Ben Mee has had a turbulent few years, to say the least.
While transitioning from a player to a coach at Burnley, getting relegated from the Premier League on the final day of the season, and then relocating 235 miles to Brentford sounds challenging, it doesn’t compare to what Ben and his family had to deal with in 2019.
His daughter, Olive, was born prematurely at 23 weeks, weighing just 1lb 2oz, in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, as the Premier League was about to restart after a four-month break.
“It was a tough, tough time for us,” Ben begins.
“Olive was in hospital for three and a half months - it was touch and go [whether she’d survive] at the beginning.
“But she was really strong and came through it really well. We feel so fortunate. It's had a real impact on how I view things - my perception on football and on general life.
“It’s opened my eyes a lot more - what things matter, what things don't, how to enjoy things a bit more and not to take things to heart too much.
"I have appreciation for our kids being healthy and the health of all of our friends and family. We’re just happy that she's now a healthy little girl and progressing really well.”
Ben continues: “It was a tough time during the pandemic. She was born during lockdown. There wasn’t a lot of support for us, so we had to deal with it ourselves in the main.
“It was a scary time; I think it was a scary time for everybody. There was a real unknown of what was going on around the country, and just to add that into it as well, it was a difficult period.
“I have so much respect for the people that helped us and Olive. We got to see their work really closely and it was mind-blowing how they worked with such small babies.
“I have so much appreciation for the NHS, especially around that time with the pandemic and how stretched they were. I'd never really been around hospitals that much, so to see it first-hand definitely opened my eyes.
“I was obviously supporting my wife as well. She had gone through it all, so it was tough. But it makes you grow as a person, grow as a couple, and grow as a family.
“We’re very lucky to be in the situation we are in now.”
During that time, the Premier League was about to restart after a lengthy break due to the pandemic.
Burnley reported back to training the day before Olive was born, but Ben didn’t go back until a week after that, for obvious reasons.
But, when he did, Ben says it was an opportunity to take his mind off things during the day, before he would head back to the hospital to see his daughter in the evening.
“Olive was born on the Tuesday morning, but my wife went into labour on the Monday, and that's the day we went back to training after lockdown,” says the 33-year-old.
“So I missed that week and got the time off; obviously I wasn’t in the frame of mind to go back. Then I went back to training the following Monday.
“It was good for me to be able to chat with the lads, run it off a bit and forget about things for an hour or so.
“I did find it really helpful to focus my mind on football. And then, obviously, once it was all done, I was back in the car and back to the hospital to see Olive.
“It was just a nice release for me. I found it really helpful to carry on playing football. I think if I was at home, not being able to do what I could do, it would have been a lot tougher.
“But it was good to get away a little bit, play football, and then focus back on the important things when that was finished.”
Three years later, Ben reveals that Olive is “great, a really independent, tough little girl” and has just started nursery in London.
Having spent most of his career in the north of England (his most southern club before Brentford was a loan spell at Leicester with “Big Sven”-Göran Eriksson), a move to the capital was a potentially daunting prospect.
But the defender says that he’s enjoying his time at the Club so far, which has been helped by our positive start to the campaign.
"I spoke with the manager [Thomas Frank] during the off-season. We would chat and I really enjoyed his honesty with me and how he was,” states Ben.
“I was looking for a club where I was going to get games and play - that was a big thing for me. It seemed like it was a really good fit.
“Coming in, I knew I was going to be one of the older ones in the squad, helping out some of the younger players and using my experience.
“I just wanted to enjoy my football. Coming into the later stages of my career, I wanted to play, enjoy it, and be a part of a group that was going in the right direction and pulling together.
"Coming down here, it's quite exciting, we’re enjoying it so far. It’s got off to a good start, so I’m happy with my decision!”
It’s the first time that Ben has been at a new club for 11 years, having spent a decade at Burnley, with seven of those seasons being in the Premier League.
He was signed by Eddie Howe, who the defender describes as “brilliant”, before working under Sean Dyche for the following ten campaigns.
Burnley were promoted under Dyche in 2014, having finished second behind Ben’s former club Leicester, before being immediately relegated from the top division the following season.
While no player looks back fondly on a term that ends in relegation, Ben admits that he and the squad learnt a lot about themselves and each other that year, which played a part in their six-year stay in the top flight between 2016 and 2022.
“There’s such a gulf in quality in the Premier League,” says Ben, “I certainly felt that in the first season.
“I think, as a defender, it’s the standard and quality of attacks, and the punishment you get from mistakes.
“I played at full-back in that first season. It wasn't my favourite position, but I was gaining knowledge and experience of playing in that league.
“Ultimately, I wanted to play centre-back, but playing out wide helped me hold my own in that league, which was quite encouraging for me and gave me a bit of confidence.
"Yes, we went down - we weren’t good enough to stay up - but we had a quite good season and a lot of us in that squad grew as players.”
In contrast to that, three seasons later, the Clarets qualified for the Europa League after finishing seventh in the Premier League.
Ben was part of a defence that conceded just 39 goals in 38 games that season and believes that was the main reason behind their impressive finish.
“We were very organised and had a really good team,” he says.
