Brentford had opportunities to sign Eberechi Eze, Michael Olise, Omar Marmoush, and Mykhailo Mudryk, according to owner Matthew Benham.
The 57-year-old is a boyhood Brentford fan who has been part of the club’s ownership setup since 2005.
Speaking at the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference on March 7, the British businessman revealed how the club, which was promoted to the Premier League for the first time in 2021, had the chance to sign multiple targets who have gone on to complete transfers to some of Europe’s biggest clubs.
“There are always going to be ones that you regret,” Benham said. “We could have signed Eze for £4million in 2019 and Marmoush on a free (transfer) about three years ago. “
Eze joined Crystal Palace in the summer of 2020 from Queens Park Rangers before moving to boyhood club Arsenal last summer for an initial fee of £60million ($81.2m; €69.4m) plus a potential £7.5m in add-ons.
Marmoush’s contract expired at Wolfsburg in 2023, though he eventually joined Eintracht Frankfurt on a free transfer. He scored 20 goals and 14 assists in 26 appearances in the first half of the 2024-25 campaign, he completed a move to Manchester City in January 2025 worth around €70m to €75m plus bonuses.
Brentford also missed out on City forward Omar Marmoush. (Photo: Ed Sykes/Sportsphoto/Allstar via Getty Images)
Mudryk, signed for Chelsea in 2023 in a deal worth €70m, with a further €30m in add-ons. The Ukraine international was provisionally suspended by the FA in December for testing positive for a banned substance and was charged with a violation of the Football Association (FA)’s anti-doping rules last summer.
“The summer we got promoted to the Premier League, there were two players who scouted amazingly well,” said Benham. “One was Mudryk, which would have been mega complicated if we signed him, but we were close to signing him for quite a low fee — €20m.
Benham also spoke on Brentford’s unsuccessful pursuit of then-Reading winger Olise, saying: “His scouting was unbelievable. Out of this world.
“We had just been promoted and were not used to the crazy agent fees in the Premier League at the time. The agent’s fee was just so insanely high even though there was a part of us thinking that if you combined the transfer fee and the agent fee, it’s not too bad. But the agent fee on its own was so insane that we stepped away.”
Like Eze, Palace pipped Brentford to signing Olise. He moved to Selhurst Park as a 19-year-old in the summer of 2021 for £8m before joining Bayern Munich in the summer of 2024.
Initially, Benham supported the club in the form of interest-free loans, but the Brentford’s previous owners, the Bees United supporters’ trust, voted to give him full control in 2012.
Since then, they have climbed from the third tier to the top flight, moved into a new stadium in 2020, and are now in their fifth straight season in the Premier League.
