Biggest Mistake Of The Pozzo Era

Discussion in 'The Hornets' Nest - Watford Chat' started by pleaseenterthenamebywh, Jan 15, 2021.

  1. leighton buzzard horn

    leighton buzzard horn Squad Player

    Recruitment. Incoming signings have largely regressed the squad, and the required outgoings that have been blindingly obvious are only just beginning to happen. We kept hold of Doucoure for a season too long, Capoue should have been moved on after a season or two as well. We were carrying too many players who just didn’t want to be here such as those two mentioned and also Deulofeu and Pereyra. We have also kept too many players who did want to be here but we should have moved on from - Deeney, Gomes, Cathcart, Cleverley, Chalobah.

    Gray and Sarr have been an astonishing way to spend the thick end of £60m.

    The recruitment has been poor and we have an imbalanced squad with too many going through the motions. I’ll always have more respect for limited players giving their all such as Cathcart and Cleverley as opposed to big name players who aren’t really fussed such as Sarr, Chalobah.

    We’ve not only lost a bit of identity but also work ethic. The PL doesn’t bring good fortune to clubs like ours.
     
    wfcmoog likes this.
  2. Jumbolina

    Jumbolina First Team

    Well yes I agree with that. The premise was if you were a new owner are we better to take on then or now. If I were a betting man I’d say we are better now but I wouldn’t be hugely surprised if we are in a big hole. We don’t know yet. Hope I’m wrong.
     
    WatfordTalk likes this.
  3. leighton buzzard horn

    leighton buzzard horn Squad Player

    Also, not a mistake as such but more a circumstance of us moving up in the football world, I do miss seeing players coming through the ranks.
     
  4. folkestone orn

    folkestone orn Squad Player

    Sometimes the obvious answer is the correct one. If Gino had hired Pearson instead of QSF we would have stayed up.
     
    leighton buzzard horn likes this.
  5. 3000

    3000 Reservist

    QSF’s second spell will always be their worst mistake in football. What an earth were they thinking hiring a manager they previously sacked. Did they honestly think he was ever going to grind our way to safety with a series of 0-0s?

    Also the scattergun approach to recruitment has been baffling at times. When we got promoted and immediately sacked off the likes of Angella, Vydra, Pudil etc. Now you can argue that they may not have been Premier League class but look who they replaced them eith that season. Oloure, Ibarbo, Diamante, Berghaus - some of the most ineffective players I have seen play for us. If you want squad players keep the ones you have and filter them out when appropriate offers come in, don’t sign squad players from other teams.
     
  6. Crezzy95

    Crezzy95 First Year Pro

    I'm still not convinced we'll ever fully recover from last season's relegation. Plenty of mistakes were made which led to us going down, however I think re hiring QSF has to be the most fatal one. Sarr has quality & proved it in many games last season. I don't think it was a bad signing. What was criminal was that he hardly played till Pearson came in, we instantly looked like a different animal. Okay we tailed off towards the end, but just one win during QSF second spell would've seen us safe.

    Other notable mistakes;

    Not selling Gray after the cup final season. Teams were interested.
    Not signing any decent centre backs during our 5 years in the Prem.
    Letting Britos/Prodl go without replacement.
    Signing Penaranda/Oulare/Success/Ndong (I could go on)
    No January signings last season apart from Pussetto on loan
    Sacking Pearson before the end of the season
    Still holding onto Deeney
    The new badge fiasco
    Appointing Sannino & McKinlay
     
  7. Chumlax

    Chumlax Squad Player

    It was certainly an almost uniquely dreadful time to be relegated, and so avoidable at the same time.
     
    iamofwfc and Crezzy95 like this.
  8. BigRossLittleRoss

    BigRossLittleRoss First Team

    Letting Fabrinni go.
     
  9. AndrewH63

    AndrewH63 Reservist

    On off the field matters I still have not forgiven them for the removal of Mars Duo and full fat Coca Cola

    In terms of the on pitch, i think being so stubborn over Silva was ultimately very destructive. They should have let him go immediately for a big fee, (after all they keep saying its the structure not the individual head coach that is the strength). They would have still had to have negotiated the January transfer window. But again they would have got massive fees for Richarlison and Doucoure from Everton. They would have found decent replacements for all three. Instead we (ultimately) cut our nose off to spite our face.
     
  10. nascot

    nascot First Team

    Maybe that's how it looks now but I'm still on their side when it comes to Silva. He was screwing us over and I think they were right to dig their heels in and make it hard for him and Everton. I liked the way for once we weren't being walked all over by a bigger club. The first few games of that season made me feel like we really were going to be a proper top 10 side but the snake **** ruined everything. Turns out he's actually a bit shyte at being a manager.
     
    iamofwfc likes this.
  11. RS2

    RS2 Squad Player

    Signing Andre Gray.

