Thomas Frank: Brentford close to a complete performance against West Ham
The Bees moved 12 points clear of the Premier League drop zone.
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Your support makes all the difference.Thomas Frank felt Brentford’s performance against West Ham was their best of the season after goals from Bryan Mbeumo and Ivan Toney surely banished any lingering fears of relegation.
The Bees’ dynamic strike duo sank lacklustre West Ham 2-0 to move 12 points clear of the Premier League drop zone.
Brentford stunned Chelsea 4-1 at Stamford Bridge last weekend, but head coach Frank felt the display against the Hammers was even better.
“I think it was close to a complete performance,” he said. “It was the first time all season we have more or less controlled the game from minute one to minute 90.
“Winning 2-0 against a very good side, a side in the quarter-finals of the Europa League and challenging for the top four, and restricting them to just five shots, that’s ‘wow’ for me.
“I’m very proud of the performance, it was possibly even more complete than the Chelsea one. The way we did it shows how far we’ve come.
“It’s a combination of a top performance and a good win, that’s the big thing. Of course I looked at the table, but I want to focus on the next game.”
After a low-key first half the second took just two minutes to come alive when Brentford took a quick throw-in.
Toney flicked the ball on to Mbeumo, who rifled the ball low into the net from the angle.
Mbeumo returned the favour for Toney in the 64th minute for Brentford’s second.
Yoann Wissa fed Rico Henry down the left and his cross was steered first-time onto the head of Toney from six yards.
West Ham’s top-four hopes are fading but they still have a shot at winning the Europa League to qualify for next season’s Champions League.
I think it was close to a complete performance. It was the first time all season we have more or less controlled the game from minute one to minute 90
However, their hopes of getting past Lyon in Thursday’s second leg suffered a blow when defender Kurt Zouma limped off with a twisted ankle.
“Him coming off is not a good sign,” admitted manager David Moyes.
The Scot felt this was a match too far for his increasingly stretched squad.
“It was disappointing, but just maybe playing Thursday and Sunday caught up with us,” he added. “We lacked intensity and hardly made any chances.
“It was a really low level game in the first half but we gave them a leg-up in the second with a really poor, shoddy goal from our point of view.”