Revealed: The secrets of Brentford’s success – by the man behind it
Coach Thomas Frank tells Jason Burt how the club with the smallest budget, the lowest wage bill and ‘a s---hole of a training ground’ took the Premier League by storm in their debut season
From the pandemic to the Premier League, the last two years have been a remarkable journey for Brentford. “Honestly it is incredible what we have achieved,” their head coach Thomas Frank says. Here, in the coach’s words, and across seven defining games, is how they did it.
Brentford 5 Sheffield Wednesday 0 (March 7, 2020)
We didn’t know it would be our last game at Griffin Park but football was shut down. I had a Zoom call that night – me, Brian (Riemer, his assistant), Rasmus Ankersen and Phil Giles (the co-directors of football) – and it was, like, “what do we do?” I remember Mathias Jensen and Christian Norgaard had pregnant girlfriends and they wanted to go back to Denmark.
I said we should keep them here and Phil said, “let them go home,
we don’t know what’s going to happen”. In the end we allowed them to travel and I clearly remember Phil – whose masters degree was in pandemics – said “take it easy. It will take months and probably a couple of years before this is over”. And he was bang on.
So we started in June and we had to play these nine games – Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Wednesday – and we were 10 points behind Fulham and West Brom but we thought “let’s go for it, let’s see what happens”. We won the first 2-0 away to Fulham, then 1-0 at home to West Brom. Game on. We won seven in a row. We met here at the training ground before the second last game, away to Stoke, and travelled up late because of Covid. Huddersfield score five minutes before the end [to beat West Brom]. The players are going mad.
We arrived at 10pm at the hotel and I said: “We can go past West
Brom with a win so make sure we do things normally.” But I think the turnaround from the emotions and playing the next day at 12.30pm… we didn’t have time to process it. We lost 1-0 and then lost to Barnsley. The narrative will always be “you bottled it” but we should have won.
Brentford 1 Fulham 2 (Championship play-off final, Aug 4, 2020)
We played the final at Wembley, a ghost stadium with no fans. It should have gone to penalties but David Raya, the best goalkeeper in the Championship, made a mistake. 1-0 and we lost 2-1. It just ended on such a downer and I remember in the dressing room that feeling… so hard, so hard.
We then had eight days of holiday – but it was no holiday – and I drove back to Denmark. I had three days with my family and we went to a nice hotel but I was on the phone. We went straight into the new season and sold the two best offensive players in the league in Ollie Watkins and Said Benrahma.
We got Ivan Toney in from League One. We were by far the team that had the fewest days off. We had to push one more time. It was unbelievably hard.
But I knew we had a strong squad that could compete for promotion.
Maybe it was because of what happened but we didn’t get a top start. But then we went 21 games unbeaten and in the 21st game we beat Reading to go top of the league and I thought “wow, this looks good” and then we lost to Barnsley, lost to QPR (and injuries hit). But in that run of 21 games we went to the semi-finals of the (Carabao) Cup. I am not stupid I don’t play the same XI every game but I put a strong team out because I believe in consistency.
But when we played Tottenham we were the team in the whole of Europe who had played the most games in that season. In the whole of Europe. We have a unique staff but the training ground is a s---hole. We don’t have top facilities. We love it and have a fantastic atmosphere but we didn’t fly home on jets. Not in the Championship.
Norwich City 1 Brentford 0 (March 3, 2021)
I was tired. Done. I was just exhausted. Not stressed, no chest pains or I couldn’t sleep, but I was so tired. I remember that international break and we couldn’t travel, we were still hit by Covid and I didn’t watch any football.
I just slept. I decided for the last part of the season that I needed to leave the training ground at 4pm at the latest, go home, walk the dog with my wife, watch a stupid Netflix series, maybe have a nap and then make dinner with my wife – or she made dinner and I had a glass of red! – and talked.
I was like the phone that you put on charge overnight and in the morning I was not 100 per cent but maximum 80. I had to change my lifestyle to make sure I could keep the energy. I usually have a huge engine and am pushing, pushing but because of Covid, because it had almost been two years, I was just knackered. It was after Norwich that I recognised it.
Bournemouth 1 Brentford 0 (play-off semi-final first leg, May 17, 2021)
Bournemouth got a corner in the 89th minute and they only put a few players up there and wanted to keep the ball and defend. And I just thought, “OK, you know what? We are going to beat them in the next game because they are afraid”. They were playing at home and were not going for the second goal?
I went into the dressing room and told the players: “They are afraid of us.”
Then in the second leg it was the best game plan ever. It was the masterpiece. I did the tactical meeting in the dressing room and showed two short videos, a minute each. One was tactical, the other motivational. Then I spoke to the ref, which I normally never do, and said: “They will time-waste. If they take more than 15 seconds at goal-kicks I will be standing like this [holding his arm in the air and tapping his watch] live on Sky. I am telling you now because they did it in the last game.”
