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Brentford's mature season debut sends Premier League message on day of surprises
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- Brentford's mature season debut sends Premier League message on day of surprises
Week 1 of the 2026-27 Premier League season began with a predictable one-off but needed less than 24 more hours to descend into peak PL madness.
Arsenal waxed Coventry City on Friday but Saturday did not follow the script. Hull City were resolute in upsetting Manchester United , Ipswich Town used new-boy vibes to beat last season's surprise package Sunderland, and Leeds — winners of just two away matches last season — found a late winner away to Nottingham Forest.
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Yet the biggest surprise came last. Whether it should've been a surprise is another story, but we digress.
MORE — Brentford rout Tottenham Hotspur 3-0
It's not simply the score line of Brentford's 3-0 win over preseason hype machine Tottenham Hotspur that pushed the Bees to top story status; And it's not even summed up by the complete control displayed by Keith Andrews' side against Roberto De Zerbi's big-money team.
Let's get the excuses out of the way: Spurs had a host of new players, its manager made some bad bets with his Starting XI, and both captain Micky van de Ven and World Cup star Pedro Porro were absent from the team.
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That's all true. But Brentford controlled the traveling Spurs in an more impressive way than Arsenal's did their newly-promoted visitors on Friday. This was a shellacking — a ruthless, composed, physical display of a big-name visitor.
Brentford show signs of maturity in start of season-long pursuit
It was an appropriate showing from a side that missed European qualification by tiebreakers last season, one that will inspire supporters to dream of what could happen when a good team capable of comprehensive displays has just one table to worry about while several of their fellow dark horse peers concern themselves with Europe.
MORE — De Zerbi, Gray lament 'outfought' Spurs' performance
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Brentford have consistency in the team and staff for the first time in ages. Last season was Andrews' first in the main gig after assisting longtime boss Thomas Frank, and he had to replace Yoane Wissa, Bryan Mbeumo, Christian Norgaard, and Mark Flekken. The previous seasons saw Ivan Toney and David Raya leave West London.
Andrews returns for this season with a new club record signing to join a series of adapted, healthy, previous club record signings. Nathan Collins, Kevin Schade, Igor Thiago, and Dango Ouattara are joined by Mamadou Sangare, who put forth a complete performance on debut versus Spurs.
And in direct contrast to the visiting North Londoners, Brentford had a comprehensive understanding of the task at hand. They knew where and when to attack and seized upon errors from Spurs. When Mamadou Sangare was shown a bit of room, he used a 1-2 to slice up the Bees and make it 1-0. When Lucas Bergvall was too casual in a following challenge, Brentford knew where to be in order to double the score line.
Andrews' second season starts with evidence of evolution
When all was said and done, Brentford had dialed up around four expected goals at the expense of just 0.47 xGA. Yes, they predictably had a bit worse fortune when Spurs put in Mateus Fernandes and Rodrigo Bentancur to take part in the midfield fight at the break, but Brentford were still the superior side.
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Andrews has evolved Thomas Frank's system and it now feels properly Brentford's system. The system works, it is evolving, and it looks right because the Bees know which aisles of the transfer market have the appropriate components to replace what they've sold. To wit, it's been a while since Brentford sold a star who went on to become a much-improved version of themselves at a new club. Raya's gotten more praise, but you'd like have to look to Ollie Watkins or Ezri Konsa at the early part of this decade.
It's one game against an average side — albeit one wearing a fancy crest — but Brentford have the potential to deal out similar shows at home this season and the nous to get more away from the Gtech Community Stadium. If they can turn a few more home draws to wins — they went 8W-8D-3L at home last season — and a few away losses to draws (6W-3D-10L), they could find themselves in the Europa League.
The logic is there. Andrews has a full Premier League season under his belt, and it's a reasonable bet that his experience would be enough to dodge the 0-of-9 points experience he had at Forest, Sunderland, and Fulham to start last season (late-season home draws with Wolves, Fulham, and Palace were as much at fault).
Schade is a star and Igor Thiago's stuck around. Many teams don't have a playmaker as rapid as Schade or a handful of a center forward as clever as Thiago. Kayode looks ready for the season and his long throws remain a weapon. Mikkel Damsgaard and Mathias Jensen are savvy operators and there's size and skill at the back.
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With so many teams trading in managers for new models, embedding multiple new key pieces, and the aforementioned unusual sides dealing with Europe, there's no reason Brentford cannot be the dark horse of this season. And on evidence on Week 1, they're on their way.
