Watford 0 Brighton & Hove Albion 2 (12/02/2022)

1-

‘Well, master, we’re in a fix and no mistake,’ said Sam Gamgee.  He stood despondently with hunched shoulders beside Frodo, and peered out with puckered eyes into the gloom.

It was the third evening since they had fled from the Company, during which they had almost lost count of the hours during which they had climbed and laboured among the barren slopes and stones of the Emyn Muil, sometimes retracing their steps because they could find no way forward, sometimes discovering that they had wandered in a circle back to where they had been hours before.  Yet on the whole they had worked steadily eastward, keeping as near as they could find a way to the outer edge of this strange twisted knot of hills.  But always they found its outward faces sheer, high and impassable, frowning over the plain below; beyond its tumbled skirts lay livid festering marshes where nothing moved and not even a bird was to be seen.

The Two Towers, JRR Tolkien

2- You’ll have spotted the intended parallels, perhaps.  Frodo and Sam are wandering around in circles in a shapeless, joyless land sometimes wondering whether they’re re-treading their footsteps and finding their confidence and energy sapped.  Similarly, it’s difficult to remain positive in the face of three months without a win, an ever darkening league table and no clear path out of the remorselessly hostile terrain that we find ourselves in.  Having missed Newcastle I haven’t seen us score in the League since Emmanuel Dennis found the net against West Ham in the last game of last year.  That didn’t end well, either.

Nor does it help, I think, that the in-stadium support has effectively been exposed to consecutive seasons of Premier League struggle, the first ending in relegation and the second pointed squarely in that direction.  It’s been a while, the Cup Semi-Final against Wolves arguably, since we had a successful team to watch in person and that affects your habits as much as your mood. Irrespective of whether the team is “good enough”, we’re going to games mentally on the defensive.  This much was evident when, towards the end of the first half at which point we were labouring but still level the blameless Ben Foster turned to the Rookery with the play upfield and waved his arms hopefully, encouragingly, to be met by a murmur.  That’s not a criticism of anyone, it’s just where we are.

3- For all that West Ham had been another strikeout at a largely unlikeable venue I thoroughly enjoyed Tuesday night.  No, we weren’t quite good enough in the end but it was an improvement on Burnley’s improvement – if defensive stakes were first planted at Turf Moor then here was some evidence that we could still threaten too.  And yes, Jarrod Bowen should have been denied the space to have his shot but it was still a fluke, the sort of miserable fluke that goes in when you’re where we are.  West Ham hadn’t been afforded many such chances.

I’d much rather have had the time to report on that one than this one.  It’s always tempting to be introspective of course; we should acknowledge that Brighton were a lot brighter, more comfortable, more positive than West Ham had been and hence a bigger threat.  One of the main reasons that we were only just about getting away with it in the first half until we didn’t was that the Seagulls attacked with verve and purpose.  Worth also remembering that the same scoreline in Sussex at the start of the season concealed a Watford performance far less able to withstand our opponents’ pressing than here.

Nor do I hold with the criticism of the starting lineup.  Roy’s remit was surely to make us harder to play against, harder to play through.  He’d already done that, quicker than might have been credited.  The progress, if and when it comes, will come through being confident enough with our defending to start throwing a few more punches in anger too;  Retaining that defensive mentality for a home game, for all that we have attacking weapons kicking our heels, didn’t work in the end.  That doesn’t make it the wrong decision.  It’s not as if playing more open football with the weapons available – and Sarr’s availability only stretched to the bench today – has gotten us very far up to now.  Daughter #1, happily sassing next to me with her sister, hasn’t seen us win since we beat Wolves on New Year’s Day 2020.

But it didn’t work.  A miserable first half saw us obstruct Brighton up to a point….  Samir impressed in the backline, doggedly getting a foot in, revelling in challenges.  But we didn’t obstruct enough to prevent those chances… Moder forced a good save from Foster, then put in a cross for Gross to head wide unchallenged;  Maupay shot from long range in too much space, Foster saved comfortably; Dunk headed over unchallenged from a deep corner.  Whether Maupay’s looping shot was quite what he intended or otherwise we had allowed Brighton enough bites not to be able to complain when they got lucky.  This wasn’t Bowen at West Ham.

The larger problem perhaps was that we were scarcely threatening ourselves.  Hell, we were scarcely anything. Dennis’ clever break midway through the half spoke volumes…  as he fooled Dunk and span into space on the half way line the home crowd roared in unfamiliar surprise and desperation.  We so badly need something to celebrate, something to cling to.  The Nigerian roared down the left flank;  a halfway confident player, a Dennis in the midst of his hot streak a few months ago, strikes it left footed across the face of goal.  Instead he turned into challenges to get it on his right foot and won a free kick that must have been very close to a penalty from the recovering Dunk.  It shouldn’t have come to that.

