The email had an intriguing early line: ‘Maybe I am the only fan with a Brentford branded Bee Hive in the back garden’. There were photographs and a video to prove it wasn’t a hoax. .
Paul Selby, who is 76, explained that he used to live one mile from Griffin Park and had ‘watched hundreds of games as a teenager in the 60’s but have lived in South Africa for 50 years’.
Paul told us that a good friend in Johannesburg works as a professional builder of hives. “I said can’t we modify one of these hives and brand it with Brentford? He said ‘who’s Brentford ?’. I explained that Brentford had made it to the Premier League and he said ‘lets do it’. Then I had the idea that we make the top part, the lid, look like the stadium.”
They started work on the construction in the back garden of Paul’s garden.
The bees were ready and waiting to move in.
And soon the whole glorious edifice was completed. On the top Paul has inscribed ‘Come on You 🐝’
Once the bees started flying in Paul made a video explaining how his Brentford hive works.
Paul says: “There will be honey eventually but the bees have only been in the Brentford hive for about two months of our South African winter. Within a month or two of our summer there will be thousands more”.
Paul is coming to London in October having been unable to leave South Africa for 3 years because of COVID. It will be his first chance to see the Bees in the new stadium.