Club Captain Kevin O’Connor said Brentford’s players were disappointed with their performance in their “crazy” Capital One Cup win over Dagenham and Redbridge.
The Bees progressed to the Second Round of the competition, where they have been drawn to face West London rivals Fulham, as they won 4-2 on spot kicks after a remarkable 6-6 draw in East London on Tuesday.
Brentford took an early 2-0 lead as Stuart Dallas converted a pair of crosses from debutant Montell Moore after short corners.
Nick Proschwitz scored his first Brentford goal to make it 3-1 just past the half hour but Dagenham levelled with strikes either side of half time.
Andre Gray put Brentford back in front and Moore restored the lead again after a late goal had forced extra time.
Dagenham then looked as if they had won it when they went 6-5 up after Tommy Smith had to limp off, reducing The Bees to ten.
But with Moore struggling with cramp, Harlee Dean headed an equaliser and Richard Lee saved two penalties as Brentford won the shoot-out.
Kevin, speaking to Bees Player after the match, said he had never been involved in a game like it.
He said Brentford knew they could play better and should have seen the game out with much less drama.
“Looking back I have never been involved in anything like that,” said Kevin.
“With the amount of goals and end-to-end football, it was crazy out there tonight.
“We started brightly and let them back in to it with a sloppy goal.
“We then got 3-1 up and conceded another sloppy goal.
“A lot of what happened tonight is our own doing; there is a lot to work on.
“We showed good character to come back at the end when we were losing, get the goal right at the end and win on penalties.
“We can’t play like that.
“We are disappointed with our performance; we know we can do better than that.
“We should have won the game before penalties.”
Kevin said Brentford needed to calm the game down when they had the lead and didn’t do so.
He added that it may have been necessary to alter the plan when Smith limped off in extra time.
“When games start to go like this one you need to calm down and get on the ball,” said the skipper.
“We didn’t do that.
“We overplayed at times, that brought problems.
“When we were down to ten we had to recognise that sometimes you have to put in behind a bit.
“We will learn from this.”
Kevin said Brentford Assistant Manager David Weir had told them not to knock a win but they knew it should have been simpler.
After Lee had saved two spot kicks, Kevin scored the winning one for The Bees, drilling it low and in off the post.
“We did show character and, as David Weir said in the changing room, we can’t knock a win,” said Kevin.
“But we should have made it more comfortable.
“We were determined to win the penalties.
“Richard pulled off two good saves.
“The takers still have to score them but Richard is tremendous.
“It worked out nicely for me, I was determined to score.”
Full post-match reaction from Kevin O’Connor is available here for Bees Player subscribers.