Sarr - the Senegalese Gareth Bale, prob **** at golf though. Couldn't give a flying **** about WFC. Cash in. Dennis - always been selfish and in it for himself. was good when it came off, looks disinterested since AFCON and whatever happened there. Cash in. Pedro - don't let us waste his talent in the championship again, although he's never scored enough goals. Cleverley, Kucka, Cathcart, Kalu, Nkoulou, Elliott Gosling, Foster - too old, certainly for more than bit parts. Rose - what a fat C**T. Sierralta - dont know why its not worked for him, I wonder if he's the Chilean Gareth Bale? Roy - jurassic park is missing a dinosaur. Duxbury et al running the club - piss off. Kabasele, Kiko, Masina, Sema, Kayembe - wouldnt really be missed would they? Kamara and Louza - suprised if they wanted to stay. Bachman - should be playing national league. What a pile of p*ss our squad is, add to that the mercenary nature of our recruiting, the haphazard nature of our coaching selection and its a wonder we ever got 20 points.
Feel like this post may be influenced by alcohol and a tad dramatic but you’re not far off. Sarr & Dennis should go and should go for money, whether that’s reinvested or wipes off some debt who knows. Clevs, Cathcart, Foster, Femenia, Kucka, Gosling, Masina, Sema, Bachman, WTE. Rose and possibly Kabasele are all a mix of old, scarred, just gone stale here or not good enough. Release / sell for whatever. Nobody knows if Kalu is good enough for The Championship, him and N’Koulou will be small footnotes in the history of Watford FC. Pedro, Kamara, Louza, Cucho, Kayembe, Sierrelta are worth building around IMO but it means A LOT of recruiting which I fail to see us doing in one window competently. I’d keep Sissoko too. Okoye and Asprilla to come in, Fletcher, Ngakia, TDB, Pollock and Zinc will probably be okay as squad options in the div below and then hopefully couple academy players like Hungbo & Baah can show the level required to get minutes off the bench. Given all that we probably need at least 10 through the door to have any promotion aspirations which to me feels unrealistic which is why I see some of the maybes like Kabasele and Masina staying.
What we'll really need is a goalscoring bloody striker. We're still as allergic to that as we are a centre back who can actually defend, and we can't keep getting away with it. I highly, highly doubt we will get away with having one player in the entire squad who breaks into double figures across a season again next year and see it end in promotion.
Positives: Sarr 15 mill plus Dennis 12 mill plus Kamara 8 mill Foster retiring Deeney/Gray wages off the books Cleverley released A few youngsters will get a chance hopefully. However: Kucka we have to sign which is madness. Rose has 1 more year to lay off Catchcart/Kabasele/Femenia another year older, slower and injury prone. No goalscorer on the books. No midfield goalscorers. Next season is going to hurt. A lot.
I can’t see King mentioned in the above posts, he should be able to score in the championship with decent service from Zinc, Kalu, or Bahh, just tell me if I’m being too unrealistic and should go back to sleep!
Given we don't spend money on transfers in the championship it’s going to be interesting to see what squad can be cobbled together from free transfers, loans and Udinese reserves…..and which managers are prepared to join us knowing this and the Pozzos’ track record for manager turnover.
…IF Z,K or B are good enough to even play for us at that level, then I believe King could be our Deeney of the 20/21 season.
Think you're both being a bit harsh on Kabasele, it's an incredibly low bar but I think he's looked our most assured CB based on the last few games. He's our only one this season to not make any complete howlers so far at any rate. He's got another good Championship season in him if he stays.
The reason why King has been forgotten is he's entirely forgettable. I disagree that he should be able to score in the Championship - he went a whole half season without scoring in the Champ for Muff before he moved to Everton. He had a very brief purple patch for us but he now seems to have fallen back to the complete nothing of a footballer who couldn't hit a barn door from the season before. Even in the Champ I wouldn't want him as anything more than a bench option; a new CF in the summer will be essential (again).
Bournemouth fans seem to think he did down tools which maybe didn't help. Certainly don't look like we have the 20 goal a season Championship man like we did with prime Deeney/Vydra etc.
