Indefensible

Since my last blog I’ve been to two more matches and yet this blog is going to be about neither of them. Instead I’m going to highlight a trend that is undermining the great ascent of my team.

Thomas Frank was right to say, after Brentford’s 4-3 victory over Ipswich Town 10 days ago, that the home team were not upto their normal standard in the first 45 minutes. If the Tractor Boys had a finisher on the pitch the halftime score would have been far closer to 0-6 than the 2-2 it was on the day.

Our defence was almost non-existent for the entire first half and the waves of relief reverberating around the Gtech every few minutes, as Ipswich passed up another gilt-edged chance were palpable.

It was a relief that we were playing a team clearing struggling to adjust to the pace of the Premier League, having only managed 6 goals in their first 8 games whilst conceding 16.

By the end of the match they had scored another third of their goals for the season and added just a 5th to their number conceded, but that was enough to keep them as one of just 3 teams to have conceded more than their hosts all season.

Brentford have become known for their fast starts and attacking play, but they should also be known for the inability to defend them. Leading in 9 matches out of 10 this season is all well and good, as is scoring 9 times in our last 2 home games, but the main statistic that focuses my mind is that only 4 of those leads have been converted into wins.

We relied on a penalty and a stoppage time winner to sneak past the stuttering tactors, even conceding what appeared to be a last minute equaliser when the visitors were down to 10 men.

This defensive vulnerability reared it’s ugly head again on Monday at the cottage down the road. Vitaly Janelt had given us a trademark lead with a belter from 25 yards early in the match and for once it looked like we might actually weather the onslaught.

Then stoppage time happened and Harry Wilson happened and, just like last October at Old Trafford, all the away fans were left trying to come to terms with what they’d just seen.

We had thrown away a lead again and maintained our 0% record away from home this season, despite leading all but one of the matches. Such a record is utterly indefensible!!

In the 2022-23 season Brentford topped the table for most points dropped from winning positions and this season we are soaring clear at the top of that table once more.

The reason for this is clearly not an inability to score, only Man City have scored more goals thus far this season, but our indefensible defensive record, only Ipswich, Wolves and Southampton have conceded more than us.

Such defensive fragility would be understandable if we were dealing with new injuries or trying to integrate new players, but all our current defensive injuries are hangovers from last season and our only new signings in the summer were attacking players.

The defensive fragilities we have are mindset based and that makes them far harder to solve without a change coming from the top. That change has to be based on the ethos we cultivate at the club around defending and it has to happen soon because this has now been dragging us down from our rightful place in the league for far too long.

On my train back north I passed a group of drunk passengers who spotted my Brentford shirt and congratulated me on the Ipswich win. I couldn’t accept their congratulations because for me winning the match was not enough.

I wanted us to have deserved the victory and after the display of defensive ineptitude I had witnessed I didn’t feel we deserved to win. To be clear, Ipswich didn’t deserve to win either with all the chances they squandered but a draw would have left me feeling more fulfilled with the use of my day than that win did.

Just because they’re my team that I love doesn’t mean that I won’t pick things apart when they need to be and highlight where improvements can be made.

Next to visit our hive are the Cherries of the South Coast fresh off beating the best team in the country 4 seasons in a row and if we defend like we have so far this season they will rip us to shreds.

Yes, we are at the highest level we have been in decades. Yes, some of the attacking play we can put together is scintillating and makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. But also yes, some of our defensive play is distressingly shambolic this season and no amount of other good qualities can make that indefensible fragility defensible