    Adding a second overpaid below par striker to the squad is something that we are still literally paying for to this day. It's going to stop us strengthening the squad this window and quite possibly in the summer as well. A catastrophic signing by the club. 70k a week should have got us a striker to score the goals that kept us in the Premier League, but instead we got a League Two standard chancer who is now coasting on massive wages.
     
    iamofwfc likes this.
  12. Steve Leo Beleck

    Steve Leo Beleck Squad Player

    Still only 30, time to rectify it and bring him home. He's had 13 clubs and scored 22 league goals in his whole career, which is impressively **** for a forward.
     
  13. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    But more importantly, how many flip flaps?
     
  14. Jumbolina

    Jumbolina First Team

    I used to always be optimistic when Fabbrini came on as a sub that today was the day it all came together. There was an 8 game spell when he was on loan at Boro when they thought he was Maradona!
     
    WatfordTalk likes this.
  15. Knight GT

    Knight GT Predictor extraordinaire 2013/14

    He didn't sell him
     
    Jumbolina likes this.
  16. Knight GT

    Knight GT Predictor extraordinaire 2013/14

    Who was interested in Gray?
    Britos wanted to go and both he and Prodl barely played in the last year they were here
    Signing Peneranda and Success seemed correct at the time as both had shown a lot of talent, it just hasn't worked
    I don't think anybody wants Deeney
    Who cares about the badge?
    Sannino did a job and Mckinlay they admitted was a mistake which they rectified immediately
     
  17. pleaseenterthenamebywh

    pleaseenterthenamebywh Academy Graduate

    Leeds and West Brom wanted Gray last season I remember, but for some absurd reason the club wouldn't let him go.
     
  18. Crezzy95

    Crezzy95 First Year Pro

    I could be wrong but I swear Rangers & Leeds were interested that summer?
     
  19. Arakel

    Arakel First Team

    He farmed him out on a season long loan with an option to buy right after we signed him.

    That was the end right there, even if the actual paperwork was signed a year later.
     
  20. wfc4ever

    wfc4ever Administrator Staff Member

    Allegedly- probably only paper talk ?
     
  21. Knight GT

    Knight GT Predictor extraordinaire 2013/14

    If that's true and there was genuine interest which we have turned down then I'm joining the anti Gino brigade
     
  22. Chumlax

    Chumlax Squad Player

    upload_2021-1-18_16-20-29.png

    From Phil Hay's Leeds transfer Q&A blog last January.
     
  23. pleaseenterthenamebywh

    pleaseenterthenamebywh Academy Graduate

  24. Knight GT

    Knight GT Predictor extraordinaire 2013/14

    FFS
     
    Chumlax likes this.
  25. Knight GT

    Knight GT Predictor extraordinaire 2013/14

  26. Arakel

    Arakel First Team

  27. folkestone orn

    folkestone orn Squad Player

    Not buying Charlton?
     
    wfcmoog likes this.
  28. davisp2

    davisp2 Reservist

    Allowing bedwetters to support the club
     
  29. The Voice of Reason

    The Voice of Reason First Team Captain

    Signing Gray without a doubt :mad:
     
  30. leighton buzzard horn

    leighton buzzard horn Squad Player

    Were it not for a stroke of luck the Pozzos would own Charlton and the Venkys would own Watford.
     
    wfc4ever likes this.
  31. Shakespearo

    Shakespearo Reservist

    Tru dat about Silva. Another club wants your manager and will pay a fee, and he wants to go - you HAVE to come to an arrangement. Yeah, it sucks that another club can destabilise you by turning your manager's head but that's professional football I'm afraid. Holding onto Silva for those few months did no-one any good, least of all Watford.
     
  32. a19tgg

    a19tgg First Team

    Not to mentioned we’ve made a rod for our own back and can more or less only ever appoint out of work managers. It’s not to say we wouldn’t anyway, but if we ever attempted to approach an in work manager, any club with a modicum of intelligence would leverage our stance against Everton against us.

    It also annoyed Garth Crookes at the time who wanted us to replace him with Alan Pardew!
     
  33. Arakel

    Arakel First Team

    Not at all. The club's stance was never that Everton shouldn't have made an approach. The stance was that Everton made an approach, Watford told them to bugger off, and Everton continued to push and push and push the matter, refusing to leave it alone and unsettling the (then) head coach (including tapping him up) shortly after he was just signed.
     
  34. luke_golden

    luke_golden Space Cadet

    Yep. I know that as a general rule, Watford fans have little time for maverick performers like Fabbrini, preferring instead those who run a lot, but for me, football is all about the never-ending hope that one day, Fabbrini, or Wooter, or Forestieri will pull it all together, go on a run of form that catapults them to greatness, and we’ll have been there to see it.
     
    wfcmoog and CarlosKickaballs like this.
  35. EnjoytheGame

    EnjoytheGame Reservist

    Fabbrini was like a dressage pony, trotting round in little circles on the tips of his toes, spooked whenever the ball came near him.
     
    Shakespearo likes this.

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