Simon Royce has been casting his eye over the two new members of The Bees goalkeeping unit during their week long training camp in Germany.
Daniel Müeller is training with The Bees following his release from the Bayern Munich reserve team while Jack Bonham has joined up with his teammates after his summer move from Watford.
The pair join Simon Moore, who shared the player’s Player of the Year award at the Big Red Ball in April, and Richard Lee, currently recovering from shoulder surgery, who was named Player of the Year in 2010/11 season.
Simon spoke to Bees Player from the training camp explaining what he looks for when he is assessing a new addition to the goalkeeper unit as he is with Daniel Müeller at the moment.
“I need to know about his background and see whether he has been coached before,” said Simon.
“To be honest I know within five minutes of a player coming in whether or not he has been coached through his technique and whether he moves his feet.
“He also needs to settle into the group which Daniel has as he is a lovely lad.
“Obviously he has to be able to do the fundamentals of goalkeeping, he has to have the right shape, he has to be able to move his feet and he has to be able to catch a ball.
“It sounds stupid but all these things sound basic but they are your fundamentals.
“He needs to be able to do what I term the bread and butter things like collecting a ball down low and it sticking – the things that would let you down in a game if you didn’t do them.
“I go through all the basics – handling, feet, collecting the ball down low, catching crosses under pressure – pretty much everything we expect out of our regular pro keepers.”
The other new member of The Bees goalkeeping unit in 19-year-old Jack Bonham who joined from Watford in the summer.
Jack made his football league debut on the final day of The Championship season last year as Watford were beaten 2-1 by Leeds.
Simon says he is very impressed with what he has seen from Jack so far and says he has all the ability to become a fantastic acquisition for The Bees.
“Jack’s been very impressive and I liked him ever since he came in,” said Jack.
“I knew as soon as he came in that he had been coached.
“He had been at Watford since he was 14-years-old under Alec Chamberlain, who’s done a fantastic job with him, and you can see he has been coached.
“Jack’s 19 and Simon Moore was 19 when I joined the club and Jack is ahead of where Simon was when I joined and look how much Simon has improved now.
“If Jack can improve as much as Simon has then we have a shining light in the team.”
Simon says that even though the squad have only had five weeks off it is easy, especially for goalkeepers, to get out of the rhythm of training and playing.
Much of the time so far in England and on the training camp in Germany has been spent on the basics and building up ahead of the season’s opener ahead of Port Vale next month.
Brentford had the fifth best defence in League One last season keeping 16 clean sheets in all competitions.
But Simon is not resting on his laurels and wants to continue working on his goalkeepers to ensure that they are even better this season.
“We decided to use the sand-pit in Germany,” said Simon.
“We have great facilities here in Germany and I think we are going to try and get one at the training ground.
“We use sand to promote power and stability in the legs and in the regions around the groin area.
“They need power to get around the goal and they need quick feet as well.
“So we can do a bit of quick feet work in there as well.
“As it is sand they can dive full out on a tension belt, which is like a glorified elastic band, and they can use that power to spring off in the sand so when they take it into the pitch they should feel like they are jumping further.
“Before we came out the first few days were predominately fitness, doing the yo-yo test etc.
“Coming out here was the real chance for them to get to work with me on a 1-to-1 basis.
“First of all getting used to catching the ball again, getting their hands ready again then getting their feet moving.
“We did a lot of work on footwork and their handling and then during the week we progressed it up to shot saving and kicking.
“With Simon Moore this year we are really working hard on getting his power and his flexibility.
“So we have done a lot of stretching in the gym with bands, Jack Bonham has been involved as well as it can only help what we are doing, just to help loosen Simon’s shoulders off so he can make more saves and be harder to beat.”
Bees Player subscribers can listen to the full interview here.