Brentford open their pre-season schedule on Saturday when they take on League Two side AFC Wimbledon at Plough Lane (1pm kick-off).
Johnnie Jackson's side finished 10th in the fourth tier last term and will provide a tough test for the Bees in their first game of the 2024/25 campaign.
Tickets for the fixture are available to buy from the Gtech Community Stadium box office until 5pm on Friday. Tickets can also be purchased on the day at Plough Lane, with a £2 price increase, on the right-hand side of gate 5. More information can be found here.
Unable to make it to Plough Lane? Download the Brentford FC app to exclusively stream the Bees' first pre-season friendly live from 1pm.
PRE-MATCH ANALYSIS
Alex Lawes, Playmaker Stats: Physical Wimbledon will provide tough test
Brentford ramp up their pre-season preparations with their opening friendly of the summer against AFC Wimbledon down in south London this weekend.
The Bees have made just the solitary summer addition thus far with the arrival of Igor Thiago from Club Brugge - and a lot of the headlines are expected to be around the Brazilian striker, who has signed from the Belgian Jupiler Pro League.
AFC Wimbledon, on the other hand, have been a lot busier in the transfer window, but did recently lose left-back Jack Currie to Oxford United for a reported fee of £350,000, which follows the winter sale of key man Ali Al-Hamadi to Ipswich Town.
They have added a fair bit of League Two experience to their side, though, with the arrivals of John-Joe O’Toole, Alistair Smith and Joe Pigott. The signing of Pigott would suggest that Johnnie Jackson, who made a name for himself in coaching circles with excellent and effective set-piece routines at Charlton Athletic, is looking to harness that strength and the early pre-season games are the best time to get to grips with the more direct style.
In League Two last season, Wimbledon were fifth for the most aerial duels won, but that would likely be expected to be the case with 54.3 inaccurate long balls per game suggesting that getting into the air was a large part of their game plan.
The arrival of Pigott is expected to ensure that Wimbledon are more accurate with their overarching tactical principles of Jackson so, whilst pre-season remains primarily about getting Brentford’s players up to speed and up to the correct fitness levels, this will pose an intriguing tactical test against a side looking to play a direct manner which may have found a gem to help them play that way.
SCOUT REPORT
Jackson's summer rebuild building positivity for promotion
Last season was one of the most positive in AFC Wimbledon’s short, but incredible, history.
They were relegated after six seasons in League One in 2022 and avoided a second-successive drop by a margin of only five points one year later. A pocket of fans had called for manager Johnnie Jackson’s head - a re-think and a reset was required.
Entrusted with turning things around, Jackson reshaped his squad and there was plenty that went on in the way of turnover; there were eight permanent summer signings, four loans in, three loans out, 14 released and the sale of teenager David Kawa to Peterborough.
His favoured 4-2-3-1 formation became a 4-4-2, with the occasional tweak, allowing him to play two of Omar Bugiel, Ali Al-Hamadi and Josh Davison alongside one another. It worked a treat.
AFC Wimbledon picked up 20 points from their first 11 games, which took them, briefly, to second. By Christmas, they had settled into more familiar surroundings in the play-off places and Al-Hamadi was flying; before he jetted off to the Asian Cup with Iraq – as Bugiel did with Lebanon - he had scored 17 goals and assisted another seven in 29 appearances.
The absence of the pair was felt greatly in the two games both missed due to their international efforts, with defeats against promotion rivals Wrexham and MK Dons helping to knock the Dons down to 10th.
As it turned out, Al-Hamadi would not return to Plough Lane. His sparkling form piqued interest from higher up the EFL, which led to a move to Championship high-flyers Ipswich for an upfront fee reported to be in the region of £1 million. It was a blow akin to the one Brentford suffered when DJ Campbell left for Birmingham in January 2006.
