Marco Silva has underlined the importance of Saturday's trip to Brentford as he looks ahead to 'a special derby' on Saturday afternoon.

The Fulham boss scotched any suggestion that his side have little to play for and wants his charges to put in a better performance against their local rivals than they managed during a desperate 3-0 defeat by the Bees at Craven Cottage in their first home game of the season.

Silva told his pre-match press conference earlier this afternoon:

"When you talk about derbies, I prefer to talk about fans, because we know all these type of games are special for them. Myself, as a manager, I like to prepare my team and my players the best we can for all the matches, [but] of course derbies always have something different, there's always something special there.

These games are special for the fans and we want them to have a good feeling after the match, with the rest of the weekend in a good mood. This season we have a big number of London derbies because we have seven London clubs, but for this football club - and for Brentford - this clash is important. We have Chelsea, our neighbours, that is an important derby for us as well.

Recently, these derby games are a bit different, and probably before I arrived in the football club as well because of some seasons in the Championship with good fights between them, and [the fixture] became a little bit different. We are here to play the game, knowing that it is a special game for the fans, and we want to make them proud and happy. That is the main thing."

Silva knows the Whites won't have it easy at the GTech this weekend - and heaped praise on Brentford manager Thomas Frank.

"Since last season, every time we play against each other, it's been good moments, good conversations between us. Very good guy, very good manager, too, and it's going to be another good clash. It's going to be nice to see him again, and let's hope we can get a different result to the game at the Cottage beginning of the season. But, yes, he's doing a very good job. That club is now clearly a Premier League club and the work from everybody - the players and, of course, Thomas - is playing a big, big part in it."