I don’t believe too much in final speeches but with this one I got everyone in a huddle and put myself in the middle and said, “I need us to be cool” and pointed at Pontus (Jansson) and Sergi Canos.
I then said I needed aggression and pointed at Mathias Jensen and Ethan Pinnock. Then I said, “I need presence” and I pointed at Ivan (Toney), at (Henrik) Dalsgaard and (Emiliano) Marcondes. Christian Norgaard asked, “Can I say something?” He made a very emotional speech saying “we are a family, play for each other, like you would play for your mother, your brother, your children”. I get goosebumps now. Staff had tears in their eyes.
Then I did another thing. I have only done it once and I don’t think I will do it again. I ran this lap around the pitch because I knew I needed to maximise every single detail. Because of Covid we had only 4,000 fans and we needed to make it loud.
We came flying out, first five minutes, it was crazy. We had a corner, they ran down and scored. 1-0 down. I turned around and smashed my foot into the bin and said, “Thomas, cool, cool. Keep your emotions. Deep breath”. I turned around and smashed my foot one more time and said “No, cool”. We went on and won [3-1].
At that stage I knew, no disrespect to Swansea, that if we hit our top performance we would beat them in the final [Brentford won 2-0]. For me that game is bigger than any other except for the final of the World Cup or the European Championship. Champions League final? No. Do they want to win? Of course. But you cannot describe what it means to Brentford to win the playoff final. It’s life-defining.
Brentford 2 Arsenal 0 (Aug 13, 2021)
That will forever be a standout moment in my career. I remember after the game I sat with Brian in his apartment close to Kew Bridge and we were with Rasmus. We had a glass of red wine around midnight and sat there thinking “wow” and Rasmus said: “This is probably going to be one of the top five games in Brentford’s history.” The first game, at home, live across the world and beating a top side.
We know we want do things differently. We know we have to find a new way to beat the established clubs and we came into the season with zero experience: Players, staff members, me with one of the youngest teams ever to get promoted, with the second youngest team in the Premier League, with the lowest budget and lowest wage bill. But we believed with our knowledge that we could make a difference.
In the week up to the Arsenal game I kept saying to the players, and it was not a mind-game, it was literally my feeling, that I would be disappointed if we did not beat them. It was no disrespect to Arsenal, but it was analysing everything. I just had a feeling.
Because of the play-offs we were behind everyone else and you can’t plan.
On Monday I went on holiday to Scotland. We drove to Edinburgh, Fort William and Loch Lomond. We had six days and there were Zoom meetings about transfers and phone
calls but I was relatively calm. Then I went to Denmark for three weeks which was fantastic. Because it [promotion] was such a big achievement and I was so happy I think my emotions were helping me cope with the tiredness.
I knew in my head. The plan was clear. I knew we had to be fantastic defensively, on set-pieces and in fitness. We knew the style of play and what I wanted to do.
We were more dominant in the Championship, the highest-scoring team for two years, and it was about breaking the opposition down but we had to change that.
We needed to be one of the best defensive sides in the league. With set-pieces we knew we were equally as good as any other team.
Maybe they might have a tiny bit better delivery but in terms of physicality and the plan we were top.
And then fitness. I should be able to run as much as you. Maybe there is a little physiology but it’s really about mindset and training. We focused more on defence, especially in pre-season. We had to nail it.
Man City 2 Brentford 0 (Feb 9, 2022)
With the start we had I was thinking, “can we be top 10?” and then we got hit by injuries. Raya was out, a top-six keeper in the league, for four months, (Kristoffer) Ajer out, Rico (Henry), Ivan.
We had the bad spell. We lost nine out of 11 games from Boxing Day. I remember before the season people saying we could lose five in a row in the league and I thought “never”. Because of the culture and mindset. And we had the City game away. We lost and that was the fifth game. But we played really well and that kept me believing.
Then the key players came back and I knew if I had my best XI then no problem. City was so close to being a defensive master-class but that spell was tough to take. I hate losing, the players hate losing and that’s the biggest difference from the Championship to the Premier League for a team like us. We are just losing more games. My three words this season were: Cool, brave, aggressive. Every game.
Chelsea 1 Brentford 4 (April 2, 2022)
There were three reasons why we went on a good run. Firstly we could never do it if we had not performed well in the bad spell. The basics were there.
Secondly, key players were fit. Even when City play without Kevin De Bruyne they are not the same. And then there was Christian [Eriksen]. I am still convinced we would have stayed up without him. A hundred per cent.
But he has given us top quality, coolness, he has made his teammates better. They have responded to him. He is smiling, enjoying playing football and being part of something and not just something, but something remarkable.
Going to Stamford Bridge, playing against the European champions, the best cup team in the world, coming full strength and we beat them fair and square. Not many teams do that. I was crazy proud. It’s very, very rare as an underdog to perform at your maximum in all aspects of how you want to play.
Following a game plan 100 per cent. That almost never happens.