Dean Smith felt the early dismissal of Yoann Barbet was a poor decision but refused to blame it for The Bees 4-0 defeat against Sheffield Wednesday today. The French defender was shown red inside six minutes for bringing down Gary Hooper on the edge of the box before The Bees found themselves three behind at half-time after goals from Fernando Forestieri, Hooper and Kieran Lee. Lucas Joao added a fourth late on in the second-half to complete a miserable afternoon at Hillsborough.

Speaking to Bees Player after the match Dean said: “I have seen it and I can see why they appealed for it. Gary Hooper had a big touch and it went through to the goalkeeper but that is not the thing for me. The thing for me is that the referee guessed: I don’t think he was even in our half when he gave the decision. He didn’t ask his linesman who was square on to the incident. For me he has guessed and has made a poor decision. By the time that he has gone down the ball was in David Button’s hands. Whether it is a red card or not he can’t guess, he has to make a decision on what he sees. He is behind the ball and can’t see what is going on and for me he has guessed and made a poor decision.

“Having said that I thought we started the game ever so well. We created chances in the first 10 minutes but the red changed everything even though it shouldn’t have. We do enough work on the training ground when we are outnumbered. It was the first red card that we have had since I joined the club and we had to get reorganised and get our shape. We knew that they were going to have a lot of the ball but the goals that we gave away were inexcusable. On the ball at times I thought we were good but it is difficult when you find yourself 3-0 down. The half-time team talk becomes about damage limitation but I thought we got together well and made it difficult for them.”

Dean made four changes for the trip to South Yorkshire with Sergi Canos, Konstantin Kerschbaumer and Nico Yennaris all coming into the midfield after the defeat to Brighton and Hove Albion eight days ago. The Head Coach said he made the changes as he wanted to see more legs in his midfield and was pleased with how the side started the game before the sending-off.

“We wanted more legs in the midfield today,” said Dean. “I thought that Nico Yennaris was excellent there today. We had Ryan Woods in there as well with Alan Judge and Konstantin Kerschbaumer on left. It’s a big long pitch here and you need some legs in the middle. You need to get up and down the pitch because Sheffield Wednesday break quickly. Their front four don’t like to go the other way defensively and we always thought that we would get a chance against their back four. That’s how the game started but you also need to have legs to win the ball back when you lose it. The game changed on the sending off and that is something that we can’t control and the result hinged on something that we can’t control.”

The result sees Brentford drop to 13th in the table. After a third game without a win Dean said that the only way that his side will get out of their current run of form is through hard work on the training ground, starting Monday.

“There is only one way to go and that is hard work on the training pitch,” said Dean. “You take your wins, your draws and your defeats on the chin. We walk into the training ground on Monday and we have to get back to what we are good at. The defending for the goals was inexcusable. We are conceding too many goals where they don’t have to work hard for them. They took a goal kick, ran through and scored: you don’t see that happening in our Youth Team. It is very disappointing and something that we have to work on.”

Bees Player subscribers can watch the full interview below