A week in the life of Watford - Jason Burt

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/footbal...es-premier-league-club/?WT.mc_id=tmg_share_tw

This is another very good read. Tells how the club builds up to match day. It really gives a brilliant insight as to what the players have to do during their week.

 

You'll need to copy/paste the article.

 

behind a paywall for us oiks.

This made me laugh though "rare, exclusive access behind-the-scenes at Watford"

Yes, rare and exclusive access. Apart from the times, the FT, the telegraph, talksport, the BBC. In fact, the only **** that isnt granted access is the watford observer!

 

Thanks for posting. That was a good read. Nice to hear about the togetherness and harmony within the squad. Really positive stuff, and credit it Gracia for building it in such a short time.

We’ll lose the next 7 now that we’re getting positive press again.

 

I was going to do that, but got moaned at for doing it last time.

But here it is:-

Telegraph Sport Football
A week in the life of Watford: a unique glimpse behind the scenes of a Premier League club

It might boil down to 90 minutes of playing time, but Watford run a detailed week-long operation.
The Premier League might be the most followed and publicised football league on the planet, but for the most part its clubs prefer to keep their day-to-day business a closely-guarded secret.
But for the past week Telegraph Sport Chief Football Correspondent Jason Burt has been granted rare, exclusive access behind-the-scenes at Watford as they prepared for tomorrow’s game with Newcastle, where he was able to record everything from training sessions to the players’ games of pool, and interview everyone from manager Javi Gracia to the physios who dole out specially-formulated tuna wraps.
This is his diary of a week in the life of a Premier League club.
Tuesday
8.30am
Javi Gracia, Watford’s head coach, is sitting in his office at the club’s training ground in London Colney.
The quietly-spoken, workaholic 48-year-old has already been there for close to two hours. It gives him thinking time and, as he puts it, “I like being here alone,” even if company is never far away for top-flight football managers. An hour previously, he has already had his first meeting of the day with his staff over a coffee; there will be another this afternoon.
Gracia is invariably the first member of staff to arrive and will be the last to leave at around 7pm. He likes it that way. “Every day, every moment,” he says when asked how often he talks to his assistant Zigor Aranalde, a fellow Spaniard - one of many on Watford’s staff.
The players had Monday off but that does not mean things were easier for the coaches. “The technical staff keep working,” Gracia says. “The most important time is the beginning of the week when we prepare the different training sessions, exercises, videos.”
Goalkeeper Ben Foster is in the gym, working alone on a Wattbike - something of an obsession for the 35-year-old, who has already been there for half an hour.
Within the next 15 minutes every first-team player will have had to clock in or face a fine that rises by £100 a minute. The cut-off point is 9am.
“I don’t see when they arrive,” Gracia says. “I am only interested that they arrive on time. Their first contact with me is on the pitch.”
Every player has to punch in his arrival time on an iPad in the dressing room in A-wing, but there are other elements to this daily ritual.
“The player also weighs himself, puts that in and answers ‘well-being’ questions – muscle soreness, how he feels, how he slept. He rates from 1-10. They do it every day,” says Alberto Leon, Watford’s head of injury prevention and rehabilitation.
As he talks Will Hughes and Etienne Capoue play pool in the canteen. The table arrived last year and – along with a table tennis table – has become a social focal point for the players. Capoue is rarely off it. “It’s a big thing,” the French midfielder says. “It’s good for the team-spirit. It’s somewhere where we can meet and not talk about football, maybe get to know each other more in a relaxed way. There’s a good vibe.”
That vibe has been helped by Watford’s results. This is the club’s fourth campaign back in the Premier League, having gained promotion in 2015. Under Gracia they are already more than half-way to reaching their target for this season. No team has ever been relegated with 11 wins and last Saturday’s 3-0 victory over Huddersfield mean Watford have six.
Although survival remains the primary goal under the shrewd stewardship of owner Gino Pozzo – who has his office at the training ground and is a constant presence – chairman and chief executive Scott Duxbury and technical director Filippo Giraldi they want more than that. They want to be the best of the rest outside the ‘big six’, and right now they are seventh, with a trip to winless Newcastle to come on Saturday.
Maintaining that kind of form requires care, not least from Leon and his 14-strong team, for whom the immediate post-match period is one of the most important times of the week.
“We do a ‘quick scan’,” Leon says. “A five-minute physical examination of every player to check for muscle pain and range of motion and we ask them how they feel. ‘I feel good’ or ‘I feel tired’. It helps give us the information.”
