Brentford head coach Thomas Frank said that he is looking forward to the return of talisman Ivan Toney, who returns for the Bees' next Premier League game against Nottingham Forest.

Speaking after his side's 3-1 defeat to Crystal Palace - the final league game before Toney's ban ends - Frank expressed his excitement at having the centre-forward back next month.

The Bees boss stated: “Even if we had everyone available and we had won five in a row, or if we had a few players out and lost a few games, I would always look forward to Ivan coming back. 

“He is needed as a character, a leader and a good player.” 

On the defeat itself, Frank believes it was the "quality and decisiveness in the crucial moments" - which came from Michael Olise and Eberechi Eze for the Eagles - that saw the Bees defeated in south London.

He added: “I have no complaints about effort or mentality from the players - they are the two key areas for any team to have if they want to compete in any league and, especially, in the Premier League. I'm so, so pleased with that.  

“The decisive factor today was the quality and decisiveness in the crucial moments in both boxes and, in that aspect, Crystal Palace were better than us today, so fair play to them. 

“I spoke before the game about Olise and Eze, that we had to keep them quiet and, if we’d done that, we would have won 1-0.

“I also must look at what we could have done, especially for the first and the third goals.

“Besides that, I think we created a quite few big chances and good moments. On another day, we could have got more out of it.”