4- Let’s give ourselves a break from this bleak fare.  Hell, given the correlation between our results and this blog’s readership there’s little to justify me still being here typing at 11am on Sunday morning so I might as well try to enjoy myself.

Things on the pitch are difficult, fingers are being pointed all over the place.  But there’s lots the club continues to get right, and here’s one instance.  Anyone younger than, loosely, 45 isn’t going to remember Ann Swanson in her pomp but whilst few outside Watford will recognise her name she was an essential component of the club’s most successful, happiest era in the 1980s. My first season tickets were in the Family Enclosure;  Ann was unmissable, the matriarch, the dominant figure.  She’s spoken about how much support she received from GT in crafting the family areas; no doubt he shared her vision but he was a smart guy, he knew who not to pick a fight with in any case.  The club owe her a lot for the reputation that was forged, for the fact that 50-ish blokes like me still instil a romantic vision of what it’s all about into the eyes of their kids such that they (reasonably) happily agree to drive up to Burnley in the pissing rain, or sit here in the cold despite (see above) not having seen us win in forever.

So the best bit of an admittedly difficult afternoon was quite comfortably Ann’s clearly genuine, tearful surprise at being told that the Family Stand would now bear her name.  Well done Watford.  Well done.

5- During the interval, a clear signal was sent with both Imrân Louza and Ismaïla Sarr warming up on the pitch.  Sarr’s achievements with Senegal had been celebrated over the tannoy and the man himself seemed keen to both acknowledge his reception and to pitch back into the fray but it was Louza who made the most immediate impression.  The opening period of the half offered grounds for optimism as the much-missed pivot at the back of the midfield got hold of the ball and gave us a degree of control for the first time in the match.

If Sarr was less effective it wasn’t through lack of effort… there was no suggestion here of the slightly sulky ineffectiveness that his worst performances have been accused of.  Nonetheless we struggled to get him into the game… his first involvement was a wild if positive shot from distance, slugged over the bar and into the Rookery.  Dennis was the next to threaten, wriggling impossibly through challenges on the left before pumping a shot off the bar, his head in his hands.

Problem was, it didn’t feel natural.  Any patterns that had developed in our attacking play have been interrupted by AFCON in particular and stymied by lack of recent success in particular.  Joshua King, whose lack of goals conceals a steady work rate was less effective here.  You kinda feel that if we are to have any hope of digging our way out of this that front three needs to function as a unit better than it did here – almost every half chance was an individual’s creation.

By the time Adam Webster shovelled a second goal past Ben Foster the visitors had reclaimed control.  Tom Cleverley and Kiko Femenía both seemed to have a role in repelling another Moder shot, yet another was deflected wide.  A scramble that portended the one that would lead to the goal resulted in Cucurella forcing probably the save of the game from Foster.  Meanwhile João Pedro, whose name had been sung in a little desperation by some in the Rookery, had his most ineffective cameo of the season.  By the time the game finished the home stands were long since emptying.  A number of sulky and violent challenges on Lamptey betrayed our frustration. Sarr’s slug at Sánchez provided at least a shot on target and some hope of better to come – and, via his link-up with Kiko, a reminder of one of the few dependable partnerships in the team.

But we’re running out of time here, quite obviously.  Some had cited this as a must-win game, that we’re best resigning ourselves to the inevitable should we not turn the corner here.  I don’t think it’s quite “done”…  that we need Roy and Ray to turn it around immediately doesn’t imply that failure to do so constitutes a bad plan or a busted flush.  There are enough winnable games left and enough bad teams around us, but winnable games are only a meaningful concept if, you know, you’re winning at all.

Frodo and Sam eventually escape from Emyn Muil through help from an unlikely source.  We’re going to need a similarly unlikely break if we’re to end our search for a Precious three points any time soon.  Villa Park, where we’re still owed a break, would be my choice.

Yoorns.

*Foster 4*, Femenía 2, Kamara 3, Samir 3, Cathcart 2, Kayembe 2, Sissoko 2, Kucka 2, Cleverley 3, Dennis 3, King 2
Subs: Sarr (for Kucka, 45) 3, Louza (for Kayembe, 45) 3, João Pedro (for Cleverley, 70) 2, Hernández, Sema, Kabasele, Masina, Ngakia, Bachmann

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