Brentford take on French side Lille in their final friendly of the summer on Saturday 5 August (4pm kick-off).
After a successful tour of America, the Bees will be looking to finish their pre-season campaign on a high, before their first Premier League fixture of the season against Tottenham Hotspur at Gtech Community Stadium a week later.
Tickets for Saturday's game are still available. Click here to find out more.
The Opposition
Les Dogues target another year of improvement
Last season had the feeling of a rebuild for Lille.
In 2020/21, under Christophe Galtier, Les Dogues had won Ligue 1 for the first time in a decade and for the fourth time in their history.
The next season, Jocelyn Gourvennec guided the club to 10th - and its lowest finish since 2017/18 - in his first and only campaign in charge at Stade Pierre-Mauroy.
Last summer, the club generated around €100m in transfer revenue, but lost their stars in the process. Sven Botman joined Newcastle, Zeki Celik went to Roma, Domagoj Bradaric signed for Salernitana, Renato Sanches joined PSG and Amadou Onana came to the Premier League with Everton.
After a year out of the game, following a two-year spell at Roma, Paulo Fonseca was brought in to fill the managerial role vacated by Gourvennec and, with a new-look squad, managed to get Lille back on the right track.
Aside from a humiliating 7-1 home defeat to PSG in the opening month of the season, the remaining eight league defeats suffered by Fonseca’s side each came by only a one-goal margin.
Their home record of 13 wins and two defeats in 19 games was bettered only by Lens and Rennes. Had their form on the road been just a touch more inspiring, who knows what might have been.
But, most importantly, their fifth-place finish represented a vast year-on-year improvement, which has given them a benchmark to try and better this season coming.
That said, one would imagine the direction of Lille’s season will somewhat depend upon the future of Jonathan David. The Canadian forward, 23, only turned professional in 2018 and, during time spent with Belgian side Gent and Lille, he has scored 95 goals in 219 appearances, never once ending the season with a single-figure goal tally.
David - who has two years remaining on the five-year contract he signed when he joined the club in August 2020 - has been courted by Europe’s elite over the past few seasons as a result, yet has not been prised away. It is thought he is valued at just shy of £50m and Tottenham are the latest to have shown an interest at the time of writing.
Should they retain him for another year, the feeling will undoubtedly feel not too dissimilar to signing a new player and their chances of challenging for a top-six spot will be handed a significant boost - on paper, at least.
Should David depart, though Lille will have a hefty war chest to secure an apt replacement with, with their second-highest scorer Remy Cabella having only scored seven times last term, their new central striker will have large - maybe even too large - boots to fill.
In the Dugout
Paulo Fonseca
Paulo Fonseca retired at the age of 32 in 2005 and immediately set about carving a career for himself as a coach by taking on youth coaching responsibilities at the final club of his playing career, Estrela Amadora.
Across the next six years, he also learned his trade at Portuguese lower league clubs 1º Dezembro, Odivelas and Pinhalnovense, before taking on his first role in professional football with Aves in 2011/12; a season that ended with Fonseca’s side missing out on promotion to the Primeira Liga by just two points.
Fonseca was in the top flight the following year, however, after being appointed Pacos de Ferreira manager, and his stock continued to rise after a third-place finish, which saw Porto bring him in as Vitor Pereira’s successor in June 2013. He started by guiding the club to the Portuguese Super Cup, but lasted only nine months in the role.
A season back at Pacos de Ferreira followed, with a season at Braga in 2014/15 after that - where he won the Taca de Portugal - before he ventured abroad for the first time to take charge of Ukraine’s Shakhtar Donetsk, where he guided the club to three successive Ukrainian Premier League and Ukrainian Cup doubles, as well as the Ukrainian Super Cup in 2017.
His most recent role before joining Lille last summer came at Roma, where he spent two seasons, guiding the Serie A club to the Europa League semi-final during the 2020/21 campaign.
