First the good news. Alex Revell and Dean Bowditch could be back for Nottingham Forest's visit to Withdean on Saturday.

Now the bad news. Albion will be one place nearer to League Two by then if they lose again at Leyton Orient tomorrow night.

Now the really bad news. The imminent return of Revell and Bowditch, from Ipswich, might lead Dick Knight into thinking another striker is not required after all.

What a mistake that would be. The chairman has already messed up by dragging his heels during the January transfer window. He must move heaven and earth to fund a forward on loan who will save his and the Seagulls' bacon.

Knight's legacy depends on it because it is the immediate rather than distant past which lingers in the mind.

He deserves to be remembered as the man who rescued Albion from Bill Archer, Greg Stanley and David Bellotti, brought the club back to the city, helped deliver three promotions by appointing Micky Adams, Peter Taylor and Mark McGhee, and, hopefully, delivered a new stadium at Falmer.

He is in danger of being remembered for doing the dirty on Steve Gritt, not landing Steve Coppell when he first had the chance, not giving Martin Hinshelwood enough backing and losing his nerve when prematurely abandoning McGhee.

Crowds, like the team, are falling. Most damning of all, Knight is in danger of being remembered for steering a club that reached for the stars but came back down to earth with an almighty bump in the basement division of English football against a backdrop of accelerating apathy.

That is where Albion are heading at the moment and it would be unfair and unrealistic to expect Revell and Bowditch to halt the freefall.

Revell has done remarkably well since his £8,000 move from Braintree last summer. He has scored ten goals, he gives the side energy and infectious enthusiasm and his ability in the air and to play down the middle or wide on the right will certainly increase the options for Dean Wilkins.

But will he be the answer to Albion's scoring crisis? It is worth remembering he had gone seven games without a goal himself before suffering ankle ligament damage in a training accident.

It is asking a lot for Bowditch to make an immediate impact as well when he eventually returns on loan. He is bound to be rusty after such limited time on the pitch, caused by the persistent groin injury which restricted his appearances in his first loan stint in November and December.

The Seagulls need more up front, much more. Their promotion successes when they were previously in this division were based around prolific goalscorers in Bobby Zamora and Leon Knight.

Adam Virgo's conversion from defender into marauding centre forward disguised a deficiency which has not been addressed since he was sold to Celtic two summers ago.

If Neil Shipperley and Jo Kuffour had been leading Albion's attack, instead of Brentford's, the result would have been different. It is sad that Shipperley, Darren Byfield and Jabo Ibehre, all transfer targets at different times over the past 18 months, are spearheading relegation rivals. The airwaves were predictably rife with mentions of Adams on Saturday night but yet another change of manager is not the answer when the man doing the firing is part of the problem.

In my view, the chairman of any club should leave the football to the football experts. He should back the manager's judgement in the transfer market to the best of his financial ability, without his own opinion of players clouding that process. If the manager fails then, by all means sack him.

I know, from past conversations with previous managers, that has not always been the case during Knight's reign. The recurring theme is that he tries to exert too much influence.

I'll give one small but significant example. The chairman likes to know what the team is well in advance of a match. Why? I am not suggesting for one moment that he has an input in selecting the side. No manager worth his salt would allow that to happen.

Equally though, it is reasonable to assume the forthright Knight will not greet the team announcement with silence, particularly if he does not entirely agree with the choice which has been made.

There were a few raised eyebrows in the press box, as well no doubt as the Boardroom, when Wilkins started up front on Saturday with a pint-sized partnership of Jake Robinson and Dean Cox. The problem for Wilkins at the moment is that players are letting him down by failing to carry out instructions.

Big centre halves do not like clever little uns. The idea was for Robinson and Cox to exploit their combination of pace and vision, one dropping deep to play the other through.

Wilkins said: "They didn't carry it out as we had planned. Too often they spent time on one side of the pitch as a pair or too often the pair of them were coming short. The midfield became congested, we then played too many one-touch balls and gave possession away."

Alexis Bertin blemished an otherwise accomplished full debut by giving possession away in midfield for Brentford's winner.

Shipperley released Kuffour clean through the heart of the defence to calmly slot his third goal in two games and 12th of the campaign, a decent record in a side which has won only three of their last 30 outings.

It was not just up front that players were not doing their jobs. Kerry Mayo was sucked into two challenges on Brentford's teenage winger Charlie Ide, resulting in a second red card this season for the experienced left-back just before half-time.

And why was the strapping Garry Richards, making his debut for Brentford on loan from Championship surprise packages Colchester, allowed to get in headers from free-kicks in both halves which narrowly missed the target? It was only recently that Richards demonstrated his aerial prowess by nodding Colchester's winner from a corner against Preston.

Bas Savage, consigned to the bench after a modest debut, almost equalised twice after coming on at half-time as part of a major reshuffle. An angled drive and a firm header from a corner by the big target man were both saved by Brentford keeper Nathan Abbey, who was much busier against ten men than 11.

ALBION (4-4-2): Michel Kuipers (GK), Joe O'Cearuill (RB), Guy Butters (CB), Joel Lynch (CB), Kerry Mayo (LB), Nick Ward (RM), Adam El-Abd (CM), Alexis Bertin (CM), Dean Hammond (LM), Dean Cox (CF), Jake Robinson (CF). Subs: Bas Savage (for Ward 45), Tommy Fraser, Joe Gatting (for Butters 87), Sam Rents (for O'Ceaurill 84), John Sullivan. BRENTFORD (3-5-2): Nathan Abbey (GK), Che Wilson (RB), Garry Richards (CB), Andy Frampton (CB), Sam Tillon (LB), Charlie Ide (RM), Michael Leary (CM), John Mousinho (CM), Joe Keith (LM), Neil Shipperley (CF), Jo Kuffour (CF). Subs: Carleigh Osborne, Kevin O'Connor (for Leary 64), Clark Masters, Calum Wilock, Paul Brooker.