During the 2005–06 English football season, Brentford competed in Football League One. For the second season in succession, the club reached the FA Cup fifth round and the play-off semi-finals.

After defeat to Sheffield Wednesday in the 2005 League One play-off semi-finals, Brentford manager Martin Allen strengthened the squad with a number of acquisitions on free transfers, including a raid on Reading (Ricky Newman, Paul Brooker and former Bees favourite Lloyd Owusu), youngsters Ólafur Ingi Skúlason and Sam Tillen and non-league striker DJ Campbell. Still heavily in debt to former chairman Ron Noades' company Altonwood, there were ongoing budgetary concerns, with the departure of London Broncos as tenants of Griffin Park losing the club £100,000, but by mid-August 2005, Supporters' Trust Bees United (which took operational control of the club in 2003) had raised £700,000 of the £1,000,000 needed to acquire a majority shareholding. Former BBC Director-General Greg Dyke, a lifelong supporter, loaned the club money in the autumn.