“Without creating too much, we were solid as a group and we had the mentality that we all had each other's backs.
"In that season, we were solid, we nicked games here and there, things went our way, and we managed to finish seventh.
"It was good enough that year but I think the league has changed since then; I don’t think that gets you to where you need to get to now. You need to have more.”
When asked how he thinks the division has changed, Ben responds: “There's a massive increase in quality. Lower down the league, there are better players.
“You see teams coming up now and spending a massive amount of money on players. I think the whole quality of the league has steadily improved.
“But it means you can test yourselves against the best players, pit your wits against them, and figure out ways to beat and get the better of them. It means you have to keep improving as well.”
When it came to playing in the Europa League, Burnley failed to qualify for the group stages after losing in the final qualification round to Greek side Olympiakos.
But Ben was delighted to get the opportunity to play in a European competition and claims that the Play-Off second leg at Turf Moor is one of his career highlights.
“As a young lad, you have ambitions to play in Europe, so to play in the qualifiers and get to do that was amazing.
“We felt like we could have probably done a bit better, maybe got into the group stages, but we had a really tough run and held our own really well.
“Aberdeen was a tough one, but to walk out as the captain of that group in that atmosphere was great.
"Then you had Olympiakos. I didn’t play in the first leg but the return leg was one of my favourite games I've played in.
“I felt like we could have gone and won it. We lost the first leg 3-1, but we had a really good game second leg and it was disappointing not to go through. But it was a great experience to be involved in - it would be nice to do it again.”
Ben’s performances this season have helped the Bees to within a few points of those European places, with the centre-back, at the time of writing, playing in every game and impressing with his solidity at the back.
That solidity is partly down to his tough tackling, which is something he has become renowned for, even in more recent times when referees have perhaps become slightly stricter in the age of VAR.
But Ben says that’s not something that puts him off going into challenges. He explains: "I think if you can tackle, referees let you tackle. It’s only when it’s not a good tackle that they'll give you a red or yellow card.
“I don't think tackling is necessarily out of the game; you just need to know how to tackle.
“They're trying to be a little bit more lenient on tackles now, letting things go a little bit more, which is right, because the game got quite sterile, I think. Any little touches here and there were given as fouls, but you need that competitiveness.
“I've always enjoyed a tackle. I think a lot of people who watch the game enjoy players being committed. It’s a big part of the game.
"But I've never been one to want to hurt a player. I’ve never received a straight red card. I've had two yellow cards once and that was in a Lancashire derby when I was young - it should have never been a second yellow either, it was a nothing tackle!
"It's not something that I try and go out there and do. It’s just part of what I'm about really. If I see a tackle, more often than not, I’ll commit to it fully and win the ball.
“I think that's part of what I'm good at. I think some players now don't really know how to tackle. I don’t think they do it that much growing up as it's more technical-based now
“They come into games and, it's not their fault, but they're mistiming things a little bit more or going for things that they probably you can't get to.
“The game’s also faster. You see a lot of ones where a player has overrun the ball, the studs are up and it catches a player. They're not necessarily malicious tackles, but when you slow them down and watch back on VAR, they never look good.”
Ben Having played in the Premier League, Championship and in Europe, one thing that has alluded Ben has been an England cap.
He did receive youth caps for the Three Lions during his time at Manchester City, whose academy he came through, before making one First Team appearance before the club’s multi-million-pound takeover, something he describes as “a strange but exciting time.”
And Ben reveals that he did have conversations with Gareth Southgate about a call-up to the England senior squad during his time at Burnley, but it was something that never came to fruition.
“Growing up, obviously I wanted to play for England. It was a real ambition of mine to do that. That would have sort of been the pinnacle,” he says.
“I spoke with Southgate during my time at Burnley, but I was never quite close enough to get the call-up.
“I think when Southgate came in, he wanted a certain style of play and it's not something that I really showed during my time at Burnley.
“Playing how our manager [Sean Dyche] wanted us to play, I don’t think that helped me from an international perspective. But I was playing and captaining Burnley in the Premier League and that was a really good achievement for me.
“Now, I'm just trying to play well and enjoy my football. If it comes, it comes, but I think [Southgate] will probably look for younger players, which is fine.
"Obviously it would have been nice to have done that, but I can’t complain with how my career’s gone!”
It was hard not to nod and agree at that statement, especially towards the end of our near hour-long chat about his 14-year career so far - nine of which have been in the top division - and it seemed an apt time to ask Ben what he sees as the high point.
It may be a simple question, but it proves to be a telling one when he reveals that his time so far at Brentford is something that he already views as one of his highlights.
“I'd maybe say that now is my high point,” says Ben, “I'm still playing and enjoying myself. I feel like I'm still getting better and learning, which is always good. I'm in a really good place.
“It’s a high point as well because I really appreciate playing in the Premier League and I'm going to enjoy my last few years of being able to do that.
“The biggest part for me is my kids being able to see me play for as long as possible. I want to enjoy it and for my family and friends to keep on enjoying it, as well as supporting me.
“I appreciate all the support I get and that summer [when I was out of contract] made me realise that I want to carry on playing for as long as possible and just do as well as I can.”