The view from the pubs at Griffin Park as Brentford miss out on promotion

05-Aug-2020 16:48:45 | The Guardian

Fans were hopeful, then despondent and finally defiant as their team lost to Fulham in the Championship play-off final

By Richard Foster for the Guardian Sport Network

It is the night of the Championship play-off final and there is a tangible sense of anticipation on the streets of Brentford, with one enterprising vendor even selling souvenir flags and scarves outside Griffin Park for a match that was taking place five miles away at an empty stadium. As their team prepares to face Fulham at Wembley, Brentford fans are congregating outside the pubs on the four corners of the stadium, making the most of the evening sunshine as they wait patiently to be allowed in.

There is a buzz in the air and Will Sylvester, a 19-year-old Brentford fan who lives in sight of the ground, is feeling good. “I am pretty confident that this time we are going to do it,” he says. Will’s father Eamonn has been a regular “across the road” since his first match back in April 1976. “It was against Exeter City,” Eamonn recalls. “We thrashed them 5-1 and I thought, well, this is all rather easy.”