Dean Smith feels that the work put in last week on The Bees pre-season Training Camp in Germany will stand the squad in good stead for the long Sky Bet Championship campaign ahead. Brentford travelled to the WM Sporthotel in the countryside outside Dortmund last Saturday week for an intense seven-day Training Camp at the renowned sports facility which was Portugal's Training base for the 2006 World Cup. Under the German summer sun, the players were tested physically and mentally on the training pitches with Dean left very pleased with the standard of work put in.
Speaking to Bees Player, after returning to Jersey Road for training this morning, Dean said: “It was a very productive week. I certainly needed the weekend off as I felt tired myself so the players must have felt a lot worse than I did because they had been working very hard all week. It was very productive in terms of getting the physical output. There was a lot of tactical and technical work going into it. We have got very good footballers but the mental side of things is one that you have to work on. The season that we have is a marathon and the week that we have just spent will have tested them mentally. You are in the hotel together for a week and sometimes you have to make time for yourself and I think that the lads coped with it really well. That will hold them in good stead for the season and the overnight stops we will have as well.”
As well as training, the trip to Germany also saw a friendly against 2.Bundesliga side VFL Bochum on Wednesday evening. Scott Hogan scored the only goal of the game ten minutes before the half-time interval as Dean used the match to give minutes to the majority of his squad. The day before the match, Dean and the coaching staff had organised a triple training session for the players, starting at 7.15am, as The Bees boss wanted to see how the players coped under the pressure of fatigue.
“It was a tough game for us,” said Dean. “I wanted players to play fatigued to see what their concentration is like and to see what their understanding of the tactical side is. Bochum were a very good team and they made it very difficult for us. They looked ahead of us in training and they looked fresher than us. In the next few games now we will be a lot fresher, a lot fitter, and you should see a much better performance from us. The lads worked hard all week and going into the game we knew that it was going to be a tiring one. However, to get the result, whilst being tired, was very pleasing. Josh Clarke, Tom Field, and Harlee Dean all got 90 minutes. They were flagging a bit towards the end but it was a good game and a good test for us.”