Leon and his team also carry out ‘CKs’, specific tests designed to show how many muscle fibres the players have damaged.
In the dressing room the players weigh themselves, as they did before kick-off. The figures are also to help measure hydration with Watford reasoning that daily saliva tests - a protocol employed by some clubs - can be intrusive. “There is an easier test,” Leon says. “Ask them - what colour is your pee?” Every six weeks there are also blood tests and calipers to check on body fat.
Then there is the food. Physiotherapist Alvaro Garcia Romero, who has a masters’ degree in nutrition, explains that a player’s diet is “not only to refuel but to heal them. It’s giving them things related to fish oil and also with avocado. Something like a tuna wrap. We try and make the food sexy.”
No pizza? No carbohydrates? “Years ago they thought the player was like a car that you had to fuel,” Garcia Romero replies. “But, okay, if you don’t have good tyres the car won’t go. They are like Ferraris. You can have fuel but if you have a flat tyre, it’s no good.”
Once a week, though, the players are allowed to eat what they want - a relaxation which makes a difference.
On Sunday all the players were in, again no later than 9am. Those who played at least 45 minutes against Huddersfield underwent a recovery session which includes compulsory yoga and, if needed, time in the cryotherapy chamber where the temperature is -125C. A 140-second session can help repair muscle damage and improve sleep patterns.
Those who did not play took part in an intense ‘game-based’ training session. They worked extremely hard, completing the equivalent amount of endurance work and expending the same amounts of energy as those who played.
There is another reason: it enables Gracia to observe their state-of-mind, to see if anyone is sulking at not playing. “If I see them I know how they are,” he says. “I watch them and I am always thinking of the players who don’t play.”
Not all coaches are like that and Gracia, for whom inclusivity is key, was delighted with the ferocity of Sunday’s session. It was also a day to fill the players with vegetables to help them rehydrate along with bespoke energy drinks and 500ml of water with every meal, every day.
10am
“Rapido!” The booming cry from Juan Solla, Watford’s assistant coach and head of fitness, rings around the training pitch. It does not need any translation.
“Sometimes you have to work hard,” Solla, who has known Gracia for 11 years. “Sometimes you have to give a sweet.”
Today, unfortunately for the squad, is all about hard work. Aranalde has meticulously measured out the spaces for the exercises, marking them with white tape. Training is sharp, competitive. A huge outdoor gym has been laid out to get the players working hard with and without the ball. They have resistance ropes and obstacles.
Three goals are set out in a line plus an unguarded tiny goal. Shots are fired at Foster and the other goalkeepers, Heurelho Gomes and Pontus Dahlberg. “Oh Will,” a grinning Foster shouts after being beaten by one fierce shot by Hughes.
Elsewhere, in a sharp short-sided game, 18-year-old Ben Wilmot catches the eye. After 93 minutes training ends and the ‘GPS’ vests worn by every player and which track distance covered and speed are handed in.
11.45am
In Watford’s gym, Jose Alfonso Morcillo, the head of performance, picks up a wristband and waves it in front of a ‘Smartcoach’ iPad attached to a piece of gym equipment – a Versapulley.
It flashes up the data for Gerard Deulofeu, showing a series of exercises tailored just for him. The equipment can replicate what happens on a football pitch – a player can accelerate, decelerate, test his strength, twist and turn.
“It's different data for different players,” Morcillo says. “We work their weakness points which are found in their daily assessments and also from their normal playing history. We are not comparing one player to another but comparing the same player.”
Before training there is ‘activation’ for 30 minutes with individual exercises to get the players ready, before ‘compensatory work’ for the same amount of time to prevent injury. It all churns out swathes of data.
Troy Deeney, the injured Watford captain, who is close to making his return, strides in and flicks on a boom-box before completing a round of press-ups. A few feet away, Domingos Quina, a prodigiously talented 18-year-old Portuguese midfielder, juggles a large exercise ball. “For the injured player we get at the physios meeting, at 8.15am, what kind of work we have to do,” Morcillo says.
Other players drift towards the canteen. Foster and Adrian Mariappa are playing table tennis. Foster has even brought in his own state-of-the-art graphite bat - these are competitive sportsmen, after all - and unwraps it with a grin. It is close to 3pm before the canteen clears, with Roberto Pereyra and Stefano Okaka the last to leave.
Gracia watches the pool before going to take part in an hour’s Q+A with a selection of young fans. What would you have done if you had not become a football manager he is asked? “Work in tourism,” Gracia says.

