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Like many Brentford fans I cast a sideways glance at Rotherham as they joined us in the Championship at the expense of our old foes Orient.

I genuinely wanted the Os to make it because I honestly couldn’t see them sustaining their incredible achievement of this season in the second tier.

There were also a few Millers players I’d have fancied in the fantasy transfer sweep such as Pringle, Arnason and Agard.

And there’s also the issue of their appallingly named New York stadium, which means their revenue streams next season will most likely be higher than ours.

Brentford are a year behind Rotherham in terms of the club’s infrastructure, and while I’ve always loved Griffin Park, now we’re in the Championship even the most dyed in the wool naysayers cannot fail to see the argument for Lionel Road.

I will shed a tear when we leave our spiritual home. It’s been the venue for laughter, heartbreak, brilliance and mediocrity, friendship and animosity, and the backdrop to my whole life.

From my childhood heroes of Steve Phillips and Jackie Graham right through to new legends like Kevin O’Connor, from the Everton night game to that first half rout of Fulham, from wonderful, principled managers like Coppell and Lewington through to David Webb, our character-packed ground has silently witnessed it all.

But next season it will struggle to cope, and that – I’m very sorry to say – is a fact.

We have to move, but I’ve had a nagging fear for some months now that the nature of the club – its very being if you like – will change for the worst as we edge towards departure day.

At the last game of the season I walked towards the mixed zone outside the dressing rooms to talk to Kevin O’Connor, and was asked by a steward for my press pass which I’d left in the press room.

Now I’m not one of these ’do you know who I am?’ types but this bloke has seen me covering games for at least the past eight years and knows full well what I do, but still insisted on seeing a pass.

I’m sure there’s a good argument for the caging and post match sweep of the section below the Braemar Road stand, but the abrupt and overly physical way it has been done in recent months – I’ve seen young women manhandled towards the barrier – smacks of a jobsworth mentality at its worst. I pray to god that doesn’t escalate when we move.

I’ve kept my fears of the club changing irrevocably to myself but, after a few glasses of wine at the Big Red Ball, voiced them to Community Sports Trust Chief Exec Lee Doyle and Media and Comms man Mark Chapman – and the responses I got were unequivocal.

These two would bleed red and white – I even almost came to blows with Mr Chapman over a long running feud we had which was so important I can’t even remember the details – so their replies went some way to setting my mind at rest.

Both stressed that it was critical that the club retains its strong family feel to ensure it keeps attracting families and young a fans from around West London and beyond.

My possibly slightly tipsy insistence that I’d already seen small signs of the Brentford identity fading from the picture like a scene from Back to the Future, were acknowledged.

But Mark’s paraphrased reply that there were enough committed Bees fans within the club to ensure that what makes Brentford unique, warm and wonderful would always be retained, did help set my mind at rest.

It will be difficult balancing act because a new stadium, new division and the inevitable increased financial implications will change the feel of the place.

But if the jobsworths are kept in check and trained to use common sense where the culture of the club is concerned, it will be fine.

Rotherham’s model might be a good one. The MK Dons model with its over zealous stewarding and flagrant lack of common sense, is not.

But then they are not a proper football club, and lack the history, maturity and caring personnel that Brentford can rely on to take us safely towards the next chapter.

Jim Levack