It’s probably the swift way he managed to score against us Oct 2018 in the front of the rookery that has clouded my judgement! His hold up play is pretty good but agree he is a low scoring centre forward!
He was generally as crap with Everton though as he has been lately with us. I don't think it's downing tools, but more that his tools are now blunt.
For me the consistent failing of the Pozzo recruitment is that the players lack mental fortitude. With very few exceptions, our players crumble when things are going wrong or they are under pressure to get a result. There is no doubt that we have had some of the most skillful players to have ever worn a Watford shirt under the Pozzos. But too many of them, from Capoue and Pererya to Dennis and Sarr, don't turn up when they are needed the most. May be these flaws are there all ready and that's why we can afford to buy them. Or maybe, as I suspect, it's a cultural thing at Watford under the Pozzos. Who knows, but football is a mental game as much as a physical one and we are bound to fail if we have a team of players who just fold in the face of the slightest of pressure.
It's a cultural thing at Watford under Pozzo. Every player can't be like that - it's the culture where all players know full well it's a player trading model and there is no long term plan and no meaningful attempt to build a team. I'd imagine we have the lowest team spirit and togetherness of any club in the football league. To compound this, Pozzo's player trading loses our club money (unless we can sell the current squad for £180m) so we don't even get any benefit from the model that creates this poor team ethos. We just get hindered by debt on our assets.
It’s a hopelessly flawed model. Membership of the PL is worth at least £100m, if you happen to find yourself in it then the best thing you can do financially is make sure you stay in it. Pozzo has made profit on players before, but there is no way in hell he could possibly make £100m on player trading. He probably thought he could double his money on Sarr, so that’s £30m profit, it still pales into insignificance compared to the PL money. Fix the roof while the sun is shining should always be the strategy, make sure the PL squad is as good as it possibly can be before you even think about buying players solely to sell at a profit. Instead we find ourselves with another relegation and selling our most expensive player ever at a loss, and this man supposedly went to Harvard business school? Edit: of course the other strategy is don’t spend a penny, which is absolutely fine, but if you are going to spend money spend it on the needs of the squad first and foremost.
Hate to admit it but i actually think that Cathcart, kabs, Sieralta and femenia will do in the championship. If Ngakia and Kamara stay we just need some youngsters to challenge and learn. I think our main focus next season has to be a proper striker and sort out the midfield, bring in some energetic young players. (don't shout, I know we want better defenders but for the championship level I think sorting the front 6 is more important.)
I’ve seen this thing about a ‘young exciting squad in the Championship’ thing doing the rounds on Twitter this morning. Do you remember the last time we went down? We said the same thing. I said that too. It didn’t happen then. It won’t happen now.
Just looked at all the players on 4 year contracts this season. All run until 2025. I bet by August the only 2 left are the top 2! Ekong Samir Kalu Kayembe Pedro Dennis Baah Kamara Louza
They probably will just about do, the problem is if we do then get promoted they very much won’t do third time around, but Gino will of course think they will be fine (along with half our fans who seem to forget the Championship is an inferior standard).
If Forest get promoted under Cooper, I cannot see Zinc wanting to come back and play another 46 games of Championship football. He will want a shot a the Premiership surely.
I read somewhere that Forest would only want to sign Zinc if they didn’t go up and they don’t see him as a Premier League player.
Behrami, Holebas and a pre-decline Deeney all had that fight in them when their backs were against the wall. We haven't signed a single player since who has that ability. Clearly our world-leading network of scouts don't bother looking at the mental characteristics of our signings.
I guess the reality is that we'll let any player/s go if the right offer comes in, then see where we stand, and then on 29th August we'll see 4 last minute signings. It's vital for the championship to have a good spine to the team so I really hope we get that sorted early...
'Checkout' & 'Ready To Go' by Family; 'Looking For Someone' by Genesis; 'Lemmings' & 'Lost' by Van Der Graaf Generator; 'Death Don't Have No Mercy' & 'Ship Of Fools' by Grateful Dead....not sure I've got the time to plough through the next 50 years' worth....