Frank on Mbeumo injury, January recruitment and finding consistencypublished at 14:49 15 December 2023
Thomas Frank has been speaking to the media before Brentford's Premier League game against Aston Villa on Sunday.
Here are the key lines from his news conference:
He confirmed Bryan Mbeumo will have an ankle operation that will rule him out for 12 weeks, meaning he will miss the Africa Cup of Nations: "Bryan is a positive guy. Everyone that gets a setback, it’s always tough to take, but he will come back stronger."
Mathias Jensen remains unavailable, but Nathan Collins has returned to training and could feature.
On whether injuries will affect January recruitment: "We need to look into it. We will not take a player if we don't think it's for the longer term."
On what improvements he wants to see after back-to-back defeats, Frank said: "Basically, it’s improving our level to be more consistent."
On trying to win their last home game before Christmas: "It will mean a lot to all of us, to put a positive performance out there and hopefully earn the points. That would mean the world."
He added: "We need to be on it and the fans need to do everything they can to be on it. When we are a team together, we perform well."
He praised Unai Emery's "top job" with Aston Villa and hailed their impressive wins over Arsenal and Manchester City.
He still backs Brentford though: "We also think we are quite good. A lot of injuries or not a lot of injuries, we know we are a threat against any team in this division and hopefully we will be that again on Sunday."