Filippo Giraldi - Ex Recruitment Head

Yes of course. The owner who deals with him on a weekly basis doesn’t understand him one bit but a fan who has never met him, never played with him and rants about him at every turn knows him inside out.

Take a step back and listen to yourself. There are plenty of dissenting voices about Deeney and rightly so. But you continuously go off the deep end about him...it’s very bizarre. It would be better if you stuck to complaints about his playing ability and captaincy as they are with merit. Being annoyed with his media involvement carries water too - they are legitimate concerns. But every time you bitch and moan about things you can’t possibly know about, it just gets weirder and weirder. If you do have knowledge of these things you claim to know behind the scenes, then shed light? I’m willing to listen if you’ve got sources who have given you details?

And now you are claiming the club are in cahoots by paying off victims of a crime, that someone has done their time for. Seriously?!

Deeney has set up a foundation and donated plenty of money and time to it, helping out others less fortunate than him - I dread to think what part of his evil blueprint for domination you think that falls under.

 

Marlon King has a rap sheet longer than occupation road, one of his other offences also includes deliberately undertaking someone then pulling in front of them and slamming his breaks on, so he deliberately got crushed behind him and the car behind. The guy had to be cut out of his car and airlifted to hospital where he spent three weeks, Marlon fled the scene, he could’ve killed multiple people and very nearly killed one. Why did he do it? Because he thought the guy was driving too slowly.

That’s just one of his other crimes, you’ll do well to look them all up as the guy is basically a career criminal. Making any comparisons to Troy and suggesting he is in fact worse is embarrassing.

 

Were you one of the victims? Or do you know them? I've never known someone to be so obsessed with that case. The one where he admitted his crime, has shown remorse, served his time for and not reoffended. Several points you completely ignore in your very concerning and ongoing obsession.

It was nearly 9 years ago.

 

He’s not completely obsessed - he also finds time to start threads on considering which Watford player he’d like to have sex with his/our daughters.

 

Who was that guy who wanted to meet everyone for a fight? Not Kelso, the other one? Ladbroke Grove or whatever. I think it's him.

Even the usual Deeney-hating suspects don't bring up the fight thing.

 

Highgrade? I miss that guy.

 

Didn't he have a particularly hard grandad?

On topic, I don't think it's wild speculation to assume that Troy is a toxic personality to have around. There's enough evidence to observe from his on pitch behaviour, his attitude in interviews and his media work and the more circumstantial stuff around his presence and influence during the period which has seen the players down tools every time they take a disliking to the manager.

I don't think he's an habitual criminal, who accepts arrest as an occupational hazard, and presumably accepts imprisonment in the same casual manner. I just think he's a terrible person to still have at our club for a large number of reasons.

 

I don't need a reminder, I'm aware and have read it enough, but apart from anything else that's not the only/worst thing Marlon King did - aside from the fact that you seem to oddly dismiss sexually assaulting a woman before punching her in the face, breaking her nose in the process; particularly as he had no idea what would happen with that punch, and there are plenty of example of single punches leading to the death of the person being punched (and ten times more so when you consider the size and power differential between King and his victim, exacerbated further still by the extreme likelihood that she was not expecing to be punched).

The incident wasn't even the first time he'd punched a woman in the face, given that in 2003 a taxi driver who witnessed the scene gave testimony in court of King chasing the two women involved up the street yelling with a belt wrapped around his fist to use as a rudimentary knuckleduster. Two years after that he approached a woman he didn't know near Leicester Square and spat at her, and was subsequently convicted of threatening behaviour.

King has convictions for FOURTEEN offences, and they don't even necessarily include some of his other actions, like the time he pocketed his own tens-of-thousands-of-pounds watch before claiming it had been stolen from the bar he was in and that it was therefore their responsibility to reimburse him for it. That driving offence isn't even the only driving offence that he committed THAT YEAR - both incidents leaving men seriously injured. He's served multiple terms in prison, and unlike Troy (and what he did, which was disgusting and impossible to ever forget) he didn't have the excuse of a one-off incident in the immediate wake of finding out that the man he saw as a father was dying (not anywhere near an excuse, still, but some kind of meagre contributory explanation/trigger, at least).

 

I think half the stuff he says because Grouty told him to.

 

Well, Deeney has made sure his Talksport show doesn't clash with the Archers.

 

There must be a reason why many fans treat differently to how Luther has always been treated...

 

I described what Marlon did as 'completely morally reprehensible'. It doesn't change my view that what Troy did was worse.

 

Because Luther is not only one of the greatest and most exciting footballers ever to play for the club, he is also a wonderful human being whose very existance makes people proud to support Watford.

 

Yes, the point I was alluding to.

 

Ironically in a recent radio interview Troy literally said that he believes he was 'always destined for greatness'. You are completely right that the term narcissist is bandied around way too much at the moment. Is Troy a toxic person with no empathy and delusions of grandeur who uses charm and manipulation to rise above and control others? Ummmm.............

