Brentford have announced the appointment of Manchester United academy director Justin Cochrane as their new head coach.
A number of clubs were interested in hiring the highly-rated 40-year-old, but the Bees announced his signing on Saturday.
Cochrane joined Manchester United as their new head of player development and coaching last summer, overseeing all academy development from the Under-17 level up.
Prior to that, he spent nine years at Tottenham’s academy, as well as assisting the FA with youth development.
Brentford director of football Phil Giles expressed his delight at bringing Cochrane to the club in west London.
“Justin is an outstanding coach who has been doing very good work in recent years with Tottenham, England and Manchester United,” Giles said.
“We’ve known him for a while and so when the opportunity came up this summer to be able to bring him to the Club, we were excited to be able to do so. Justin will be part of the First Team coaching group under the continued leadership of Thomas Frank.
“The Head of Coaching role is a new one for us but will help us bring the coaching staff across the Club even closer together and ensure that we are totally aligned in our coaching principles across teams. We look forward to Justin joining us for day one of pre-season.”
Brentford are still hopeful of beating Man United in the race for Christian Eriksen, according to 90min. When his contract expires at the end of June, the Dane is expected to leave the Bees, with former club Tottenham also interested in signing him.
