Adlene Guedioura

Needs to be arrivederci ...

 

Or ... au revoir ..

I hope he is at the Vic on 2nd May - he certainly deserves to be part of the celebrations

 

Of all those that you mentioned, the Brentford game was perhaps the only one that we were required to have some balls. Our talent and ability to overwhelm inferior opposition has never been in doubt.

But i'd say we are exponentially a better team with Guedioura in midfield. Endless running, fighting, positional awareness, defensive cover - he has lead the charge, and his presence has been infectious. i'm almost certain the rest of the squad were galvanized by his effort at Derby.

We certainly can win without him, but we've just looked far less prone to inexplicable meltdowns since he's been bossing it in midfield - which is kind of important in huge pressure-filled games. I love our squad, but even in their brilliance they can be a right shambles at times. Adlene has shown them the way of the fairly comfortable 1-0/2-0 victory. Because all they knew before that 8 goals games that resembled ping pong more than football. And gave us all heart attacks.

 

I thought

Watford 1-0 Blackburn
Bolton 3-4 Watford
Leeds 2-3 Watford

were pretty ballsy performances.

I agree we're a more complete team with Gueds in it and he's one of the first names on my team sheet. However, we've played games without him against sides of Sheffield Wednesday's quality and higher, and won. I don't think it'll affect us too much.

 

See you later, goal creator

 

So was the 4-2 v Huddersfield.

 

Wages!

(Not really but as someone else has done the Hogg/Villa gag this was all that was left!)

 

Not to forget the 2-1 against Wigan when he only played for the last 5 minutes after the game was already won, and 3-0 against Rotherham. But I guess Douglas Rinaldi will gleefully point to those as examples of us being "a right shambles" and winning through "chaos", while conveniently forgetting that Guedioura played the full 90 against Ipswich (one of our poorer performances in the second half of the season) and at Forest (during which the "inexplicable meltdown" occurred in between their sending off and our third goal). Seriously, since when did any table-topping Championship side put in a consistent 90 minute performance in every game they won, never mind drew or lost?

Don't get me wrong, I love the player as much as the next guy, but our still fine form without him proves that he's not the be-all-and-end-all. Now imagine a similar portion of the 2005/06 season without Ashley Young, and the difference in squad depth between that season and now becomes pretty clear.

 

What am I going to do with my replica Guedioura elastoplast hat once he's gone?

 

Guediora vs. Derby is probably the best performance I've ever seen from a Watford player.

 

I'm one of the guy's biggest fans, don't get me wrong, but what? Without that one point, we'd be second. Unless you're calling it a springboard to the four subsequent victories after that game, in which case I'd tell you that we'd have won them anyway.

A palace fan said to me that he thought they sell him to us next season. He was drunk, though. I'm placing faith in his words.

 

The bloke has unreal stamina and ran that game incredibly, think we would have been carved open more and possibly lost 3-1 or so if it wasn't for him, would also have required the players to try and put even more energy which they already did in against Derby, meaning very little recovery time again for Boro.

I do think it was a significant moment in the season if I'm honest.


Edit: I should say however, not a chance we'd be sitting around fighting for a play off place. Just the performance and result were key for that weekend which in turn got us where we are now.

 

I wouldn't worry about it. Douglas Rinaldi has been predicting our downfall for months I believe. According to him we've been hanging on to our play-off place by the skin of our teeth since Christmas...despite never being outside the top 6. Some people are just born pessimistic.

 

I am indeed calling it a springboard. A large springboard.

Despite our poor record against our fellow promotion chasers, it'd be fair to say we went into the Derby game feeling confident of a result. And then we get someone sent off, and its basically groundhog day for most of the players. Another meltdown and done over again by a top 6 team. Not only did Guedioura make the equaliser out of nothing, but he kept us afloat by just working like a nutcase.

The Derby result give us huge momentum for the Boro game (in which Guedioura happened to again be our best player), and his presence has given us a semblance of balance and midfield authority that we otherwise haven't had.

Without him we've been a completely different team. Saying that "we'd have won them anyway" is quite a depreciation of his influence and contribution. So who would we have played instead? Layun/Toszer/Munari? None of those bring the same impact that Guedioura has. I have no doubt that we'd have dropped points without him.

