Watford 0 Cardiff City 1 (03/02/2024)

1-  Sometimes I tell people things that aren’t quite true.  Not… lies, exactly.  Things that were true at one point, or sort of true, but the reaffirmation of sharing with someone else gives them a certainty and permanence that isn’t really justified.  And I occasionally catch myself and think “hold on, that actually isn’t right, is it?”.  “Watford – Daughter 1 can sort of take it or leave it these days”.  Well, yes, but only in the way that a freezer runs hot or cold.  “Daughter 2, meanwhile, is obsessed”.  Yes and no.  She’s always keen to come to the games, certainly.  Plymouth (A) was her idea.  Always ready to hear about developments in between.  Doesn’t… ask about them unprompted though.  And wouldn’t be caught dead watching games that she can’t make on the TV.  In both cases, to varying degrees, the repeated retelling distorts the reality.

Recently I’ve also been telling people that Watford are different this season.  “All the games are fun, even when we don’t win”.

2- Which is more true than it has been for a while, but the last week has demonstrated the hopeless, optimistic imbalance of the statement because this, in particular, was bollocks.  Cardiff were utterly unremarkable, the grey sludge of mid-table nothingness;  until they scored there was nothing to suggest that they were anything other than there to be put out of their misery.  Thereafter they justified their averageness by looking far better at defending a lead – competitive, pretty organised, robust – than they had at creating one.  Nonetheless, this was a game that we had no business losing.  “We would have lost that one last season” has been a popular mantra in this campaign…  for the first time in a while, we lost one of those games in this one too.

The quality of the goal almost adds to the insult.  Josh Bowler had been having an absolute shocker up to the 43rd minute and contributed little to the second half either until his withdrawal, but the strike and the turn inside that had preceded it were magnificent.  Which… highlights the risk inherent in the patient possession-based approach to the first half.  The metronomic keeping of the ball along the backline, and subsequently on the half way line as we slowly pushed Cardiff back, is a bit like employing Neil Warnock… fine as long as it’s working, utterly charmless as soon as it doesn’t.  Against a robust side adept at defending a lead, suddenly we had nowhere to go.

3- A triple sub on the hour mark changed the balance of the game completely.  Chaotic and ultimately fruitless though our resurgence was, this was much more credible and enjoyable than the soporific first half had been. Highlights suggested we’d come close a couple of times in the opening 45… a cross-shot from Ryan Andrews and a nearly-something when Asprilla was close to getting onto the end of a Lewis nod-down.  I remember these incidents as having happened but they mischaracterise our efforts, suggesting far more attacking potency than we were able to impose on the game.

The second half started with snappy passing and aggressive purpose.  Words had been Said.  Unfortunately this lasted until Cardiff’s first counterattack, at which point we retreated into our shells again.  Whilst keeping the law of other, which dictates that whoever is missing from the side at any point is The Answer and about to make a transformative impact, firmly front of mind it was difficult not to agree with Dad’s assertion post match that we miss Edo Kayembe and his bulldozer rampaging through the midfield.  Giorgi Chakvetadze was one of the few to impress at Hillsborough in the week and the news of his permanent retention the following day very welcome but he was lost here in a more withdrawn central role, outmuscled and largely irrelevant for an hour.

But the changes and the switch in mentality that came with it opened the game up, and Cardiff’s backline had to earn their corn.  Asprilla moved to the centre of the pitch with Emmanuel Dennis taking his place on the right;  in the past the Colombian has tended to disappear in such circumstances but the reverse was true here as his game ignited.  Ken Sema came on for Martins on the left and looked fully up to speed for the first time since his injury – would be no surprise to see him start at Southampton on Tuesday.  And Mileta Rajović was introduced for the ineffective Bayo… if much of his contribution involved disciplined closing down of Jak Alnwick he also battled and occupied multiple defenders at once, on several occasions executing a decent lay-off despite being outnumbered.

Koné, who was transformed from Wednesday night and was a constant source of a magicked-up yard of space and an increase in pace, got on the end of a move and clipped a shot onto the post.  Overlap after overlap came down our left where attacks were focused, and number of corners the results.  Twice, loose balls in the box didn’t fall for us when it was inconceivable that something wouldn’t nudge them over the line.  Dele-Bashiru came off the bench to crash a shot goalwards, too close to the keeper to demand anything more than competence but at least it was something.  Ben Hamer came forward for a corner, wasn’t marked and would have had a decent chance at a header on target had a less well-set teammate not gotten his head to it first.  Cardiff’s defence, enforced by further big blokes from the bench, were at full stretch. Much better from the Hornets, but why not this oomph earlier?

4- Prominent in much of this was Emmanuel Dennis, a Jamie Tartt signing who was the only new, senior addition to the squad over the transfer window.  Two sides to this of course.  On the one hand, the one thing every squad is missing is that most elusive of signings, the “twenty goal a season striker”.  In the Championship a fully fit and firing Dennis is incontrovertibly this, certainly as close as we’re going to get on our budget and could plausibly turn is into more than peripheral play-off contenders.  On the other… everyone’s heard or read the rumours of the disruptive nature of his influence the first time around. Nor were these unprecedented… a striker who scores twice at the Bernabéu in the Champions League does not get offloaded to a relegation-destined side on loan a year later unless things have gone wrong in the interim, while the consistent vehemence of the criticism offered by the likes of Tommy Mooney the first time around hinted at more than merely patchy performances in a struggling side.

On balance, for me, why not.  That the club have chosen to take him back, that he’s reportedly here on 30% of his contracted salary are both encouraging plus points;  if it goes badly the impact is fairly limited given that our chances of reaching let alone impacting the play-offs without him are moderate and the salary sacrifice above.  But it might pay off.  And it won’t be dull…  

Here there was evidence for both sides of the argument.  Dennis was certainly sharper and livelier than he’d been in his two briefer cameos earlier in the week…  direct, competitive, provocative, perhaps not quite there yet but a genuine threat, no longer a mere (heavy looking) passenger chasing fitness.  On the other… over-elaborating on the ball, holding onto it for too long on occasions, and once cutting to the touchline and shooting from an impossible angle into the side netting to the annoyance of team-mates in the box.  To be generous, he’ll be better able to impact games when he’s up to a full 90 minutes.

5- To provide a bit of balance…  the Plan might have been a good one.  Cardiff are better at defending than attacking so… if you don’t give them the ball they really are going to need to pull something special out of the bag to beat you.  The fact that they managed it doesn’t mean the plan was a bad one (even if watching it unfold was purgatory).

Secondly, we know that we’re not amongst the strongest sides in this division (for now…  though given the number of young talents in the squad we have reason to be positive for the future).  Given that, results like this are going to happen.  It’s not fun, but unless you’re convinced that we’ve developed sufficiently to expect to be able to take on all comers at this level then it comes with the territory.

Though with Saints and Leicester over the next week, we could have done with a kinder break here.

Not travelling to Southampton, see you next Saturday.

Yooorns.

Hamer 3, Andrews 2, Lewis 2, Pollock 3, Hoedt 3, Livermore 3, Chakvetadze 2, *Koné 4*, Martins 2, Asprilla 3, Bayo 2

Subs: Dennis (for Martins, 60) 3, Rajović (for Bayo, 60) 3, Sema (for Chakvetadze, 60) 3, Dele-Bashiru (for Livermore, 78) NA, Ince, Morris, Sierralta, Porteous, Bachmann