Town boss Mick McCarthy isn’t expecting Brentford to be a weaker proposition despite their ongoing changes, having been impressed by their performances in pre-season. The Blues begin their 2015/16 Championship campaign at Griffin Park on Saturday afternoon (KO 3pm).

Last season the Bees finished one place above Town on goal difference but since then manager Mark Warburton has been replaced by Dutch head coach Marinus Dijkhuizen and a sizeable new backroom staff employing a statistics-based continental model.

In addition, key players such as on-loan Spurs midfielder Alex Pritchard and new Blues signing Jonathan Douglas have moved on with the squad still in a state of flux, Moses Odubajo having had his switch to Hull City confirmed this afternoon.

“And [winger] Stuart Dallas has gone as well,” McCarthy pointed out. “And, who knows, before the game on Saturday Andre Gray [might also have left, he is also] subject to a bid [from Hull].

“We’ve looked at them and we will plan for the way they play. I don’t think they’ll change the way they play. It’s fairly similar to what Mark was doing last year with the players that they’d got.

“They seem to have two sitters and one up front, 4-2-3-1 or whatever number you want to put on it.

“We watched them against Norwich and they seemed to play reasonably well and they beat Stoke at home. Pre-season friendly, I know, but it was a good performance.

“We’ve got to be careful. I remember this time last year, and certainly into the start of the season, everybody was laughing up their sleeves at Watford thinking ‘It’s bonkers this, they’ve changed their manager’ and then there was another manager and players were coming and going.

“They’re all looking at us laughing up their sleeves at the minute because they’re in the Premier League.

“So, I don’t take the fact that the manager has changed and there’s a change of the plan or running of the club and that's going to make them play badly. Not a chance. They’re all pros and they’ll be ready for us on Saturday.”

He added: “[Watford] are there, in the Premier League, so who’s to say what they’re now doing at Brentford isn’t going to work?

“There might be a hiatus while it doesn’t and it might seem to be going all wrong, but if somebody’s got a plan in place and they think they can do it and they get the right people in, I don’t think we should even get involved. Just let them do it and see what happens and we’ll take care of what we do.”

Do still progressing moves for first-team regulars, such as Odubajo and Gray, upset the mood of a side going into games?

“We went to Derby last year and we had Didz sitting out virtually because we thought Leicester were going to increase the money and he’d have gone there, and we had Teddy Bishop making his league debut,” McCarthy recalled.

“We were all over the shop in the first half, but in the second half we were the better team and should have won the game.

“I think players continue to play, and they have to. And, do you know what, if they don’t, I don’t think they’re the ones that get sold for £5 million, £6 million or £7 million in the Championship. If they down tools, they’re not the right characters.”

McCarthy has said he’ll have no qualms about fielding 17-year-old right-back Josh Emmanuel against the Bees and similarly has no concerns regarding his new left-back Jonas Knudsen, signed from Danish side Esbjerg last week.

“Not at all, not in the slightest,” he continued. “He’s trained with us and he looks to me like a Championship defender.

“He’s a bit of a warrior, he puts his foot in, he gets about the pitch. He’s not come here wanting to play at a slow tempo, he’s playing it properly.”

Emmanuel is likely to come in at right-back with Jonny Parr out with a thigh problem, which has been troubling him throughout pre-season, and Christophe Berra suspended for one game following his play-off red card at the end of last season.

Midfielder Luke Hyam is the only other player sidelined by injury presently, having undergone knee surgery which is expected to keep him out of action for around another three months,

Teddy Bishop has been suffering with shin splints, which McCarthy says has been limiting his training.

“It’s not an injury, you’ve just got to manage them,” he said. “The problem is him getting all his training in.

“He can’t train fully because he has to rest them but he’s getting the best treatment we can give him.”

Nevertheless, he expects the 19-year-old to make further strides forward during the new campaign: “I think he proved himself [last season]. Like all kids who get in the team, we’ll be hoping he pushes on, of course.

“You don’t want them to get in and stagnate and get left out and go back to the U21s, but there’s no chance that’ll happen to Bish. He’s just such a good player.”

McCarthy is likely to opt for Bartosz Bialkowski in goal ahead of Dean Gerken, the Pole having started last week’s final friendly against Utrecht, which ended 1-1.

Emmanuel is set to be one of two debutant full-backs on the right with Knudsen on the left.

In Berra’s absence, Tommy Smith will start at the left of the centre of the defence alongside skipper Luke Chambers.

Cole Skuse will take up his usual midfield holding role with Kevin Bru perhaps ahead of him if McCarthy has concerns regarding Bishop’s fitness due to his restricted training. New signing Douglas seems unlikely to start having played little part in Brentford’s pre-season preparations.

On-loan wide men Ainsley Maitland-Niles, on the right, and Ryan Fraser, on the left, will both make their Blues debuts.

Up front, McCarthy has a decision to make on the partner for last season’s 27-goal Championship top scorer Daryl Murphy.

All things being equal, David McGoldrick would probably be the first choice but the Ireland international was amongst those to return to pre-season training late and has featured in fewer friendlies, so Freddie Sears, who started last week’s final friendly, may be given the nod.

