Thomas Frank has insisted Ivan Toney accepted the decision to leave him out of Brentford’s opening game of the season against Crystal Palace after revealing “there’s a lot of transfer interest” in the England striker.
Toney has entered the final year of his contract and made no secret of his desire to leave Brentford, with Arsenal, Chelsea and the Saudi Pro League side al-Ahli having all been linked with him this summer. But while Frank admitted that a move is “not close”, he explained that the decision to omit Toney from his matchday squad for the opening game of the season had been taken by him and the club on Thursday.
“A lot of things are going on with Ivan, especially with transfers, there’s a lot of transfer interest. Because of all that, we’ve decided not to include him in the squad,” Frank told Sky Sports before kick-off. “I can’t give too much away the day before. Of course Ivan is a top player, we all know that. He has been fantastic for us for four years but we showed last season we can cope without him.”
Asked after Yoane Wissa’s goal gave Brentford a 2-1 win how Toney had taken the news, Frank said: “There was no problem. Ivan always wants to play. He has been one of our best players over a long period of time. We saw last year that like with any good player, one day they will leave the club and someone else needs to step up and do well. Every time Ivan hasn’t played then Wissa has stepped up and he did that again today.”
The Palace captain, Marc Guéhi, played the whole game at the Gtech Stadium despite transfer interest in him from Newcastle. Palace are understood to have rejected their latest bid worth up to £65m but the chairman, Steve Parish, admitted he has held talks with Newcastle’s sporting director, Paul Mitchell, and that other clubs had also shown an interest in the England defender.
“We’re always very respectful when we get a bid for a player,” Parish told TalkSport. “We’re very respectful of Newcastle United and Paul Mitchell is somebody I have an incredible amount of time for. I’ve known him for a long time, he’s been very, very good to me in football and we have a good relationship. So, he and I have had a chat about this.
“Inevitably, the agents are involved and have got a point of view, they’re decent guys. We’ve had conversations with other clubs that have expressed interest as well.”
Parish also said Palace could end their interest in re-signing Wilfried Zaha, with issues over tax set to scupper a loan move from Galatasaray. “I’d have Wilf Zaha back in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like it’ll be possible this summer,” he said.
