Preston North End 0-5 Brentford: Bees end four-game winless run
- Published
Prior to their win against Preston, Brentford's most recent victory came against Blackburn on 12 March
Brentford ended a run of four straight draws to regain third spot in the Championship as they comfortably beat Preston North End.
Bryan Mbeumo sent the Bees ahead inside the opening 10 minutes after Mads Roerslev's neat through ball.
Marcus Forss doubled the lead with a cool close-range finish from Roerslev's clever delivery from inside the box.
Ivan Toney headed in Tariqe Fosu's floated cross for Brentford's third before Sergi Canos' tap-in and Emiliano Marcondes's near-post finish sealed it.
Swansea had leapfrogged Brentford into third position in the Championship after they beat Millwall in Saturday's early fixture, but the Bees' win lifted them back above the Swans.
Thomas Frank's side had drawn four games in a row prior to the trip to Lancashire, but bolstered their position in the play-off spots and are now seven points clear of seventh-placed Reading.
Defeat for Preston was their 11th at home so far this season, but they remain in 16th position with five games remaining.
The players wore black armbands and stood for a two-minute silence before the game for Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, who died at the age of 99 on Friday.
'A harsh lesson' for Preston - reaction
Preston North End interim head coach Frankie McAvoy:
"Today is a harsh lesson for us all and hopefully we can learn from it, that's the biggest thing.
"What we've got to do is make sure we knuckle down and get ready for the games coming up and focus on Stoke now.
"Both individually and collectively as a group, we didn't defend anywhere near as well as we did last week."
Brentford manager Thomas Frank told BBC Radio London:
"We never get too high or too low depending on the results and we always give ourselves 24 hours to come back, to calibrate normal.
"But of course this was a good win and a big win for us, scoring five goals when we've struggled to do that lately.
"It's good to see that we are back to our offensive normal."