Watford Fc 2-0 Huddersfield Town - 16/01/2021

Ain't seen nothin' yet.

 

True Cleverley has scored more from open play than Perica, Gray and Deeney have combined.

 

In all fairness to Pedro, he is holding the ball up quite well at the moment. My original thoughts where the same as yours but with in game interchanging between the 4 front players, some pressure would be taken off his shoulders. That formation might also enable Zinckernagel a bit more freedom to be wide and central. Final thought, I would prefer a lightweight Pedro to an overweight Deeney any day.

 

I don't get all this anti-Gray sentiment. As soon as his confidence returns he'll tear up this league.

 

He runs the club in an on the pitch, footballing sense and very likely has something in his contract that dictates him playing, regardless of form or even fitness. I've literally been saying it for years and was, of course told not to be ridiculous repeatedly, but there is truly no other explanation at this point.

A consistently woeful, ineffective footballer with a woeful attitude, but it doesn't matter because he's effectively in charge. It doesn't matter how bad he is or how old he gets, as long as he wants to be the "main man", he will be. It's absolute insanity.

 

People often assume that the only way for a forward to hold the ball up is to be big and strong but in reality, you can be just as effective with quick feet and skill. It is not like the others can hold it up anyway Troy is too slow and Gray cant control the ball.

 

It's really annoying me to point this out because he should be our USP and, as has been said, ****ing all over defenders down here, but instead his level of commitment is displayed by his continual default decision to throw himself to the floor and scream to earn a free kick around the box, even when he's utterly beaten his man, and the 'foul' wouldn't legitimately have checked his momentum at all. He did it at least twice in the second half this afternoon: once breaking in to the box from the right wing after he'd absolutely left their left back for dead, and again with that one late on in front of goal that caused Mooney to lament him being just like a young Grealish at Villa on the commentary.

You may say that he's 'won' or 'earned' a free kick, but realistically it's an incredibly lazy and cowardly choice - he, we, and everyone else know how ***** we are from dead balls, and all he would have to do is keep going and he would have a genuine opportunities - it's like he's afraid to try and be tested, and as a result is completely abdicating his responsibility.

Extremely disappointing to see, and it should be being coached out of him, but I doubt our former 'title-winning winger' can even express the concept to him clearly let alone do anything about it.

 

I can understand people thinking such a thing would be ridiculous, because it would be completely illogical to set up a players contract like that.

But what we’ve witnessed over the past couple of years leading up to where we are now also flys in the face of all logic. At this stage picking Deeney is effectively sabotage and defies all logic. The only logical conclusion now is that you have to be right.

 

It's absolutely true that it is getting nigh on impossible to explain his continued, continued presence, even when clearly not fit or free from injury, in the starting line up, and no matter how poor his last or recent performance/s. It is genuinely baffling and extraordinary. It is hard to see anything other than an similarly extraordinary explanation, at this point. But if that were indeed the case, it hardly bears thinking about for what it says about the hierarchy, even knowing what we do actually know of them.

 

this says it all

 

A lot of us said about 2 years ago that Deeney has earned his status as a legend, that that he was in danger of spoiling that.


I think, 2 years later, with his performances, with his terrible conditioning, with his big mouth, with his digging out of younger team mates on the pitch and sniping at striking rivals off, with his come and get me interviews after relegation, with his media career seeming to be a higher priority than winning for us, with his complete deluded self worth, based on zero facts, I think he's burned through an absolute Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk combined wealth of good will to the point where I absolutely loath him now.

It's taken some absolutely despicable behaviour and performances to get here, but he's done it.

 

We saw in his purple patch last season just what Sarr can do. It’s frustrating he’s not yet found a level of consistency, but I suppose trying to see it from a human point of view too he’s still relatively young, he moved to a new country and has so far had no fewer than five managers plus the biggest health pandemic in a century. He’s probably had his head turned too.

For his first full season here, and again considering all the Head Coach changes plus the pandemic, I feel Pedro is progressing nicely. It’s funny but at the start of the season most of us, me too, were saying ‘he’s not an out and out forward, we need a traditional Number 9 up there with him’ but so poor have Deeney, Murray and Gray been (and Perica unable to string a run of games together) that now is not be averse to JP leading the line as he did back in September. I’d be disappointed if he didn’t finish as our top scorer now.

Cleverley has his critics but he’s now scored four goals this season, in a team that’s generally underwhelmed in front of goal. He comes across as a good pro too, and I don’t feel his contribution to the season so far should be ignored.

I was annoyed when Ngakia got dropped for Femenia but I hold my hands up that the latter has performed well, and today he was once again very decent.

With every home match we win, the gap grows between our points at home and our awful tally on the road. It’s so perplexing. I appreciate Huddersfield had to make several changes today, but they remain the only side to have beaten us by more than one goal this season. Four week ago we were shocking at their place and it cost Ivic dearly. Today, on our turf, a routine against the same opponents. As we still have to travel to Norwich, Bournemouth, Brentford and several of the play-off chasing transit goes without saying improving our away form is probably Xisco’s most pressing challenge.

