Every fortnight we cover the best and worst football songs from every club in the UK from our book ‘The Sound Of Football: Every Club, Every Song’. You can buy it here

Brentford

Nickname: The Bees

Ground: Griffin Park

Stadium Capacity: 12,763

Song: Hey Jude

Did Rod Stewart play for Brentford? We know that his first love was football, closely followed by blondes and platform shoes. On his hit song, ‘You’re In My Heart (The Final Acclaim),’ he compared one of his conquests with the best team he’d ever seen. Better even than Manchester United or his beloved Celtic. Was Rod talking about Brentford?

For years, the press would write that Rod had played for The Bees as a young man. But, in 1995, he finally confessed he’d never played at Griffin Park. He’d only had a trial as a schoolboy. We think we can now assume that Brentford was not the best team he’d ever seen.

One man believes Brentford was the best team he’s ever seen, and that’s ex-player Lloyd Owusu.

Owusu joined Brentford from non-league Slough in 1998 and immediately made an impact, helping the team to promotion. He finished top scorer with an impressive 22 goals. Over the next few years, he continued to feature prominently and became a fan’s favourite due to his ‘raise the roof` goal celebrations

Although Owusu left the club briefly, he returned in 2005 for a second spell. The fans welcomed his return, and one in particular – Status Quo bassist John ‘Rhino` Edwards – even created a tribute song, ‘Owusu The One And Only, in his honour.

Brentford’s club song is ‘Hey Jude’ by the Beatles, played at every home game. For the chorus, the fans sing:

“Laaa Laaa Laaa La-la-la Laaa

La-la-la Laaa Brentford

Laaa Laaa Laaa La-la-la Laaa

La-la-la Laaa Brentford“

(Source: fan chant)

There are two theories why the fans sing Hey Jude. The first is that a woman named Jude in the 1960s dumped a Brentford player, and the club played the song to remind him of her. The second theory is more straightforward – and more plausible – it was simply started by supporters who spotted that the chants of “Hey Jude” could be easily swapped with “Brent-ford“.

‘Hey Jude’ is one of The Beatles’ greatest songs, but drummer Ringo Starr almost didn’t play on it. The band was ready to record the track, but Ringo went to the toilet before they started. The rest of the band didn’t notice he had gone. He heard Paul McCartney singing and ran back in time to hit his drums right on cue.

John Lennon may have once said that Ringo wasn’t “even the best drummer in The Beatles“, but Ringo knew, like all great drummers, that timing is everything.

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