The fact Bugiel stepped up to the plate with nine goals and three assists in his last 17 appearances of the season - and that Jackson’s side secured an exhilarating last-gasp win over arch-rivals MK Dons - revitalised their promotion push, but three defeats in the last five ultimately saw them finish five points off the top seven.
In a pre-season interview on AFC Wimbledon’s YouTube channel, Jackson said building his squad with the aim of having two players for every position would go some way to bridging the gap to promotion and, at the time of writing, the Dons have made five summer signings, with three standout in particular.
Winger Myles Hippolyte - who started out at Brentford in 2010 - has signed from Stockport, having helped them to the National League and League Two titles, as well as having won the Scottish Championship with St Mirren, while John-Joe O’Toole - who played 14 times on loan last term - brings the experience of just shy of 550 career appearances at Championship, League One and League Two level.
Matty Stevens has also joined after leaving Forest Green. The 26-year-old striker is a proven goalscorer at League Two level, looking to get his career back on track following a loss of momentum brought by an eight-month lay-off with an ACL injury.
While not having yet shelled out a penny in the transfer window, they have made money with the sales of Josh Davison to Tranmere and academy graduate Jack Currie to Championship newcomers Oxford United. With Bugiel and promising teenager Aron Sasu having signed new contracts within the last three months, Jackson’s squad is starting to take shape.
Right now, the Dons are one of the favourites to secure a top-seven finish in League Two, but there is no doubt that they will be aiming higher.
IN THE DUGOUT
Johnnie Jackson
Johnnie Jackson - a boyhood Arsenal fan - started out at Tottenham and signed his first professional contract with the north London club at the start of the new millennium.
After loan spells at Swindon, Colchester and Coventry, he broke into the first-team picture under David Pleat.
However, Premiership opportunities were harder to come by under Jacques Santini and Martin Jol, meaning further loans to the Championship with Watford and Derby beckoned.
At the age of 23, in the summer of 2006, he opted to leave Spurs in search of regular playing time and returned to Colchester on a free transfer shortly after their promotion to the second tier for the first time in their history.
After their relegation, he requested a move away and dropped down a division to sign for League Two Notts County, who had appointed former England boss Sven-Göran Eriksson as director of football and signed Sol Campbell.
A short spell on loan at Charlton in 2009/10 followed and he returned to London to sign for them permanently in July 2010.
He settled like a dream at the Valley and captained the Addicks to the League One title in his second season, before retiring in March 2018 at the age of 35 to take up a coaching role at the club.
He later worked as Lee Bowyer’s assistant, succeeded him as caretaker in October 2021 and was then appointed on a full-time basis two months later.
Charlton did not keep him on at the end of 2021/22 but, within two weeks, he took the managerial hotseat at AFC Wimbledon vacated by Mark Robinson two months earlier.
He is now the fourth-longest serving manager in League Two, having reached two years in charge in May and, along with his assistant Terry Skiverton, signed a new two-and-a-half-year contract in February.
THE GAMEPLAN
With South London Press' Edmund Brack
Edmund Brack, who reports on AFC Wimbledon for South London Press, has highlighted centre-forward Omar Bugiel as the player that the Brentford defenders need to pay close attention to when they travel to Plough Lane on Saturday.
He stated: "Bugiel is a really good striker at League Two level. He has wonderful technical ability and provides a real physical presence, which is a tiny bit Ivan Toney-esque.
"Obviously Toney is playing at a much higher level, but the way he leads the line for Wimbledon is probably just as valuable to the way they play."
Read the full interview with Edmund Brack here.
LAST MEETING
AFC Wimbledon 0 Brentford 1 (Pre-season friendly, 17 July 2021)
A single strike late in the first half from Joel Valencia was enough to give Brentford a win over AFC Wimbledon in a pre-season friendly.
The game was played in warm conditions in the summer of 2021, with the first period failing to capture the imagination, before Valencia netted just before the break.
The second period was livelier and threatened further goals, but none were forthcoming and the Bees got the win at Plough Lane.