Brentford head coach Thomas Frank feels the controversy surrounding last week’s draw at Arsenal overshadowed another impressive display – and encouraged his players to continue to dream big.
The Bees saw their unbeaten Premier League run extended to 10 matches after Ivan Toney headed an equaliser at the Emirates Stadium.
However, it subsequently emerged video assistant referee Lee Mason had not fully investigated an offside call against Christian Norgaard in the build-up, which left Gunners boss Mikel Arteta fuming.
Frank, though, feels the fall-out – which has seen full-time VAR official Mason stood down from duty for the next round of Premier League games – took the shine off what he believed was another significant marker from his well-organised squad.
“It has massively overshadowed our performance,” the Brentford head coach said.
“We were more than good enough for a point and if there could have been a winner, it should have been us.
“Nobody is talking about the Bryan Mbeumo situation where he scores (in the first half and the goal was disallowed for a shirt pull), which was also a human error.”
Frank, though, urged his players to continue their upward momentum as they prepare for the visit of Crystal Palace.
“There’s no target. We are allowed to dream and we are pleased with where we are,” he said.
“We have an almost fully fit squad, players in form, and players full of confidence. We are in a top place but we need to do everything we can to keep this up.”
Frank told a press conference: “Our overall performance is good. You can see that in the players’ faces.
“We talk about the good place we are in and we need to continue.
“Our 10-game unbeaten run is well deserved, but now it is about doing it one more time against a very good Crystal Palace.”
Brentford will have Toney available after the striker picked up a slight hamstring problem late on against Arsenal, but has been back in full training.
Palace will be without forward Wilfried Zaha again because of a hamstring issue.
Frank, though, knows the Eagles will still carry plenty of attacking threat.
“It is like talking about (Manchester) City with or without (Erling) Haaland, Arsenal (without) (Bukayo) Saka, Liverpool (without) (Mohamed) Salah or us without Ivan Toney – there is always key players in every team,” the Brentford boss said.
“Even I can’t get around it and say, ‘No, they are equally as good, with or without Zaha’, that would not be the truth. Of course, Zaha is a top player for them.
“But, when other players are coming in, dynamics are changing a little bit, other players are stepping up and there are other things we need to be aware of.
“I have read their recent results. They maybe have not scored as much as they would have liked to, but they have huge individual qualities.”
