The Second Coming Of Quique Sanchez Flores

Midfielder has just crossed the halfway line, or Jurado being chastised for passing forwards?

 

Still can't get my head round this. A bad run yes but 11th and a cup final. And replace him 3 games into the new season with a guy who was let go and had clearly fallen out with the WFC heirarchy. I'm sure they know what they're doing....

 

Four games, plus we lost the last four of last season as well. We’ve had a noticeable downturn in form stretching back a while now. How do we know QSF had fallen out with the heirarchy? We didn’t renew his contract, he said he saw the season differently to the owners and viewed it as a success. I’m sure he was disgruntled, but his appointment clearly supports the fact that there was no falling out, just an obvious difference of opinion.

 

We lost the cup final 6-0.

 

Is this the guy who once we went 1-0 down wouldn't change anything and under whom we'd never come back in a game once we'd conceded? They all start to blur in to one after a while.

 

Scenes on here when City beat us 8-0 in a couple of weeks and we line up 4-6-0.

 

Revenge. Gino ****ed him off last time after he kept us up, and now he’s back to have the last laugh and ensure our relegation.

 

Well it used to be the non-LT-hand, now I need a tactical rethink tho. I have a full bladder so I guess I’ll find out soon.

 

Lucky git.

 

Wrong Fred.

 

He did say something in a book that alluded to him not really liking the approach of the board.

 

The key question, really.

When we first hired QSF, there were some warnings from fans of his former clubs about how we could expect the team to line up and how we could expect things to unfold. Some posters on here also unearthed postings describing how his teams played and how his tenure went.

Every single one of those warnings/opinions turned out to be spot on.

People on here made the same predictions when he went to Espanyol and, lo and beyond, things unfolded almost exactly as predicted.

There will be no spot changing for this particular leopard.

 

Not that I'm looking forward to the prospect of us failing - but at least if we remain to be utter droppings defensively under QSF, the penny MIGHT finally drop with Gino that the defenders aren't good enough.

Obviously the other side to that is QSF getting us better defensively and Gino uses that to go another couple of windows without buying quality defenders.

As for the surprise of us reappointing him - I think a lot can be read into the line that the dressing room atmosphere under Gracia was starting to deteriorate (as per Leventhal). If the squad atmosphere was good under QSF, then I'm sure that's worked in his favour.

 

He got 1.30 PPG with Espanyol which is exactly the same as what he got with us. If you count the point we’ve already got that would us to 45. I reckon he’ll keep us up which at this point is all that matters.

 

We'll have to see how this pans out. Reasons for rehiring him, is that he's available, he knows the club, some players know him (which may or may not be a good thing), fans like him so he'll get a good reception which could lift everyone (although that's short lived if we carry on losing), he knows the Premier League so should be able to hit the ground running.

So there's lots of reasons why Watford would go back from him, but I'm surprised he wanted to come back to Watford. Having said that, he knows he'd get a good reception from the fans, it's Premier League football and there are not too many of those jobs open to him. If he wants to progress this career, maybe he'll actually use Watford as a stepping stone to get a better job, and in his case, I wouldn't begrudge him using Watford in this way.

 

QSF: The only way is up.

(Hopefully higher than 18th)

 

2 year contract as per The Times.

 

2 year contract or the next bad run of results, whichever comes first.

 

Pleased for Quique that he got the Hotels.com gig after he left WFC. Can he do both jobs?

 

Heard it's a 2 year deal.

 

Mods, can you change my username to Quique's Beard?

 

See Reids posting of the Athletic article.

 

I’m sure there’s already someone at the club who can make a cup of tea

 

He's currently running Harvester's in the Watford friendly league. I doubt he'd give that up to come back to Watford.

 

At the time, it was thought Gino and Duxbury, thought QSF was enjoying living in London too much. Not focussed on the job, and lost focus. They blamed this for the drop off in form after February. That's why they took on Mazzari rather than opt to activate the second year in the contract. I am not sure they thought he had be. A bad coach, just a lazy one in the final months.

 

Yes but do you expect us to finish higher than 11th and do better than runner-up in the CF? Terrible run vs best ever prem finish and getting to a cup final.

 

I guess he believes that if he impresses enough, he'd be in a chance for the job, or a similar role at another Prem club.

He has the advantage of knowing why the Pozzos got rid of him, which would allow him to take that on board and act upon it.

He has not done great since he left. He is the last person I wanted to see back here, but if he took anything from last time, then he just might do something.

Good luck to him and presumably goodbye Holebas.

Bring on the song...

 

I think you’re looking at it like all the non Watford fans out there, best ever premiership finish and cup final, doesn’t tell the whole story though does it.

The cup final, it was great to get there yes, but we had an easy run until Wolves, that was a great game and a great win but we were very fortunate. They were 2 nil up with 10 minutes to go, Nuno lost the game with his substitutions, up to then they’d murdered us. Then the final, we all know what happened there.... a record equaling defeat, the competition has been going for over 100 years and we equaled the record.

And the 11th place finish, great and until you remember we were in contention for 7th until we hit a bad run of from (which includes the cup final) which has continued into this season. In a world of click bait headlines there is always a different story below the surface isn’t there.

Do I expect QSF to finish better than 11th? Absolutely not, he could conceivably be going into October with 1 point through no fault of his own, I’ll be happy with anything from 17th upwards.

 

How long would it have been before the 'best ever prem finish and getting to a cup final' stopped being a factor as the losses piled up?

 

Lessons could have been learned, but the failings from before probably will resurface again. Players lost their belief in him as they seem to do with all the coaches we employ. A new coach tends to get a good 6 months before players start switching off.

I think Holebas will be gone in January. I heard some unsubstantiated rumours of a falling out with Gracia before the Newcastle match. I doubt it was true as I've seen nothing mentioned since, but if true, then he'll be gone for sure.

Flores didn't play him much, but then he had Ake to call on, who is a far superior player to Holebas.

I remember when Flores first came to Watford the players were in awe of him. Clearly that halo has long gone now, so the air of mystery about his credentials is no longer there.

Luckily we are still very early into the season, and if Flores doesn't work out there is plenty of time to sack and hire another new manager. If we did that, then I'll delete my Twitter account for sure.

Deeney did rate him though, as this is the interview he gave after Flores was sacked. This may be a big consideration in smoothing over the sacking of popular Gracia with Flores.

https://www.skysports.com/football/...ique-sanchez-flores-is-crazy-says-troy-deeney

 

No I'm looking at it as a Watford fan. Facts are facts. Terrible run but highest prem position and a cup final. How much of that bad run was due to the cup run which we were always likely to lose heavily. A 6-0 defeat was more likely than a Watford win. Hughes or Gray score those chances vs WHU 2 games ago and we probably win ? Gino buys a RB or LB or CB who can defend and maybe we concede less. I'm playing devils advocate to an extent but I basically feel we are a bottom 8 team, overachieved for the first 3/4 of last season.

 

Truly cannot stand irrelevant, hypothetical rubbish like this. You could say things like this in EVERY match for EVERY team.

 

Harsh but Holebas needs to be gone one way or another anyway. He’s very very old for a footballer, relying on him in any way shape or form is completely pointless. Whatever issues rehiring QSF may it may not bring Holebas going is far from one that we need worry or care about.