Brentford are looking to hire a chief scout to ease the workload for co-director of football Phil Giles.

The Bees chief has to spend a great deal of time speaking to agents and agreeing contracts with players, whether they are with the club or a prospective signing.

And the move gives Brentford autonomy in the scouting department, while freeing up Giles to focus on other areas.

He said: “It was about how reviewing how we’ve done things up to now and adding a focal point as well as I’m not able to manage the day to day minutiae of scouting.

“That needs managing and they’ll come in and manage it and provide leadership. They’ll bring extra knowledge and experience into the club which we need and manage the overall strategy with regards to recruitment which involves all sorts of different components.

“It’s more of recognising areas where we can make things better as we go.”

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Giles will be overseeing the successful applicant’s work but urged fans not to expect his impact to come in the summer, given the timing of the appointment.

He added: “Part of my job will be to make sure he has everything he needs. He’ll come in quite late to impact this window but he can bring ideas to the table.

“We’ve had conversations and will hopefully make quick progress. We’d like to bring some players in. We’ve got a solid support staff.

“Last summer, it wasn’t a question of (Rasmus Ankersen) and I coming in new, Marinus and Roy coming in new. There were new support staff and new players.

“We won’t have the first part of pre-season as a getting to know each other period. We’ll be cracking on straightaway.”