 win in extra time.
Remarkably, there was no real hangover for Thomas Frank's men, despite the manner of the defeat and the gap of just over five weeks between the end of last season and this. Still, they did it the hard way and prevailed at the second time of asking after beating the Swans on Saturday afternoon.
Getting to this point has been far from plain sailing, however. From financial hardship around the turn of the millennium to promotion to the promised land, we take a look at how Brentford reached the first Premier League for the first time…
After financial struggles in their lower league years, it was 2007 - 60 years after they had last played top-flight football in 1947 - when things started to change for Brentford after current owner Matthew Benham's involvement in the club began.
A lifelong fan of the club, Benham eventually took full control of the club in 2012, and his involvement has been key to a gradual but consistent ascent from the doldrums of League Two, a journey that makes the decades of financial trouble and existential threat seem so long ago.
Having suffered a miserable relegation in 2007, Brentford won the League Two title in 2008/09 and began to grow, ever so slightly, in stature. Once Benham's ownership was confirmed, he began to mould the club to fit his vision. They reached the League One play-off final in 2013 with former Man City striker Uwe Rosler at the helm, but it could have been the perfect start.
Every Brentford fan will know where they were on April 27, 2013. Doncaster Rovers visited Griffin Park for a winner-takes-all clash: A win for Rovers would secure the title and consign Brentford to the play-offs, while a Bees win would see them promoted to the Championship.
A foul by Dean Furman on Toumani Diagouraga saw Rosler's side awarded a penalty in front of the Ealing Road terrace deep into second-half stoppage time. Fulham loanee Marcello Trotta clutched the ball and prevented club legend Kevin O'Connor from taking the spot-kick.
Then time stood still as the Italian's shot thundered off the crossbar, allowing Rovers to break through Billy Paynter, who squared for James Coppinger to strike beyond helpless goalkeeper Simon Moore.
If anything, it made promotion the following year even sweeter, particularly as the act that secured second-tier football was a penalty, too. This time, Alan Judge did the honours, though.
Over the seven seasons since, Brentford have worked tirelessly to become an established Championship club, with a top-half finish in each campaign under their belts. The club's transfer policy has been central to the rise.
Headed by co-sporting directors Rasmus Ankersen and Phil Giles, the club have developed a reputation for identifying undervalued talent using mathematical and statistical modelling and often developing them in the B Team, which was set up in the summer of 2016 after the controversial closure of their academy.
In its infancy, this was often in untapped leagues or regions where players might command a lower fee, though since Brexit, the talent pool has been greatly condensed.
First put into practice ahead of the 2015/16 season, it was a system former head coach Mark Warburton felt unable to work within, partly given the fact he would be unable to veto incoming transfers.
There were undoubtedly creases to iron out, with German pair Akaki Gogia and Philipp Hofmann struggling to settle in west London, yet equally the plan began to work almost immediately as they brought in 13 players permanently, sold seven, finished ninth in the table and still made a significant profit on transfers.
Their policy has often been likened to that of the Oakland Athletics baseball team's 2002 season, which spawned the Brad Pitt film Moneyball. Benham himself, however, has distanced himself from such comparisons. "The label can be confusing because people think it is using any stats rather than trying to use them in a scientific way," he said in 2015.
Owing somewhat to the club's ties with Benham's other club, Danish Superliga outfit FC Midtjylland, there is a large Scandinavian presence at the club's Jersey Road training ground. In addition to head coach Frank and his assistant Brian Riemer, there are seven Danish players in the first team, as well as Icelandic goalkeeper Patrik Gunnarsson, Finnish striker Marcus Forss and Swedish skipper Pontus Jansson.
Naturally, the policy has had its doubters. Since promotion to the Championship, many believed Brentford were simply a selling club punching above their weight and would not have what it took to make the step up to the next level. For several years there was an air of truth about that as summer after summer the players they had shaped departed west London, with the likes of Andre Gray, James Tarkowski and Jota going on to ply their trade in the Premier League.
But as a club who do things the 'right' way and have future prospects at the forefront of their mind, Brentford played the long game in grafting towards an end goal. Due to meticulously planning two transfer windows ahead, there was always a ready-made replacement, usually signed for a fraction of the incoming fee.
A total of £27.2m generated from player sales helped the club achieve a £23.4m total profit in 2018/19 and though they posted a loss of £9.2m in 2019/20, the £24.9m from outgoing transfers showed just how crucial the policy is to the future of the club.
Any mention of the play-offs has left Brentford fans wincing over the past 30 years, with each of their nine campaigns ending in failure since the first at the conclusion of the 1990/91 Third Division season. The curse that has followed them has now been banished to the past, though.
Following a steady if unspectacular start to this season consisting of three wins, three defeats and one draw, Frank's men were 11th on October 24, having almost completed the comeback of all comebacks in a 3-2 loss to Stoke, having been 3-0 down with 20 minutes to play. It wasn't to be that day, but the fight seemed to ignite something within the squad that led to a 21-game unbeaten run.
In itself, that still fell five games short of the club's best ever unbeaten run in the EFL - a 26-game streak from February to October 1999 - but in the midst of it, they also managed to reach the Carabao Cup semi-finals for the first time in club history.
What captured the attention of most, however, was Ivan Toney's record-breaking campaign. The 25-year-old striker arrived in west London as Ollie Watkins' replacement - following his initial £28m move to Aston Villa - and, with great expectation upon his shoulders, exceeded every single one set for him.
On the final day of the regular season, he scored his 31st league goal of the season and, in the process, broke Glenn Murray's record of 30, which was set in 2012/13.
When the unbeaten run reached its inevitable conclusion in February, days after a brief flirtation with top spot, the blistering form of Watford under Xisco Munoz took Brentford out of automatic promotion contention and they never quite managed to find their way back into the top two.
That brought about a 10th play-off campaign - the joint-most in history - that saw them paired with Bournemouth. Arnaut Danjuma's second half goal saw the Cherries take the first leg plaudits, but a thrilling comeback in west London five days later sent the Bees to Wembley.
And so they returned to Wembley in an attempt to exorcise their demons once again. And this time, they were successful, thanks to first half goals from Toney and Emiliano Marcondes.
It's been 74 years since Brentford were among the country's elite clubs in the top flight. But that's about to change as the long wait is finally over.