Upon leaving Stadio Olimpico, Fonseca was linked with Tottenham, Newcastle and Aston Villa, though a move to the Premier League did not materialise, before he was appointed Roma head coach.
Pre-match analysis
Alex Lawes, Playmaker Stats: Goals expected at the Gtech
Brentford’s four friendlies this summer have yielded a total of 15 goals and their final pre-season fixture ahead of the 2023/24 Premier League campaign promises further entertainment.
Managed by former Shakhtar Donetsk and Roma manager Paulo Fonseca, Lille finished fifth in Ligue 1 last season to qualify for the UEFA Europa Conference League and they should prove tricky opposition.
Ligue 1 winners as recently as 2021, Lille arguably underachieved over last season as a whole, but their easy-on-the-eye style under Fonseca has won admirers and they finished strongly, losing just two of their final 14 matches.
In Fonseca's preferred 4-2-3-1, Lille like to dominate possession via patient passing sequences, usually from deep, and no team in Ligue 1 averaged a higher possession share last season than Les Dogues (60.9 per cent).
Dictating play and controlling match tempo has obvious defensive advantages and, notably, Lille conceded under nine shots (8.7) per game last season - fewer than any other team in the French top flight.
Although Lille's critics argue that their possession-based style can be ineffective, they fired off 14.7 shots-per-game last season. Only Ligue 1 champions Paris St Germain firing in more shots on average (as might be expected with a strike force of Mbappe, Messi and Neymar!).
Dead-balls could well be important in this one, as Brentford - as mentioned in other previews - had a lot of joy from set-pieces last season, and Lille managed 149 shots from corners, throw-ins and free-kicks in 2022/23: the most in Ligue 1.
In terms of players to keep an eye on, Remy Cabella and Jonathan David fit the bill for Lille.
Former Newcastle United midfielder Cabella scored seven goals and supplied 11 assists in Ligue 1 last season, and was also the only player in the French top flight to record more than 100 key passes (101).
Currently linked with a transfer to Inter Milan, David has hit 52 Ligue 1 goals in 112 appearances over three seasons for Lille and is a dead-eye from the penalty spot. The Canadian scored 10 goals from 12 yards last season, missing just once (a 91 per cent conversion rate).
From a Brentford perspective, it will be interesting to see if Shandon Baptiste and Josh Dasilva can build upon promising pre-season performances.
Both players scored in the Bees' 3-3 draw with Aston Villa last time out and their stats from last season underline their quality: Baptiste with the best pass completion percentage (86%) of any Bees player in the Premier League last season, with Dasilva (83%) not far behind him.
Saturday's clash between an adaptable Brentford side, who are comfortable being direct, and a relatively slow and controlling Lille outfit should be an intriguing one.
The Gameplan
With Romain Lafont of L'Equipe
From Paulo Fonseca's preferred way of playing to the ones to watch for Les Dogues, L'Equipe’s Romain Lafont brings us up to speed on all things Lille in Hot off the Press.
"Brentford should expect a team that want to seize control of the ball at every moment of a game. Fonseca wants to produce a beautiful game and he always takes a lot of risks to ensure that.
"It is really pleasant to watch, but it means that the team is often vulnerable as a result."
When asked about the players Brentford need to keep a close eye on this Saturday, he added: "I would say Hakon Arnar Haraldsson. He scored five goals in the two friendly games he played within the first 10 days of arriving at the club and he is certain to be a threat.
"In addition, young box-to-box midfielder Carlos Baleba has a profile that would be a great fit for the Premier League and he has a lot of potential for the future."
Last Summer
Brentford 1 Real Betis 0 (pre-season friendly, 30 July 2022)
In their final pre-season friendly of last season, Brentford beat La Liga side Real Betis at Gtech Community Stadium.
Bryan Mbeumo scored the only goal of the game, which saw the Bees head into their opening Premier League game against Leicester with a win under their belt.
The supporters at the Gtech saw new signings Aaron Hickey and Ben Mee in action for the first time, while Christian Norgaard came into the Brentford midfield in what was his first game of pre-season.