Saturday saw Brentford’s recent unbeaten run in the league come to an end with a narrow 1-0 defeat away to ten man Norwich City. The home side had top scorer Grant Holt sent off for a nasty tackle in the first half, but the Bees couldn’t quite make the most of the man advantage, and although we hit the post and Myles Weston had a golden opportunity late on to equalise, it was Chris “not the bloke from Coldplay” Martin who scored from a tight angle to win it for the Canaries.

Up until then Norwich had seen Wojciech Szczesny deny them with some top saves, which is of course business as usual for the young Pole, and we had frustrated them with a narrow formation, putting Kevin O’Connor, Marcus Bean and new signing Toumani Diagouraga in midfield while Sam Wood paid close attention to Wes Hoolahan, which seemed to work and perhaps the frustration got to Holt, causing him to lunge in on Diagouraga. Unfortunately we perhaps lacked a bit up front, with Weston paired with Charlie MacDonald and as such couldn’t really capitalise with the extra man. Perhaps we should have at least got a draw out of the match, but it was not to be. Besides, better teams have gone to Norwich and been picked apart, so an unfortunate 1-0 defeat isn’t too bad.

If you want to read a more detailed match report then you might be best off heading to the Brentford website, but if you’re more of a picture person then you might want to look at the highlights on the BBC website. I haven’t been able to watch these as my computer thinks it’s abroad, but I’m sure they’re terribly exciting.

Anyway, we have the chance to bounce back almost immediately with a match at Griffin Park tonight. The only problem with this is that we’re facing Southampton. Had the south coast side not started on -10 points, they’d currently be 9th in the table, two places and six points ahead of us, and that’s including a fairly ropey early season. However, they’ve been in very good form recently, partly thanks to the free scoring Rickie Lambert, and have reached the Fifth Round of the FA Cup where they’ll face arch rivals Portsmouth, so they will be a dangerouse side to face.

Of course they were a decent side when we played them earlier in the season, drawing 1-1 at St Marys thanks to a Cleveland Taylor goal, so the aim will be to repeat that performance, or perhaps even better it. I fancy us to get a point at least from this one, maybe an exciting 3-2 victory. Maybe.

One player who won’t be featuring against Southampton, or indeed against anyone for the Bees in the near future, is John Bostock. Although we extended his loan deal from Tottenham for a week, he didn’t feature against Doncaster or Norwich, and the Daily Mail is reporting that we decided not to extend the youngster’s loan, rather than Spurs not letting us have him for longer. It also seems that Harry Redknapp isn’t too impressed with Bostock’s attitude whilst on loan with us.

Bostock was clearly a very talented player, but perhaps not what we need at the moment. He has the skills, but League One is more about physicality and, although he has shown us glimpses of his ability, such as his debut against Millwall and his cross against Colchester, he’s given the ball away too often. He wants to play in the Championship now though, and given the right team he’d do well there. Put him in a good footballing side and I think he’d do well at that level. If he gets his head down and works at it though, he’ll be a good Premiership player in the future, trust me. Maybe he’ll have some big North London derby battles with Szczesny in the not too distant future?