Aaron Hickey admitted his “excitement” for the start of the Premier League season after Brentford beat Real Betis 1-0 in their final pre-season friendly on Saturday.

French winger Bryan Mbeumo scored the only goal of the game in the first half as the Bees narrowly edged past the La Liga side at the Gtech Community Stadium.

Hickey, who signed from Bologna last month, made his first appearance in front of the Brentford home support, playing over an hour. 

After the game the Scottish full-back hailed the fans and claimed he was excited for the start of the season next week. 

The 20-year-old told the club website: “It was amazing playing in front of the fans – it was louder than what I expected it to be. The fans were great the full game. 

“I've loved it ever since I arrived. It’s a great club. As soon as I arrived everyone was dead friendly and I’m just delighted to be here. 

“It will be exciting, the first Premier League match, so hopefully we can do well and get the win.”

Brentford kick-off their domestic campaign with an away trip to Leicester on Sunday, before welcoming Erik Ten Haag’s new-look Manchester United side to Gtech Community Stadium the following week.

Hickey signed a four-year deal with the Bees in July, having made 36 appearances in Serie A last season, scoring five goals and registering one assist. 

The highly rated Scottish international cost Brentford £17m including add-ons, and is one of seven new arrivals for the west London club.

Notably, Thomas Frank’s side have also signed former Burnley skipper Ben Mee on a free and 21-year-old winger Keane Lewis-Potter from Hull for a further £17m.

Hickey added that he was “delighted” with the victory, and that the new signings were already beginning to gel with the rest of the squad on and off the pitch.

The full-back said: “We did well as a team, stuck together. A few times in the game it was quite hard for us, they made it hard so I’m just delighted that we got the win.

“It’s good. You can see every day in training that we’re building up more of a relationship so it’s good to have someone new to the club [Mee] also coming into the team. 

“Obviously you’ve got to play very good teams coming into the Premier League, because you know it's going to be tough so it’s good to get opposition like [Real Betis].”

Elsewhere, Bees manager Frank labelled the friendly a “perfect test” considering the standard of the Spanish opposition. 

Speaking to the club’s media team, he said: "We're facing a very good side from Betis. 

“They finished fifth in LaLiga last year, won the Copa del Rey and had some good players out there. 

“They put everything into it of course, they played with a high tempo. It was almost a perfect test for us, and it's nice that we could perform well and get some confidence.

"When the season starts, it's always a bit different but we can take good things away from this performance, which we certainly will do. 

“It was a good performance, not a top performance, but a good solid performance. If we perform like this in every game then there will be a lot of points for us in the Premier League."