 

Well now that's a very black and white assessment of my thoughts. Are you a tabloid journalist?

 

...I never said we'd have won the games without Guedioura. I said that, had we lost against Derby, we still would have won against Middlesbrough and the three games since then. Slav's side aren't so mentally fragile to allow a loss to dictate the next game.

Guedioura has indeed won us a lot of points; he's been one of the standout performers of the whole season, for me.

But had we lost against Derby, we would not be "fighting for a playoff place".

 

Not quite. Just for reason you stick out as someone who has been consistently pessimistic about our chances. As I say even to the extent of doubting a play-off place which realistically hasn't been in doubt since February.

 

"Pessimistic" carries a lot of harmful connotations around here that I don't have. For my 20 years supporting the club, I've always celebrated our successes, and I'll always hold my hands up when i'm wrong.

Perhaps I should have said "out of the automatic places", which would have meant playing for the playoffs. Bar relegation, I can't agree that anything has been certain since February. Things are unpredictable and change quickly in this league, we've seen that too many times down the years. I don't that's a wildly negative viewpoint to have.

And all I've really done here is stated how I think we've improved with the addition of Guedioura. I'd probably say the same about Ben Watson as well. Two very shrewd signings because before that, I felt we were very unbalanced and bipolar.

No matter if we're first, last, winning or losing, i'll unashamedly give my opinion, whether it agrees with the consensus or not.

 

And sometimes that opinion can be overly negative, no?

 

What do you mean by "overly negative"? If I disagree with something, or want to give an opinion that isn't 100% positive, I'll always explain myself. I never go off on irrational expletive driven rants. I don't boo players or management. Or even officials for that matter.

If you choose to perceive my opinions as excessive in any direction, then that's your choice. But just because something doesn't meet your idea of positive, doesn't mean that it is somehow a problem.

 

I couldn't really give a **** tbh. Just echoing the thoughts of some of the others on here. You're free to post whatever you like, there just seems to be pessimistic undertones to most of them.

 

I'm sure they'll get in contact themselves when I start properly ruining their buzz.

 

Here, meaning this thread btw

 

Give Doug a break. I can sympathise with his plot of underexpectation. It's ingrained into the DNA of many long term fans.

Expecting success does not come naturally to Watford fans.

We all support the club in our own ways and that doesn't have to always be Tony Robbins type high five, belief will self perpetuate type of thing.

 

As a short term loan, Guedioura and AJ have been the best by miles. Cleverley was (eventually) season long.

Is still love TC

 

I hope we sign Guedioura permanently as much as anyone, but without meaning to contradict myself it's fair to say that the jury is still out over whether he's truly Premier League quality. Great going forward and defensively, his only real weaknesses are his lack of goals and the fact he can struggle a bit to impose himself against a packed midfield.

On the plus side he does have quite a bit of top flight experience, but much of that was with a very poor Wolves side who got relegated by some distance, and there's likely a valid reason why he isn't getting into the Palace team on a regular basis. But being an international with 32 caps and tournament experience, even if the Algerian national team aren't very good, means that he's well equipped to handle high pressure games in front of big crowds, which will be an important asset if we go up and sign him.

He's been class for us anyway, and although the PL is still quite a big step up, with the team spirit we have in abundance and his obvious love of the club (both of which can go a long way for a promoted team, where lack of egos is paramount) I'm confident he can remain a great player with us at the top level.

 

Not sure about Adlene's 'lack of goals'. He's got three which I wouldn't have thought was a bad goals:minutes on pitch ratio.

 

I'd say he is PL quality and if not then we would/ will have problems next year, as he's our best midfield player, with the exception of a fully fit Abdi, which sadly is an oxymoron

 

You would not go down the Grapevine or **** Whittington and say that:]]

 

At least if we want to sign him, money shouldn't be a problem

 

Well if he is available come the end of the season then I wouldn't say no. He has been fantastic for us since he joined on loan. However, I don't know what Slav has up his sleeve for the summer!

 

On the flip side I suspect Palace's asking price magically jumped some time around yesterday tea time.

 

Doah! Bloody promotion.