Brentford Director of Football Phil Giles says the Club’s process of wanting to develop players hasn’t changed despite now being a Premier League side.

The Bees have a reputation for investing in and improving young players and this summer has been no different, after the signings of Aaron Hickey and Keane Lewis-Potter.

20 and 21 years old respectively, the duo come into a squad already full of young talent.

Speaking with Bees United members during a recent online event, Phil revealed that, despite a change in targets after promotion from the Championship in the 2021/22 season, the way the Club sets about achieving them will be the same.

He explained: “In terms of strategy, when we were in the Championship, we had a promotion strategy. So, nice and simple, what do we want to achieve? Get promoted. What we had to think about with every decision was whether it would help us get promoted.

“The Premier League is slightly more complicated than that because setting a clear target of where we want to be is a little bit more difficult because, obviously, winning the Premier League is nice and easy to say, but perhaps a bit less realistic.

“So, we've kind of had to come up with some things to replace the targets of getting promoted, with things like, ‘Where do we think we want to be and how we want to do it?’

“I guess the ‘how’ is kind of very similar to what it was in the Championship, it's just we have moved divisions, but the process of improving and developing young players has been a constant underlying thing.

“So, in some sense, that sort of thing hasn’t really changed from that perspective.”

Talking about the Club’s new additions, he added: “There's been a nice blend of players - a couple of younger ones, Keane Lewis-Potter and [Aaron] Hickey have loads of potential. That's great, we like that, that’s our bread and butter.

“The Lewis-Potter deal was complicated by Hull’s takeover. It took quite a long time for it to happen, but we have a good relationship with the guys that came in. They were happy to get good money for him and we’re very happy to have him here. It just takes time.

“Ben Mee obviously has more experience, which is good.

“Time will tell how the players get on. As always, with some players it doesn't quite work, some players you bring in and they surprise you, so that can happen.

“And we like some of the B Team players that we have bought so far as well, we’ve spent a bit of money there - some proper investment in that B Team group.”

Phil was speaking at an online event for Bees United. Become a Bees United member now.