 

Oh absolutely, I agree/don't doubt that he has tarnished his 'legend' status over the past two seasons - whether that's purely from his efforts on the pitch, or it's his mouthing off counter-productively at opponents; his taking a column at the Sun; his becoming a morning shock jock whilst still the captain and (unfortunately guaranteed) playing member of the squad; his constant desperate flirtation with other clubs and inaccurate insistence that he deserves to still be playing in the Premier League.

At best, the latter period of his time here will always be a very large asterisk, and in terms of how fans feel about him on a personal level, I think a great many, like you, will have had that severely affected.

 

I think it's down to rotation. We've got three games in six days amd Xisco is looking to maximise use of the squad.

 

He has been incredibly professional from the first minute of the season and become one of our most important players - my opinion of him as a character has gone through the roof, especially when you compare it to the depression engendered by the conduct a mercenario piss-taker like Capoue exhibited this season (regardless of the fact that on talent alone he deserved to play at a higher level).

 

Yup. Don’t disagree.

I was just annoyed Ngakia started the season well and then got dropped, but I can’t disagree that Femenia has performed very well, at both right and left-back.

I agree about your Deeney comments too. It’s so sad. He could have left as a club legend but instead looks likely to go on tarnishing his good reputation. It’s as if there’s some scientific formula that says the worse he gets as a player, the greater the noise he makes off the pitch.

 

that is one hell of a graph , if reading it correctly backs up the increasingly popular view that Kiko is one of our best players

 

This is what makes it so frustrating. It's so obvious where our problems lie. We have a really decent team, but without any end product. For the want of a striker, even of modest goal scoring ability, we'd be cemented in 2nd place, probably challenging Norwich for top spot.

Our defensive record is impressive, conceding only 17 goals from 23 games. Only Swansea can boast a better record. We actually have the best home record in the Championship. It's just this pitiful away record that is pulling us down like a swimmer with ankle weights.

Pedro is our top scorer on 6 goals, which is a good return from him individually, but puts to shame the other forward players. In total we're 13th in the table for goal scoring, and 24th....yes 24th on goals scored on the road. Ironically, we're first in goals scored at home!!.

We've not got a single player in the top half of the BBC page for assists, and only Pedro appears in goals scored.

I think we've talked about Deeney and Gray to death. Whereas Deeney does have something to offer still, Gray does not. If we fail to gain promotion, it will be down to the fact Gray is hoovering up money that could have been spent on a player deserving of such salary. If Gray was really a £70k per week striker, we'd be well on our way to promotion. It's his position in the squad with all the expenditure that goes with it that is blocking Watford from getting in a striker to trouble the BBC goal scoring charts.

 

I hear a lot of nonsense about "service" from our wide players.
It makes me wonder if these people watch football on the TV.
Do they think Salah or Mane at Liverpool spend their time dribbling
past full backs and crossing the ball the for Ferminio to head one in ?
Ditto Man U front 3 .
Has anyone ever seen Kane or Son run down the wing and cross it in
for the other to score ?.
We are shyte up top because we have no central focal point.
I.E. our centre forwards are past it \ not good enough\ too fat\cant score

 

To find our strikers you will need to scroll down , keep scrolling , a bit more,
keep scrolling , then when you come across low scoring full backs and defensive
mids ,but admittedly above most goal keepers ,you will find our no.9 and no.18

 

I know you’ve always been a Deeney backer but its unfair to single out just Gray and not Deeney. They’re both useless and both on huge salaries.

 

Is that our old Craig Forsyth with the 2nd best passing stats?

 

This is a good point .
I have always said that TD offers more than just goals whereas if AG does not score what does he contribute?. (Running the channel does not count BTW).
However after his attempt to get sent off today it is time to say , thanks for everything but WBA need you

 

Amazingly seems like it must be, although he is probably helped by just sneaking in over the 600-minute threshold with 730 minutes played for the season so far. Still only 31; crazy.

 

Even our players were better before Pozzo

 

I reckon, if needed Kiko and Ngakia could both play together on the right.

 

Where the hell is Perica? He’s in then he’s out it’s like the Hokey Cokey ffs. Typical Pozzo signing and a seemingly waste of a squad space

 

As I said above, he's injured and not even back running/training yet.

 

Can't see either not being an improvement on Sarr.

 

That's a bit harsh , IMO.

 

I disagree. Deeney is at least useful in build up play, however, I do think if we go up then this will be Deeney's last season for us. Gray just offers nothing. He is just hopeless in front of goal and also in the build up play.

 

Again, Deeney does absolutely nothing that shouldn't be expected of any semi-competent, professional footballer.

He's mostly capable of bringing the ball down and playing a short pass. Fantastic, pat on the back for him. It doesn't matter if he does absolutely nothing else to effect the game whatsoever (unless we get a penalty of course, then he can smash that in and continue his cringeworthy "I'm the man" crap).

 

But Deeney is a striker who can’t score. Any of our players can be useful in build up play if that’s what they’re asked to do. Deeney is paid £70k per week to score goals and he doesn’t score goals. We don’t need to pay someone £70k to be good at ‘build up play’ I’m sure Sierra Alta would be good at ‘build up play’ if we asked him to do it but he’d cost a fraction of the amount.

They’re both as much of a blight on the club as each other.

 

Listening to the hive live commentary, even Mooney seemed pissed of with Deeney so it’s not just us