Brentford Football Club has been granted a licence to open and operate an Academy under the Elite Player Performance Plan.

The Club will initially open a Category Four Academy for the start of the 2022/23 season. The Academy will feed in to the Club’s existing B Team, extending the development pathway for young players.

With a Category Four Academy, Brentford will have players in the professional development phase of their careers, the Under-17 age group upwards. Brentford FC will have an Under-18 team for the 2022/23 season, playing matches as part of an organised league programme. The Club has entered the 2022/23 FA Youth Cup and is working on delivering teams in a range of competitions this season.

The Club operated a Category Two Academy from 2012 until 2016 and has had youth teams for long periods of our Football League history. The decision was taken to close the Academy in 2016 in order to focus on a smaller group of players as part of Brentford B. The B Team will continue with their games programme as per recent years and the aim is to further develop the programme without the restrictions of the Covid-19 pandemic.

There has been a recent change in Premier League rules which means that, by the start of the 2024/25 season, all Premier League clubs must have an Academy at Category Three level or higher. The opening of a Category Four Academy is a step towards eventually complying with the new regulations. It is also necessary to have an Academy in order to gain a licence to compete in UEFA competitions.

Brentford Director of Football Phil Giles said: "When we achieved promotion in May 2021, we had in the back of our minds that this would have knock on implications for us in terms of operating an Academy. With the standard of First Team football improving, we would need to improve the standard of the B Team. However, Brexit has made recruitment of top talent from overseas more difficult. This applies to all English teams, which means in turn that the competition for top talent in this country has become even more competitive and therefore more difficult too.

"We also knew that promotion moved us one step nearer to European football, and while we still recognise that it is a big challenge to qualify for Europe, if we did manage to achieve it then we wouldn’t want to be prevented from taking part because of a technicality in the UEFA rules.

"When the Premier League recently changed its rules around operating an Academy, it became clear that we would have to develop a new Academy plan. As circumstances change, then the Club will continue to evolve and adapt to whatever challenges we encounter, but always with the intention of being the best Club we can possibly be. We are excited by the challenge that re-opening an Academy will bring, with good people already in place to tackle that challenge.

"Having closed the Academy once before, I want to be clear that we have no intentions of re-opening an Academy with any thought that it should be closed again at any time in future. We want our new Academy to complement and enhance our B Team programme, which we are confident will remain the best way that we can bridge the gap between Academy and Premier League football.

"We will be committed to running the best Academy that we can. In particular, we will put the welfare of the young people who attend our Academy at the forefront of our plans, with every Academy graduate benefitting from the experiences they gain from their time with Brentford, whether they eventually become a professional footballer or not."

Like the Women’s teams, the academy will be powered by Utilita Energy and will carry the Utilita logo on the front of their playing shirts. The Utilita logo was also carried on the Brentford First Team’s front of shirt during the promotion winning 2020/21 season. Founded in 2003, Utilita is one of the nation’s fastest-growing independent energy suppliers – currently powering more than 800,000 UK customers. Utilita has established itself as a hugely recognisable brand within British football, with their commitment to grassroots football and saving families money on their energy bills with their Energy High 5 movement.