McGoldrick and summer signing Brett Pitman are likely to appear from the bench at some stage, the latter for his Town debut.

There have been extensive changes to the Brentford squad over the summer with Gray’s proposed reunion with Odubajo still ongoing at time of writing. The former Luton striker is not expected to face the Blues.

Utility man Kevin O’Connor and keeper Richard Lee have retired, while veteran striker Tommy Smith is unattached and fellow frontmen Nick Proschwitz (to SC Paderborn in Germany) and Will Grigg (to Wigan Athletic) have also moved on.

Defenders Tony Craig (to Millwall), Alfie Mawson (to Barnsley), winger Dallas (to Leeds with Town having shown interest) and new Blue Douglas are also amongst those to have departed.

Key midfielder Pritchard has returned to Spurs, Arsenal midfielder Jon Toral is spending this season at Birmingham, while striker Chris Long, on loan from Everton last season, has now signed permanently for Burnley.

The Bees have made eight signings this summer - defenders Yoann Barbet (from Chamois Niortais), Ryan Williams (from Morecambe) and Denmark international Andreas Bjelland (from FC Twente).

In midfield, they’ve added Akaki Gogia (from Hallescher FC), Josh McEachran (from Chelsea) and Austrian Konstantin Kerschbaumer (from Admira Wacker), as well as strike pair Lasse Vibe (from IFK Goteborg), a Denmark international, and German Philipp Hofmann (from 1FC Kaiserslautern).

Bjelland ought to be fit for Saturday’s match having recovered from a groin problem but midfielders McEachran (foot), Marcos Tebar (hamstring), Sam Saunders, who scored both the Bees’ goals in last season’s corresponding fixture, and Lewis Macleod, and striker Scott Hogan (knee) are also unavailable.

The teams have only met on 10 previous occasions with the Blues having had much the better of the West Londoners.

In March at Portman Road, Town missed a succession of second-half chances as the two play-off challenging sides drew 1-1.

Murphy put the Blues ahead in the ninth minute via his 22nd goal of the season, then Douglas hit back for the Bees, before the Blues failed to take numerous opportunities to win it in the second half with Murphy missing a gilt-edged chance just after half-time.

On Boxing Day at Griffin Park, Murphy scored twice and Paul Anderson and Smith once each as Town won 4-2 to briefly hit the top of the Championship.

Murphy opened the scoring in the first minute, then added the second on 21 before Anderson made it 3-0 on the half hour.

Late on, Bees sub Saunders netted twice either side of Smith’s 82nd minute goal for the Blues.

Overall, Town have won six of the games between the sides (two in the league), the Bees one (one) with three (three) ending in draws.

Three current Town players have previously been with Brentford. Jay Tabb was at Griffin Park between August 2000 and June 2006, making 114 starts and 42 sub appearances, scoring 24 goals.

Centre-half Tommy Smith was on loan at Brentford between January and March 2010, making eight starts. Former Bees skipper Jonathan Douglas joined the Blues earlier in the week having made 186 starts and one sub appearance while at Griffin Park, scoring 17 goals.

Plenty of pre-match features from the Brentford perspective, including a podcast featuring our own HarryFromBath, can be found on Beesotted here.

Saturday’s referee is David Coote from Nottinghamshire, who showed 116 yellow cards and six red in 29 games last season.

Coote’s last Town match was the 3-1 defeat at Cardiff in October last year in which he booked Tyrone Mings and two Bluebirds.

Squad from: Bialkowski, Gerken, Emmanuel, Knudsen, Chambers, Smith, Yorwerth, Skuse, Bishop, Bru, Douglas, Tabb, Coke, McDonnell, Maitland-Niles, Fraser, Touré, Murphy, McGoldrick, Sears, Pitman.

Photo: Action Images

SouperJim added 10:42 - Aug 8 A rare slip from Mick letting the truth out about Didz! Anybody with half a brain knew what the situation was and it's all water under the bridge now anyway, but Mick is usually so good at keeping a lid on things.
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DanLyles added 11:12 - Aug 8 If Mick prefers Sears to McGoldrick then I think it could be partly influenced by Brentford liking to play it out from the back. Sears is more effective at chasing people down than Didz. Our forwards and wingers could really help stop the flow of their game today by pressing them and forcing them to play it long. A key battle for me will be our left wing against their right back. Fraser should be buzzing having had a very good half against them for Bournemouth last season and they have a new first choice right back McCormack who has't been bedded in yet. Lastly, who wouldn't bet against Douglas coming on in the last twent minutes and scoring a header, which seems to be his speciality from the video I saw of his goals. COYB's.

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Seasider added 14:31 - Aug 8 Notice that Jonny Parr was also injured for first game last year;think Mick hinted that he is a bit of a sick note?If we can put up with Mr Parr always injured perhaps we could also accommodate another Jonny ie Williams who we should be able to get for a song because of the above! This is a great chance for young Josh to cement a place,after all think Marcus would like more players to come from academy as we did during Sir Bobby's time.

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