Ivan Toney’s goal scoring feats throughout the 2020/21 season have already been well-documented, but he continued to break new ground until the final day of the campaign. When he scored Brentford’s first goal in a 3-1 win over Bristol City at the start of May it was his 31st of the season, more than any player has scored in the second tier since Guy Whittingham scored 42 for Portsmouth in 1992/93. It was, therefore, the most scored since the division was rebranded as the Championship.
The 31 goals enabled Ivan to join a select group of Brentford players. In Brentford’s 94 league seasons so far, only six players have ever scored more than 30 goals in a season. Ivan is only the second player to have done it in the top two tiers, and only the second in the last 60 years. No-one has done it twice. Those landmark seasons are outlined in pieces here and here.
But Ivan continued to find the net. He scored in both the Sky Bet Championship Play-Off Semi-Final Second Leg win over AFC Bournemouth and the Play-Off Final win over Swansea City. That meant he ended the campaign with 33 goals. Only four men have ever scored more in a single season, and all of those did it in the lower leagues.
Brentford’s best ever goal-scoring seasons can now be ranked as follows:
1932/33 – Jack Holliday – 39 goals
1991/92 – Dean Holdsworth – 38 goals
1958/59 – Jim Towers – 37 goals
1977/78 – Steve Phillips – 36 goals
1929/30 – Bill Lane – 33 goals
1936/37 – Dave McCulloch – 33 goals
2020/21 – Ivan Toney – 33 goals
Ivan’s tally came in 52 games. He started 49 of those games and came on as a substitute in the others. He scored in 27 games this season and hit a hat-trick in a 7-2 win over Wycombe Wanderers. He scored two goals on four more occasions, including in three successive games in October.
Ivan scored 11 times from the penalty spot, and also scored in shoot-out wins in the Carabao Cup against Wycombe and West Bromwich Albion. He scored 16 of his goals at our new stadium, 16 away from home and one at Wembley Stadium. Six of his goals were the match winner and another six earned The Bees a point in a drawn fixture. Brentford only lost two of the 27 games he scored in.