During the 1996–97 English football season, Brentford competed in the Football League Second Division. Despite having led the division for most of the season, a collapse in the final 13 matches dropped the Bees into the playoffs, where they were defeated by Crewe Alexandra in the 1997 Second Division playoff Final.

Despite a hangover in the 1995–96 season, Brentford entered 1996–97 with largely the same core of players which reached the 1995 Second Division playoff semi-finals. That said, centre back Barry Ashby and midfielders Paul Smith and Carl Hutchings rejected new contracts in favour of monthly agreements, though all three would sign new deals during the opening two months of the season. Manager David Webb's only significant signing of the 1996 off-season was that of Scott Canham, paying West Ham United a £25,000 fee to turn his loan from the previous season into a permanent deal.

Brentford began the Second Division season with a 11-match unbeaten run and firmly held on to top spot in the table. The four-pronged attack of Carl Asaba, Nicky Forster, Robert Taylor and Marcus Bent proved fruitful and Asaba's 7-minute hat-trick versus Shrewsbury Town on 31 August 1996 was the quickest ever in a league match by a Brentford player. One win in eight matches from mid-October through to mid-November dropped the Bees back into the playoffs, but the club returned to the summit early in the following 13-match unbeaten run. Forward Nicky Forster, who was in the final year of his contract, was sold to Birmingham City for a £700,000 fee on 31 January 1997, but would not be replaced.

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