The month saw The Bees begin September against Wycombe Wanderers at Jersey Road in a behind closed doors friendly. Despite a positive display from Neil MacFarlane’s side, who were denied by some impressive shot stopping in the Wycombe goal, they were narrowly beaten 2-1, with Jonny Mitchell netting for The Bees.

They followed that up by taking on a Luton Town XI at Griffin Park as Brentford had the chance to play in a stadium environment in a tight affair as the away side picked up a 1-0 win through Callum McManaman’s goal.

The Bees would then travel to Cambridgeshire to take on a Peterborough United XI where they would once again slip to a narrow loss with Siriki Dembele’s penalty the difference between the two sides.

Reflecting on those matches against some experienced outfits, Arthur believes there were a number of positives to take.

He said: “It’s been good. The two games against Wycombe and Luton were basically against their first teams so it was a very good challenge. We played really well against Wycombe and I felt we deserved something from the game, and I thought we were the better team, but against experienced sides like that then these things can happen. I thought we were good against Luton as well, we missed a penalty and had some really good chances, but they were a very strong side as well, it was their Carabao Cup side, so it was an impressive team.”

Results then began to turn as they took on Beckenham Town in the first round of the London FA Senior Cup. A performance that Arthur says everyone was pleased with as they progressed with a 6-0 victory.

“Neil (MacFarlane) was happy with the performance, and from minute one we completely dominated them and kept the ball really well,” explained Arthur. “We were very clinical and the likes of Christian (Tue Jensen) and Gustav (Mogensen) scored a lot of goals. There’s a lot of players in form at the moment, the likes of (Jaden) Brissett as well, so it’s good to be around.

“We want to win the competition and we’re going in the right way. It’s a good cup competition and we get to face different types of opposition, so it will be interesting.”

The Bees then showed their confidence as they travelled north of border to Scotland to take on Aberdeen Reserves and Hibernian Reserves.

Having journeyed to Aberdeen they started off brightly and raced into a three-goal lead courtesy of two finishes from Mogensen and one from Tue Jensen in a wonderful first half showing. Credit to the Scottish side though who battled to pull a goal back in the second period and had more chances to threaten Nathan Shepperd’s goal. But it would be Neil MacFarlane’s side who would claim the win as they left Aberdeen with a 3-1 victory.

Two days training in Edinburgh then saw The Bees prepare for a trip to Easter Road to take on Hibernian. In a reversal of the previous match, it was The Bees who were on the wrong side of a 3-0 score line when Olli Smith and Josh Campbell’s clinical finishing put the hosts into a comfortable position. Just before half-time Brissett managed to pull a goal back with a well taken penalty before Mogensen netted once again to pull the score back to 3-2. More chances fell for The Bees, but they weren’t able to cap off what had been an excellent second half showing as they returned from Scotland with a 3-2 defeat.

Reflecting on the trip to Scotland, Arthur was delighted to finish the month strongly as the side now look to kick on into October.

He said: “I thought the first game against Aberdeen we were really good. We started strongly, it was different because it was on Astroturf, which we’re not used to. I think we blew them away to be fair in terms of our intensity and our work rate, as well as our quality on the ball. The second half was a bit more even, but I felt we did well.

“The game against Hibs saw us struggle in the first half and I think they were quite a senior team and they showed their quality in the first half. The second half I felt we were very good.

“I really enjoy the football that we play. Playing out from the back is what I love to be a part of so it’s very good. Hopefully we can keep improving on that and develop as a team. There’s lots of little bits that we can always improve on to get to that next step and we’ve been working on it in training. Hopefully we can show it in matches.”