They are big on staying upbeat in Brentford.

The programme was full of messages of support from fans - and the best-selling souvenirs in the Griffin Park club shop are red wristbands proclaiming  "positive mental attitude".

It is a message constantly rammed home by their maverick manager Martin Allen, who won't let anything get his team down during the frantic race for promotion.

How Michael Symes could do with a bit of that "positive attitude". Saturday should have signalled the start of the season for the  injury-ravaged striker - but once again it looks over before it began.

He was effectively kicking off his campaign eight months late; there are no such things as meaningless matches for a player who has missed as much action as the tall striker.

And for half an hour or so his first start since New Year's Day in 2005 could not have gone any better.

Looking busy from the off, he made his mark after 36 minutes by hooking home from ten yards after Dean Windass had nodded down a Ben Muirhead corner.

From City's next attack, Symes was at it again as he found the room to unleash a 25-yarder which goalkeeper Stuart Nelson managed to finger against the foot of his left post.

It was a cracking shot - with desperate consequences. Symes had pulled his hamstring in the act of shooting.

He tried unsuccessfully to run it off by half-time but did not reappear after the break. His jinx had cruelly struck again and now he will struggle to recover in time to play in any of the remaining five games.

With his contract up, we may well have seen his final outing in a City shirt.

Sympathetic boss Colin Todd said: "Symesy scored a good goal which would have spurred him on, as you saw when he hit the post. It was an encouraging performance and then he got another injury.

"But it's been an horrendous season for the boy in terms of not being fit and unable to play matches.

"At the start of the season he was due to go to Macclesfield but couldn't get involved because of injuries. Then when he gets himself back after Christmas, I sent him to Stockport to get some games but he didn't play - which was stupid for the manager of that football club.

"But he's shown enough to get an opportunity again with us and now he's out again. We don't know for how long."

The latest setback for Symes knocked the gloss off a job pretty well done by the Bantams. Given Brentford's lofty ambitions, the visitors certainly would have settled for a point beforehand.

But then again, they usually give as good as they get against this lot.

Allen had got confused in his pre-match notes, claiming that he had never won as a manager in four previous attempts against City. He was either one out - or had a good idea of how this latest joust would pan out.

This clash was flat in comparison with previous rousing encounters. There were no double sendings-off, four-goal first halves or dramatic comebacks on the agenda.

As Windass said afterwards, nobody will be rushing to watch a video of this game over and over again.

But there was still the usual edge which you can expect from facing a side who like to play with a very physical approach. In League One, they don't come any more "in yer face" than Brentford.

Windass was the proof of that as he nursed a deep gash which needed eight stitches after a first-half clash of heads.

That meant City's talisman had to play the bulk of the game swathed in bandages. They had to be changed at one stage after the wound reopened and blood seeped through, giving him the appearance of a modern-day Terry Butcher.

Brentford's approach was more Frank Butcher, hardly the best entertainment to watch, although Allen maintained this was the best they had played in weeks.

But they did take full advantage of the five-minute period City were reduced to ten men as Windass left for his needle-and-thread treatment.

Lloyd Owusu added to his terrace cred among the west London locals with the equaliser, although he knew little about it.

The build-up was slick enough, with a well-weighted pass from Alex Rhodes behind Lewis Emanuel picking out the overlap of right back Jamie Smith.

His first-time cross was right on the button - but the same cannot be said about Owusu's finish.

Put it another way: If he had shanked the ball in the same way at Augusta, it would have flown out of bounds.

Instead, Owusu's total miscue completely wrong-footed Donovan Ricketts before dribbling over the line off the far post. The scorer was just as confused - he had dropped his head in disgust after the initial miscontact, only to recover instantly and set off on a ridiculous celebration of his outrageous luck.

Owusu played it a lot straighter afterwards and claimed: "It happened so quickly but it was just one of those things. I did not get much of a connection but it still went in - and that happens sometimes in football."

Reading between the lines, that translates as: "Yes, I know it was a fluke but I'm hardly going to turn it down."

Referee Phil Dowd must have wondered what he had stumbled upon.

He had been pencilled in for Manchester United and Arsenal but that went out the window after his shocker at Blackburn last week - a non-performance which left Paul Jewell branding him the "worst official in the Premiership".

The powers-that-be must have either agreed or decided that discretion was the better part of valour by taking him out of the firingline of Old Trafford.

Instead he was given Griffin Park and, to be fair, he had a good afternoon.

There was little hassle with the players, who probably enjoyed the luxury of being refereed for once by somebody they had actually heard of.

The only moment of confrontation came from a delegation of silver shirts that swarmed around the official after Darren Holloway was caught late and high by Sam Sodje. But Dowd quickly defused the tension with a yellow card.

Holloway had also got one for a lunge on Bantams old boy Isaiah Rankin but the game, while predictably physical, was never dirty.

It was no place for the faint-hearted, nor those who liked to get the ball down and play. City certainly tried but every attempt was inevitably met by a Brentford tackle or two snapping at their heels.

Craig Bentham certainly enjoys a challenge and the 21-year-old built on the promise of last week's Scunthorpe cameo. His passing went a bit off radar at times - one first-half slice gifted Brentford a throw-in nearly 40 yards behind him - but there was no questioning the quality of his tackles.

Brentford, obviously needing the three points more than City, asked most of the questions after the break but Todd's men had most of the answers and Ricketts was surprisingly untroubled.

The best chances fell to Owusu - one a header after Damion Stewart got in a tangle and the second a ten-yard jab after a break from the impressive Jay Tabb. Neither got anywhere near the intended target and this time there was no fortunate bounce to bale him out.

TELEGRAPH & ARGUS

BRENTFORD			BRADFORD CITY
Staurt Nelson	1	1	Donovan Ricketts
Andy Frampton	3	2	Darren Holloway
Sam Sodje	4	5	David Wetherall
Michael Turner	5	6	Mark Bower
Ricky Newman	6	8	Marc Bridge-Wilkinson
Paul Brooker	7	10	Dean Windass
Llyod Owusu	9	14	Michael Symes
Jay Tabb	11	15	Ben Muirhead
Isaiah Rankin	15	16	Lewis Emanuel
Alex Rhodes	17	22	Damion Stewart
Jamie Smith	23	25	Craig Bentham
	subs	subs
Marcus Gayle	16	13	Russell Howarth
Sam Tillen	18	4	Tom Kearney
Calum Willock	19	17	Bobby Petta
Darren Pratley	29	19	Danny Cadamarteri
George Bankole	31	27	Joe Brown

MATCH OFFICIALS
Referee:	P Dowd
Assistant Referee:	G Beale
Assistant Referee:	P Norman
4th Official:	K Hill

SUBSTITUTES
BRENTFORD	min		min	BRADFORD CITY
19 for 7	72		46	19 for 14
29 for 6	81		70	17 for 15
18 for 17			76	27 for 2

GOAL SCORERS
BRENTFORD	min		min	BRADFORD CITY
Owusu	43		36	Symes

DISCIPLINARY
BRENTFORD	min		min	BRADFORD CITY
Sodje	63		59	Holloway