‘There must be something that really p****d him off’
Brentford boss Thomas Frank has accused a Nottingham Forest groundsman of injury his goalkeeping coach during a pre-match bust-up.
The incident occurred prior to Brentford’s 2-2 draw at the City Ground where a late own goal rescued bottom of the table Forest a point.
As goalkeeping coach Manuel ‘Manu’ Sotelo began going through some warm-ups, a member of the Forest ground staff walked into the penalty area, causing a dispute.
A video showed the two exchanging verbals before Sotelo appeared to push the Forest member of staff, who had a long digging fork in his possession.
Forest v Brentford has had a tetchy start .. and we haven’t even reached kickoff yet.
Brentford players and coaches arguing with #NFFC ground staff about where they should be warming up. A bit of push and shove and the referee having to get involved. pic.twitter.com/OrtRloNVZT
— Daniel Taylor (@DTathletic) November 5, 2022
Forest concluded in an investigation that the groundsman had walked into the penalty area to tell the visitors to move out of the box as they had breached Premier League regulations on how long a team can warm up in the box for.
During his post-match interview, Frank revealed that Sotelo had suffered an injury as a result of the altercation.
“Yes he got a mark,” the Brentford boss said. “Something gave him a mark and I have even got a picture.
“I have a bit of a temper so I am not an angel all of the time and I try to be the best version but my goalkeeping coach is the most down to earth guy, there must be something really p***** him off.
“I just hope like everyone is looking into it. There must be cameras.”
Frank added it’s the first time he had ever seen a situation like it.
“In all my time in football and, especially all my time in the Premier League, I have never seen a groundsman walking around in the middle of our warm-up doing things.
“I don’t know if that is a coincidence, but it just surprised me very much.”
Forest boss Steve Cooper decline to comment.
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