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The blog of a travelling psychiatrist and football lover. Who happens to be a halfway decent photographer. Takes a cynical view of the world

Archive for the tag “sporting director brentford”

Brentford Bees Forum With Manager and Sporting Directors


An excellent forum was held where all questions were answered as best as reasonably they could. The only difficult moment was a late question again about Mark Warburton and his departure. The fans were given good updates on all aspects of the club. These were maybe the main points:

  1. Promotion to Premier League within 3 years. This is Plan A. There is no Plan B
  2. The new ground should be ready, just, for start of 2018-19 season
  3. Signing a couple of players on loan has not been ruled out to cover injuries
  4. We need to remember than until we move ground we are limited by the small turnover in comparison to other Championship clubs. Last season Brentford turned over 8 m £ in comparison to a Championship average of 17m £
  5. Although signing many EU players, players in the Football League are on our radar even down to Conference level
  6. Football league rules do not allow differential pricing of games for away fans. The example cited of Leeds charging £24 for a junior away ticket for example could not replicated at Griffin Park
  7. The squad is stronger than last season.

In attendance answering questions were

  1. Mark Devlin
  2. Cliff Crown
  3. Marinus Dijkhuizen
  4. Rasmus Ankersen
  5. Phil Giles
  6. Peter Gilham

As a small bit of background Rasmus ankersen and Phil Giles are the co-directors of football at Brentford, Cliff Crown the chairman, Mark Devlin CEO and Marinus Dijkhuizen the manager.

  • Phil Giles  worked at Smartodds – a company owned by Matthew Benham which provides statistical sports modelling services – for eight years and had been their Head of Quantitative Sports Research since 2010
  • Rasmus Ankersen was Chairman of FC Midtjylland the Danish Superliga team owned by Matthew Benham and author of a book ” The Goldmine Effect”.
Marinus Dijkhuizen and Cliff Crown at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Marinus Dijkhuizen and Cliff Crown at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Cliff Crown at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Cliff Crown at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Marinus Dijkhuizen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Marinus Dijkhuizen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Marinus Dijkhuizen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Marinus Dijkhuizen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Mark Devlin CEO Brentford FC   at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Mark Devlin CEO Brentford FC at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen and Phil Giles  at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen and Phil Giles at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Marinus Dijkhuizen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Marinus Dijkhuizen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

Rasmus Ankersen at Bees Forum 2015 Sept

The Mystery of Warburton and Brentford. What exactly do we know?


Brentford fans woke up tuesday morning 10th Feb to a large article in The Times that announced that Mark Warburton would be leaving the club at the end of the season. Today 11th Feb it seems Sporting Director Frank McParland may well be also leaving. Why? Behind these unexpected and unwanted developments it seems there are two strands of thinking. Matthew Benham wants an all-powerful sporting director who makes all the decisions regarding new signings, unlike the current situation where Warburton does this. McParland is not seen as the man. The second issue relates it seems to the desire by Benham to want to bring in a free-kick coach and a sleeping expert. Warburton does not want to change things when things are moving so well this season. Further confusing aspects that may be primary or secondary problems relate to the news that Warburton it seems is on the radar for the Leicester City job, but seemingly not yet approached, and his name is mentioned in relation to the currently vacant QPR position, where any degree of interest is not reported on.

So what does this mean to Brentford? At the moment it is just a huge fog. Brentford have been in discussions with a potential Spanish manager of Rayo Vallencano, Paco Jemez. Again it is unclear what the sequence of temporal events might have been, but the comments yeaterday by Warburton that he will see the job through this season, is suggestive that he was being pushed before being potentially pulled for other roles.

The last piece of news relates to a posting by Benham on facebook this morning, where he says ” Its been a very difficult 24 hours. I will try to explain the situation more in the next couple of days. I’ve been a genuine fan since 1979 and try to honestly act in the best long term interests of the club”.

So the saga has a long way to go and might unravel in any direction. Lets see.

photo 2 photo 1-1 photo 2-2

Mark Warburton

Mark Warburton

photo 4-3 photo 5-1 photo 5-2

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