I apologise now to fans of Zenit St Petersburg, who deservedly won the UEFA Cup last night, and Glasgow Rangers, who deserve great credit for getting to the final and playing their part. I also apologise to people who only like to read about the top teams in the Premier League.
I am going to crave your indulgence this morning as I write about my team, Watford. Having watched us lose 4-1 to Hull City last night in the second leg of the Championship play-off semi-final, 6-1 on aggregate, I would find it very difficult to write about anything else. We now know that we are resigned to another season in the Championship and won’t be mixing it next season with the Manchester United’s and Chelsea’s of this world!
In my mind there is absolutely no doubt that Watford will never have a better chance of achieving promotion to the big league. The quality of the Championship this season has been poor. It has been exciting, but poor. West Brom have been the only team to show a bit of real quality and Watford should have undoubtedly been sitting on a beach looking forward to Premier League football with them next season.
The 6-1 scoreline is embarrassing but compared to many games this season the actual performances were not too bad in both legs. Watford played reasonably well in the 2-0 home defeat and it was a mixture of individual errors and very poor refereeing that cost us. In the first half of the second leg we played some of our best football of the season. Then another horrible individual error cost us and after that the team fell apart and the least said the better about the second half!
Anyone who has followed Watford’s fortunes over the past couple of seasons or read anything about them will know that under manager Aidy Boothroyd Watford have played an awful style of ‘hoofball’ that is depressing and boring to watch. It has led to the boss earning the nickname Aidy Hoofroyd. The style, or lack of it, has led to widespread condemnation amongst fans, players and managers of other teams. How can anyone ever forget the singing of the West Brom supporters earlier this season at Vicarage Road after they had scored their third goal. “3-0 to the football team,†they sang. It was embarrassing.
The condemnation of the style of football has increasingly spread to Watford’s own fans. After an incredible but lucky start to the season, Watford found themselves six points clear at the top of the table after thirteen games at the end of October. Since then, including the play-offs, Watford have played thirty-five league games. We have won just eight of them. We managed to win just one of the last sixteen games of the season. It is remarkable that we managed to maintain a place in the play-offs, but no surprise that we lost by such a humiliating score.
The team have been booed from the field at half-time and full-time in the last few home matches, and remarkably, there were five thousand empty seats for the home leg of the play-off. That shows the apathy and despair Watford’s style of play has created amongst the fans.
For several months now, the fans, the pundits and anyone else with any footballing idea have been calling on Aidy Boothroyd to change the style of play and get the ball on the ground and pass it a bit more. He has very obviously ignored this advice and continued with his hoofing style of play, much to the annoyance of everyone, including, it would seem, many of the players.
Remarkably, for the two play-off games, after six and a half months of failure, Mr. Boothroyd decided to change the style of play. Watford actually passed the ball, and players who have been pilloried all season for their lack of ability suddenly showed that they could actually play.
Before the second leg Mr. Boothroyd told Sky Sports that we are now keeping the ball on the ground a bit more and that playing decent football was the future for Watford. Twenty-thousand Watford fans couldn’t believe what they were hearing. It was too little, too late. He is, of course, absolutely right, but why did it take him at least five months too long to work it out and then completely change the style for the two most important games of the season?
For most of this season I have been embarrassed to be Watford fan. I have supported them for forty-years and have never said that before, even in the dark days of the old fourth division. Although a little embarrassed by the scoreline, I wasn’t ashamed of how we played in the play-offs, in fact, I quite enjoyed most of it. I am just so bitterly disappointed that our manager, who will always be a legend at the club for what he has achieved prior to this season, has displayed a ridiculous pig-headed attitude of knowing better than everyone else for so long.
There was a massive inquest after a recent home defeat to Scunthorpe who were already relegated. I think it is likely that in that inquest the players finally revolted and told the manager that they couldn’t play the way he wanted to any more. If that is the case, then this was one occasion when player power was a good thing. It was too late, but it was good.
I hope Boothroyd stays at Watford and tries again next season with a style of play that the fans and players are comfortable with. I won’t hold my breath, but next season could just be our season.
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