 

Bingo!

 

Troy is, at this point, not a very good or often that useful player, and it seems fairly clear that his persona and style of 'leadership' has played at least some kind of role in the dressing room being as fractured and mentally weak as it currently is, but honestly this is hysteria; I hope you don't react to everything in your life like this. As posts on an internet forum, they aren't necessarily indicative of anything more than your thoughts on that footballing issue, I'm well aware, but your reaction here is almost lunacy, so I hope it is as entirely divorced from your normal life as it is from measured reality.

 

Thank you for your concern. I guess there's quite a big difference between how I come across online to people who dont know me and in reality with people who do know me. Although Im sure there's some overlap!! I do have an interesting and enjoyable life which Im very grateful for. I dont agree that what I'm saying is lunacy or hysteria. I just think that while over the past 5 seasons Troy has on occasions turned in match winning performances his behavior and personality have led to us getting less points over the course of each season than we would have done without him and his leadership/talisman moniker is a complete myth. Its a case of emperor's new clothes. Imagine what its like for talent like Sarr, JP, Richarlison and even Perica being told what to do by somone like Troy! It's totally counter productive. Why isn't Sarr the talisman? he's the most talented player we've had since John Barnes!

 

What, you do have a hard grandad?

 

I initially thought that was Bingo terminology. Maybe when two fat ladies start getting frisky. Would be a good name for a cocktail too.

 

Like 'Hard Grandad, 44'

 

Troy did his time for the crime and has helped people less fortunate than himself too. I still think he is a bit of an egotistical d1ck though especially after the talksh1ite show.

 

Well yes, I agree with the majority of this, it's perfectly reasonable and probably born out by the evidence available to us - although I do understand why he is seen as the talisman and how that gives rise to a certain amount of power/aura around the place naturally that can't be helped.

That being said, it does seem fairly clear he is not a good leader and makes the absolute most of the position he is very aware he has.

From some of the things he's said in recent times about young players, it almost seems like there's an element of Roy Keane syndrome about him too - a product of a slightly different era, or at least in of possession the mentality of it, which means he buys in to the 'big man on campus' type mythology of senior players in a squad and the deference they should be shown. Whether that works with the genuinely young players these days is under increasing doubt.

 

To be fair to Troy I wouldnt wanna fight him, especially if I was lying injured on the ground with a head injury.

 

I have to admit the lack of votes on that poll does still hurt. I think the vote for Luther was only made to stop Marlon King being the winner.

 

Marlon King and Adam Johnson

 

Troy Deeney, Marlon King and Adam Johnson!!! Maybe we should stop talking about Watford values and being a family club now. 2 of these convicts have actually captained the club. We are such hypocrits!

 

I've been one of Deeney's biggest critics, but I think he has shown enough remorse, done his time, and the crime doesn't need to be raked up as an example of his character now. Many people have done horrible things when they are drinking, and although drink is not an excuse, it can bring out the worse in us.

A player that I was personally friendly with back in the day, Tony Coton, also had convictions for violent offences, not just the one GT got involved in. Yet he was such a decent bloke when I knew him, just a lovely man through and through, and he was an incredibly supportive and positive person to have around the club.

People can change, they mature, or at least get to know their limits, and they will usually look back with shame and horror at what their own past exploits. I ceretainly look back with a degree of embarrassment of some things I got up to.

I don't have the personal connections with the club as I did back then, so whereas I could see the general warmth for Tony Coton around the club back then. These days I tend to see complimentary words for Deeney in response to questions asked by journos, and that is not the same level 0f endorsement in my view.

Unlike @Burnsy, I don't think we have to actually know someone personally to make our own judgements. We all make judgements on what we all see and hear, and Deeney is putting himself out there, he courts controversy, the publicity, and has done so for 5 years when he should have been earning his money on the pitch. I didn't like, for example, the lack of joy when Quina scored our first last week at the far post (he just turned his back), he seemed more annoyed that the cross didn't go to him than pleased that Watford had scored. Little things, but telling. There is plenty of evidence and in my view he is unprofessional and is pretty awful on the pitch for 90% of the time, and he isn't coming across as one I want around the club I (still) love.

Having said that, he made a run towards the near post for our first goal on Tuesday, and made a run to the back post for his goal. So maybe he has seen that if he runs a bit instead of relying on a pinpoint cross and the defence giving him complete freedom and time, then he may actually make some useful contributions. We live in continued hope.

 

Shut up Highgrade.

 

The Athletic have confirmed that Giraldi has left the club in all capacity and is now looking at offers from other clubs.

Giaretta and Gino will now be in charge of recruitment and negotiation will be undertaken by Duxbury.

 

Wait for him to join L**** and, after the inspired signing of Andre Gray, drive them to promotion.
Gutted.

 

Yep. Marlon is a scumbag. You really can't compare the two of them.

 

Didn't we work out Highgrade was someone from the 1881? Pretended to be a Luton fan too towards the end.