Thomas Frank has revealed that Brentford were 'a little bit more active' towards the fourth official during his side's 2-1 defeat in response to Newcastle United assistant Jason Tindall always being in his 'ear'.
It falls to Tindall, who stands on the touchline, to communicate with the fourth official on Newcastle's behalf so that Magpies boss Eddie Howe can focus purely on the game. Remarkably, in recognition of that, Brentford's coaching staff changed their usual approach on Saturday to ensure they got their points across to fourth official Stephen Martin at the Gtech Community Stadium.
It was an afternoon where Brentford were awarded two penalties. Referee Chris Kavanagh did not require any assistance for the first after Sven Botman wiped out Kevin Schade inside the box only for Toney to uncharacteristically miss the penalty in the 29th minute. VAR intervened for the second just before half-time when Alexander Isak was harshly adjudged to have fouled Rico Henry with a high boot when clearing a corner and, this time, Toney made no mistake to send his side 1-0 up at the break.
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Newcastle recovered in the second half to win the game 2-1, following an own goal from David Raya and a superb winner from Alexander Isak, and Frank was keen to stress the visitors earned 'well-deserved praise'. However, Frank also spoke about how there 'shouldn't be a need to think of a strategy' with penalties on an afternoon where Schade and Mathias Jensen tried to shield Toney by standing on the spot with the ball as the striker walked away from the nearby Newcastle players before returning to take his second spot-kick. These scenes were reminiscent of what Kieran Trippier did for Alexander Isak at Nottingham Forest last month.
"We also need to game manage - everyone wants to game manage a little bit," the Brentford boss told reporters. "I'm not talking about us not doing anything, but we need to go a little bit into the dark arts of football. Where is the sportsmanship? We need to be aware of that.
“We were also on purpose a little bit more active towards the fourth official today. Again I’m talking about consistency. I try to be calm. I don’t think it does me any good to interact with him, but we know that Newcastle have their strategy. Jason Tindall is always speaking in the fourth official’s ear throughout the game so we just have to be aware of that.”
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