Ivan Toney ensured a remarkable Sky Bet Championship season had a record-breaking ending on Saturday. The striker scored Brentford’s first goal in a 3-1 win over Bristol City on Saturday. In doing so he scored his 31st of the season, more than any player has scored in the second tier since Guy Whittingham scored 42 for Portsmouth in 1992/93. It was, therefore, the most scored since the division was rebranded as the Championship.
The 31 goals enabled Ivan to join a select group of Brentford players and he has other records in his sights. In Brentford’s 94 EFL seasons so far, only six players have ever scored more than 30 goals in a season. Ivan is now only the second player to have done it in the top two tiers, and only the second in the last 60 years. No-one has done it twice. Those landmark seasons are outlined in a piece here.
Brentford’s best ever league goal-scoring seasons can now be ranked as follows:
1932/33 – Jack Holliday – 38 league goals – 39 in all competitions – Division Three (South)
1929/30 – Bill Lane – 33 league goals – 33 in all competitions – Division Three (South)
1958/59 – Jim Towers – 32 league goals – 37 in all competitions – Third Division
1977/78 – Steve Phillips – 32 league goals – 36 in all competitions – Fourth Division
1936/37 – Dave McCulloch – 31 league goals – 33 in all competitions – Division One
2020/21 – Ivan Toney – 31 league goals – 31 in all competitions – Championship
Ivan’s tally has come in 45 Sky Bet Championship appearances. He started 44 of those games and came on as a substitute in the other one. He has scored in 25 games this season and hit a hat-trick in a 7-2 win over Wycombe Wanderers. He has scored two goals on four more occasions, including in three successive games in October.
Nine of Ivan’s goals have come from the penalty spot and he has also scored in shoot-out wins in the Carabao Cup against Wycombe and West Bromwich Albion. He has scored 15 of his goals at our new stadium and 16 away from home. Six of his goals have been the match winner and another six earned The Bees a point in a drawn fixture. Brentford have only lost two of the 25 games he has scored in.
When goals in all competitions are taken in to account, Ivan now sits joint-seventh in the Club’s EFL-era. Dean Holdsworth scored 38 goals in the 1991/92 season while George Francis scored 31 in 1959/60. Ivan has the potential to add to this tally between now and the end of Brentford’s season.