 

Wednesday
8.45am
Aranalde is sitting in the coaches’ room, his gaze fixed on a large, high-definition computer screen with a MacBook next to him.
Although Gracia has made a point about watching every minute of Newcastle’s 10 Premier League matches this season in the previous few days, Aranalde is the man responsible for analysing opponents.
Watford use DVMS, the feed of every game from the Premier League, with six different cameras. Aranalde always prefers the tactical camera with its wide angle that covers the whole pitch. He clips and labels 50 attacking and defensive ‘actions’ and even though he works quickly it takes 90 minutes for every game and two hours after that.
Aranalde reduces it to 25 clips to create a show-reel for Gracia and eventually compresses it into a four-minute video to present to the players. “When we watch three games we can work out a pattern of play,” he explains.
Aranalde has already done the work for Newcastle and is onto Watford’s next opponents, Southampton. It never stops.
“The technology helps us a lot,” Aranalde says. “We see the whole picture. It is then a matter of spending the time and the ability of the eye to watch the game. We try to find things and then practice them in training.”
Sitting next to him is goalkeeping coach Inigo Arteaga, who is in charge of Watford’s set-pieces. It is an increasingly vital area.
Backroom staff undertake hours of detailed research on opponents “From the DVMS we download every set-piece for every team from the beginning of the season. I will look at 100 corners and watch them from different camera angles,” Arteaga explains. “We have a base of our own set-pieces but will vary them.” Arteaga also produces a video for Gracia.
Next to them are analyst James Best and scout Isidre Ramon Madir. Madir will go down to the home dressing room at half-time and speak to Gracia for three to four minutes before the head coach talks to the players, showing him on an iPad, what has been picked up.
“It means I can explain in one minute, two or three important things – and show them,” Gracia says.
10am
Kit-man David Walter is loading the five metal skips he will take to Newcastle. He checks, double-checks, packs and unpacks. And then he does it a third time.
Walter will lay the kit out in the away dressing room at St James’ Park the night before the game. “You then have that peace of mind that you have got everything,” he says.
Out on the training pitch, Gracia is shouting. “Touch and move!”
It is a training game; replicating what Newcastle might do, based around shadow play, spotting strengths and weaknesses. The session ends at 11.27am followed by a five-minute stretching routine led by Solla. “I have to control the ‘load’ and design the week for the coaches. We try to organise all the drills in the direction of the things we are going to find in the match,” he says.
12:45pm
Pozzo is at the serving hatch, waiting for his lunch. It is extremely unusual to have an owner as hands-on and involved as the 52-year-old Italian who bought Watford for £500,000 in 2012, cleared the £10million debt and – along with Duxbury – masterminded gaining promotion and transforming the club.
The investment on and off the pitch – in the squad, the stadium, the infra-structure and staff – is significant. The ‘Watford way’ is now established, a method based on an impressive scouting network developed from the family’s ownership of Udinese in Italy.
Javi Gracia is poised to sign a new contract to extend his Watford stay.
There is an obsession to improve and while there was initial scepticism to their approach – in particular the high turnover of managers, which has seen nine employed in six years – that perception has changed. Gracia is set to break that trend by signing a new, extended contract, but Watford’s system is stress-tested.
The club also have the fifth-lowest wage bill in the Premier League, with many members of the squad – particularly the foreign ones – knowing that the club can be a showcase for their talents. Even so, as Everton found in the summer when parting with £50million for Richarlison, Watford will only sell on their terms.
Pozzo is talking to Capoue. There is olive oil on every table, another staple. The players mingle; they do not group along nationality lines, even though 14 countries are represented in the first-team squad. The Italian defender Adam Masina fills a cardboard box and the players are encouraged to take food home for dinner.
“They are young, some of them live alone and it’s not always easy to cook for yourself so we say ‘okay, we have amazing food so take it with you’,” Garcia Romero says. “It helps because, for example, it’s not always easy to find the best fish. So we say ‘take this’.”
Duxbury explains how important it is that everyone mixes together and why all the departments have mingled into one. “I have a clear vision of how I want to run this football club, both on and off the pitch,” he says. “When you have a clear vision, you create a harmonious environment where everybody is working for the same goal in a unified and enjoyable work place.”
Watford work hard on team spirit and even shelved plans to rebuild the main building at the training ground, just off the M25 at London Colney, because they like the homely, quaint feel of the way it is. Like other clubs there is a liaison team to answer the every need of the players and their families – although a line was drawn when one player called at 5am asking for a taxi to be booked for him.
Thursday
10am
The players gather in the media suite. Earlier there was a ruckus. Cooked breakfast has to be ordered by 9.10am and several players came in at 9.11am claiming – rightly – that the canteen clock was fast. This drew protests from their team-mates, with Garcia Romero called to act as a light-hearted mediator.
Deeney loves football quizzes and is pondering over a question – ‘name the eight* English players who have played in Serie A this millennium?’ – before he also heads to the meeting. Although injured, the striker will attend, as do all the first-team squad, fit or not. Gracia outlines his plan to face Newcastle, showing his first video and a PowerPoint presentation of the week. The meeting is short but detailed.
“We played against Wolves [a recent 2-0 away win] and the way they defend we had to do something orientated towards that during the training sessions,” Gracia explains. “We then showed them a short video of around two minutes and said ‘we are going to do this’.” There is a similar approach to Newcastle.
Twenty minutes later, in the driving rain, the players are on the training pitch. Aranalde is handing out the bibs – red and yellow – before starting a two-touch, one-touch possession game, involving the goalkeepers.
But now, with a match only 48 hours away, it is time to ‘taper’ training. Less hard work; more tactics, even though the slickness of the wet pitch ups the ante and makes challenges even keener than usual.
The session lasts precisely an hour. Some stay out to practice finishing; others free-kicks. Laughter fills the air while a group of young Watford fans – it is half-term – mingle with the players in the canteen after they return from another yoga session. “Everything is done with a purpose. It’s part of the job and you see the benefit,” Capoue says. “The club is pushing us to be more competitive, to get that edge. They are not waiting.”
Friday
4.30am
It is still pitch dark when Watford’s team bus departs for Newcastle, having been loaded with kit the night before. Later in the day the team will fly up from Luton Airport after a training session in which Gracia will work hard on team-shape, pattern of play and set-pieces. It becomes more honed; ever more focussed.
“Friday is the day to activate the players for the match-day,” Leon explains. “We select from the squad 10 players who are more at risk of injury and we check them and ‘quick scan’ them and create a plan to treat them on Friday afternoon and do the ‘activation’ before the match.
“A player who has 1,000 hours of training, in general, they are more likely to get injured. Football creates an imbalance and the things we lose on the pitch we try and get back from outside.”
On Saturday morning Gracia will be up, once more, at 7am, before breakfasting with his staff. The next two hours will involve fine-tuning the plans to face Newcastle ahead of one final team meeting in late morning – with set-pieces, again, hammered home.
“The importance of the set-play is massive,” Aranalde says. “More and more it’s difficult to play because teams are more organised, the players are fitter. It is more difficult to break them down.” ​

