Straight off the back of Hull, Brentford are back on the road again – this time up to Sunderland for a League Cup tie neither side seems convinced they actually need. Billy “The Bee” Grant took the Beesotted Pride of West London minipod up to the Northeast to get the lowdown from Black Cats expert Connor Bromley from Howay The Podcast, and it’s fair to say the mood in Sunderland isn’t what it was last time these two met.
Back in early September, Sunderland gave Brentford a real game at the Gtech, and Connor doesn’t need reminding – “we thought that Sunderland were one of the best sides that we’d actually played this season,” Billy admitted, with Brentford fans turning round mid-game to say exactly that. Since then, though, it’s gone wrong for Régis Le Bris’s side. Five points from eight league games, six goals scored, 14 conceded – numbers Connor can’t dress up. “It’s been a really weird season,” he said, “because basically it’s been characterised by defensive mistakes. Sunderland have essentially thrown away a lot of points.” He reeled off the evidence: two defensive errors on the opening day, a 5-3 battering at Man City despite out-shooting the cheats, then back-to-back league defeats to Brighton and Bournemouth since the international break.
There’s real affection for Le Bris underneath the frustration, though. Connor’s biggest fear isn’t the football – it’s the club pulling the trigger too soon. “I trust Regis Le Bris to fix it,” he said, pointing to a promotion, a seventh-placed finish and the Europa League run he’s delivered since taking over. Granit Xhaka’s dip in form hasn’t helped – “he’s not the same player… he was the heartbeat of the team last season” – and Connor was blunt that some of the frustration around a right-back playing right-wing is fair, but sacking the manager over it would be “a silly decision.”
Which brings us to Wednesday night. Arguably, neither side is treating this as a priority. “This is not Sunderland’s priority right now,” Connor said flatly, with the league and Europe eating the real attention. Expect wholesale changes from the hosts – as many as ten or eleven – with teenage midfielder Juma Bah Hoga among the few given a proper look. Billy expects something similar from Keith Andrews, though with more first-team quality mixed in than Sunderland will risk, Mamadou Sangaré likely needed for minutes and a genuine debate over whether Igor Thiago or Callum Wilson leads the line.
Connor’s honest enough to admit it: “if you look at the two elevens that are likely to play, you’d say the Brentford eleven is stronger,” and his real worry is Brentford “running riot” and ramping up pressure on a club already feeling fragile. Asked to play manager for the night, his instinct was pure cup-tie pragmatism – minutes for the fringe players, not a serious tilt at the trophy. Both hosts landed on the same scoreline independently: 2-0 to the Bees.
Catch the full Besotted Pride of West London podcast by clicking the links above, at PrideOfWest.London, or wherever you get your pods, and listen out for the Beesotted post-match reaction straight after the final whistle at the Stadium of Light.
Come on you Bees.
