“Any chance?” asks Michael Caulfield, Brentford’s sports psychologist, and with that Paisley, a lurcher-whippet with a marble-cake coat, hops out of the boot of his car at the training ground. He stops for a chat with the groundstaff, on their hands and knees repairing black netting chewed by urban foxes in this part of west London.
“When a fox sees Paisley, they scarper off to Surbiton,” Caulfield says, walking past the place he calls Augusta, by which he means the immaculate pitches in front of the Robert Rowan Performance Centre named after their technical director who died six years ago. “It sounds pathetic but I walked past his portrait this morning and went: ‘1-1 last night [against Sheffield Wednesday], penalties, you wouldn’t believe it, but we got there. Hope we get a home draw.’”
Soon Caulfield is talking about his unique, open-air office. “There are four benches here now, two – for the academy – are having an official opening next week,” he says. The first spot, he adds, was a “crappy tin bench” outside the original training pavilion. He sought an upgrade, ordering a wooden one, adding a plaque that reads: ‘Michael’s Bench; Just sit and talk, or just sit.’
“The most moving thing was Robert’s widow, Suzanne, rang and said: ‘Can we come and sit on the bench?’ I could have filled the ground up with tears. We had 15 minutes in the sunshine. Some days no one comes near me but the next day you can’t get on there. That was the whole point of it, to create a space where you can just sit there and go: ‘It’s shit.’ Or: ‘Wasn’t that amazing?’”
Sir AP McCoy, who led Caulfield to retrain as a psychologist while he was chief executive of the Professional Jockeys Association, has visited. The All Blacks, too. “They nearly broke it,” he smiles. It is on those benches where he gets to work, chatting with players and staff, usually with a light touch. Sometimes they walk and talk, Paisley in tow; Keane Lewis-Potter and Aaron Hickey found it beneficial when injured. Mads Roerslev took Paisley for a walk the day after Brentford’s 4-3 win over Ipswich. A replica bench followed at the request of the B team.
“I told them they could decide what would be on the plaque. They came back with something brilliant: ‘Michael’s Other Bench.’ I could have gone to Saatchi and Saatchi, Google, Elon Musk, AI, all the gurus of the world and they would have come up with something as dull as flu.”
In a way, that speaks to the simplicity of Caulfield’s work. “Myself and Thomas [Frank] often sit down and have a bit of lunch. After he signed his new contract [as manager in 2022], he said: ‘I’m jealous of you, Michael. You don’t understand, you’ve got one thing I’ll never, ever have and, by the way, that goes for most people in this building.’ I said: ‘Go on then’ … ‘Time.’ And that’s my innovation.
“I’ve got time and I create time for others to have time. I’m always working towards that moment when the music stops, so for Monday, when it’s red and white stripes v Fulham’s white and black shorts, 11 v 11. I’m trying to keep that joy and soul in football.”
The palette of conversation is rich and varied; his previous dog, Shankly, a lurcher-greyhound, who acted as Caulfield’s sidekick during his spells at Middlesbrough, Hull and here. “The idea was you’ll never walk alone,” he says.
Growing besotted with football – “the greatest meritocracy in the world” – after his first game, West Ham 1-3 Manchester United at Upton Park in 1967; the Brentford Lifeline Society, which Caulfield pays into, £2 a week. “I mean, you try and get out of that,” he laughs. Morecambe and Wise; Maggie Smith.
Working at the darts in Bolton, the dressage at Badminton; David Raya’s journey from Barcelona to Blackburn and Arsenal, via Brentford and Southport, Bryan Mbeumo’s artistry. “I’ve asked him to do a print for me because he paints beautifully, wonderful watercolours,” Caulfield says. “And he enjoys a tinkle on the piano. He’s a delightful man, who happens to be very good at football.” Only Erling Haaland has scored more league goals than Mbeumo this season.