 

Don't forget NBC who did a documentary about what goes on behind closed door from the training ground to the match day build up

 

Good to see PR team at the club pumping out the feel good stories while things are going well, something the club have invested in since the Mazzarri sacking by the sounds of it!

 

Interesting that it's the goalkeeping coach who runs the set-piece drills. Makes sense

 

Thanks for posting @hornetboy1 - much appreciated.

 

Good article and full of snippets you don't usually hear about.

Great vibes coming from the club at the minute.

 

*fixed*

 

It’s not as good as the article I posted.

 

Excellent read - we sound so meticulous

 

Thanks HB1.

 

Excellent read. Thanks for alerting us to it.

I’m really enjoying this season. Really hope this year we give the FA Cup a really good go too, because with the right draw we could go a long way.

 

Only if we don't get a Jon Moss or Lee Mason type referee officiating. We're always at the mercy of an official, so unless we get a fair deal, we've got little chance of a cup run. Look at how the Carabao Cup was sabotaged.

 

I stopped reading at L*t*n Airport.

 

So Alberto Leon is our latter day Sweeney Todd.

Odd no mention of corpses on trolleys in corridors.

It's how I imagine it.

 

Why ? Is it banned there ?

 

Interesting the club gave this story to the Telegraph, who really lead the way on publicising the HBSC letter thing.

 

One thing that you can be sure of. Gino never holds a grudge when it comes to business.

Would never have done a deal for Richarlison with Everton if that was the case.

GT was brilliant at that also. Remember when he sent himself up and worked for The Sun, after their vile campaign against him.

It's a sign of a really strong character who can do that. Never letting emotion get in the way of sound business.

 

My hunch is that they gave it to Jason Burt, more specifically, as IIRC he has definitely been a favourable voice for us in recent times, and been responsible for some of the other decent stuff that's come out regarding us. I also met and sat next to him for a while, once, and he seemed like a nice guy...

 

And to think I got told off all summer for being the pessimistic one!

 

Good to see muscle imbalance making an appearance

 

Isaac called it to get his 'friends' home safe from his hotel room.

 

Perhaps it was to pick a player and two 'ladies' up from Sopwell House after a few glasses of Baileys and they could no longer drive or do other things...

 

I knew this article would jinx us!

 

Did it give the answers to the 8 English players to have played in Serie A this millennium? I'm struggling to name one!

 

Ronaldo Viera is a made-up name, surely?

 

He played alongside Diego Eusebio.