Keith Andrews proud as Brentford pick up first win of season against Aston Villa
Brentford head coach Keith Andrews spoke of his “pride” after Aston Villa were beaten 1-0 at the Gtech Community Stadium to hand him a first win in charge.
Dango Ouattara hit the winner on his debut following a club-record £42.5million move from Bournemouth, as the home side turned in a guileful display that got life after former boss Thomas Frank off the ground following a false start in last weekend’s defeat to Nottingham Forest.
Once in the lead, Brentford coped comfortably with a limited attacking threat from Villa, who are still awaiting their first goal of the new Premier League season.
“The overriding emotion is pride,” said Andrews. “I spoke before about identity of our team. I felt we saw it in abundance, the spirit and connection between players, staff and fans. Ultimately we produced a performance that was us.”
Ouattara’s goal arrived just 12 minutes into his debut. Igor Thiago – fresh from scoring his first Premier League goal last weekend – manoeuvred to flick on Caoimhin Kelleher’s long clearance and through the middle burst Brentford’s record buy, carving between Matty Cash and Pau Torres to finish at the second attempt past Emiliano Martinez.
“His goal will get the headlines but there were aspects of the game, the selflessness nature of how he approached the game for the team, that’s what was needed today to get a result,” said Andrews. “If he didn’t stick to that task it was going to be difficult to deal with them.
“He was amazing. He will be a big player for this club. His attributes are there to see and you’ll see more of that as we get more control of games and we’re able to feed him a bit more.
“But the out of possession shift he did today was selfless. It was very impressive, but I’m not too