Caulfield says he cannot take credit for Brentford’s fast starts or joyous crescendos. Brentford scored inside the opening 40 seconds of three successive matches and then 75 seconds into the fourth game of that run, a 5-3 win against Wolves. Mbeumo scored a 96th-minute winner against Ipswich and they prevailed on penalties on Tuesday.
“If I’ve helped, then it is by 0.00001% recurring,” he says. “We did find out, because only we would know this, that when we got the third goal [inside a minute], that hadn’t happened in one million games. Football is still based around conversation, connection, emotion, understanding. You can now analyse the game in incredible detail and thought. If you can get those two married, you’re on to something.”
Caulfield, who radiates warmth, rewinds to his first day, midway through 2016-17, a few days before Frank joined Dean Smith’s staff. Brentford were 18th in the Championship. Then, his role comprised half a day a week, now it is three, two with the first team, one with the B team. “We had just been whopped 5-0 by Norwich,” he says. “Everyone thought they brought me in because of the result. So, in the meeting room after training, 25 chairs, me in the middle. I was doing the Tony Blair,” he says, drily, “that’s why I wear a jacket.
“I said: ‘I’m terrified. This is as bad as it gets for me, introducing myself to you after a 5-0 defeat. I’m standing here dressed like this in front of you … Don’t think for one minute I’m enjoying this, so I’d be really, really honoured if one of you could ask a question. Can one of you save my life?’ Then a hand goes up. Lasse Vibe. ‘Can we trust you?’ he said. I could feel 25 pairs of eyes going: ‘You better answer this well, otherwise you’re done.’ I said: ‘Well, you’ve already made your mind up anyway, but I hope you can.’ OK, good.”
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How does Caulfield think the players and staff view his role? He pauses for thought. “They accept it, they understand it, they appreciate it, I think, but they also question it as well. It is great because they challenge me.”
Perhaps Henrik Dalsgaard, who won promotion with Brentford three years ago, put it best. “A bloke comes in with his dog, walks around the pitch and we give him the heavy stuff from our hearts. I’ve been doing it this morning … I walked with a B team player. He was telling me about his week; he’s finding his way in life.”
Players and staff later went for a wander. “It was beautiful. You’ve got 11-15 players in tracksuits and T-shirts, support staff in tracksuits and T-shirts, and a history teacher looking like he’s about to give a lecture on the Tudors. Bonkers.”
Caulfield, wearing a flat cap, blazer, shirt, striped socks and a pair of Dr. Martens, does a good line in self-deprecation. “I don’t really look like your football man, to quote [the X page] Bryan’s Gunn.” Caulfield sometimes refers to himself as a dustbin, where players and coaches can declutter their minds to focus on performance. But deep and complex issues, such as grief, arise on those benches. “I’ve got the list: anxiety, racism, divorce, miscarriages, it is an absolute A-Z.” Perceived miscarriages of justice? “It’s a VAR-free zone.”
Surely not everyone wants to chat? “A third are really interested, a third are quite interested, a third are going: ‘Michael, how are you?’” The conversations, of course, remain confidential. “Some of the things I know and have heard, shared and discussed, they’re going to the grave with me. They will never be discussed, written about, spoken about, put in fancy lights. There’s got to be room in life for that, I think.”
With Paisley, Caulfield makes his way towards the first-team bench, outside the gym and round the corner from the padel court installed last year. He shakes hands and chats with a B team player, before bumping into a cleaner heading the other way, engaging in conversation, and then Rhys Weston, the former Arsenal and Cardiff full-back who is now Brentford’s head of team operations. “Home draw?” Caulfield says of the Carabao Cup quarter-finals, hours before Brentford are rewarded with a December trip to Newcastle.
Grounds staff fix a couple more blemishes. The Ukrainian midfielder Yehor Yarmoliuk drives home. Caulfield walks past the meeting rooms and, later than billed, towards the far end of pitch one. Paisley, apparently in anticipation of the chicken and cheese roll treats that await, stretches into a downward dog before looking with great intrigue towards the camera lens. “Sorry,” Caulfield says, “I got talking.”
