Monthly Archives: December 2007

29th December 2007- Championship, Watford 2 Queens Park Rangers 4

QPR’s remarkable victory leaves Watford without a home win since 20 October.

QPR now sit 19th in the Championship, a long way from Watford who, after a seventh home league game without a win, are on the slide. The manager, Aidy Boothroyd, is trying to quell talk of a crisis but the captain, Jay DeMerit, admits the club’s hopes of going straight back into the Premier League are fragile. “We are a little bit nervous at home – it feels as though there is more pressure,” he said. “A team that is near the top of the table should be winning at home. Our jobs aren’t safe; we have to play well in order to keep them.”

What a jolly splendid sunset over the Rous Stand.

https://www.soccerbase.com/matches/results.sd?date=2007-12-29
https://www.11v11.com/league-tables/league-championship/29-december-2007/

26th December 2007- Championship, Watford 2 Cardiff City 2

http://watford.fcdb.info?id=4787

Jobi McAnuff’s last-gasp goal rescued a point for Championship pace-setters Watford against visiting Cardiff City.

Watford started Boxing Day on top of the table yet the growing dissatisfaction around Vicarage Road suggested anything but; by the evening they were second. Jobi McAnuff’s volleyed equaliser, scored so deep into injury-time that the Cardiff City manager, Dave Jones, called foul play, could only paper over the cracks for a side whose home form is rapidly undermining their title credentials.

We remain painfully easy to play against at Vicarage Road, as revealed by yet another committed but mediocre side.  A bit of guile in the transfer window, whether permanent or on loan, appears essential.

https://www.soccerbase.com/matches/results.sd?date=2007-12-26
https://www.11v11.com/league-tables/league-championship/26-december-2007/

15th December 2007- Championship, Watford 0 Plymouth Argyle 1

This was the first game played after Watford’s Sierra Leonean midfielder Al Bangura had his application for leave of stay in the UK turned down.  He was initially cleared to stay in early 2007 but the Home Office appealed the decision on a legal technicality and won meaning Bangura would have to return to his homeland which he’d fled when he was just 15.

The club organised a protest against the decision at half time during the game against Plymouth.  Al himself addressed the crowd alongside the then Watford chairman Graham Simpson, and Watford MP Claire Ward.  Four days later the Home Office announced Bangura would be allowed to stay whilst he appealed against the decision and applied for a work permit.

On 14th January 2008 he was awarded the work permit and allowed to remain in the UK.

BBC imageBangura loses deportation hearing

Watford lost their place at the top of the Championship after David Norris’s 89th-minute winner earned Plymouth three vital points at Vicarage Road.

guardian Watford player to be deported, asylum tribunal rules

Norris strikes and Argyle add to Boothroyd’s blues

BHappy image Matt Rowson’s thoughts on the home office decision not to allow Al Bangura leave of stay in the UK.

5 thunks from the Plymouth game.

Screen Shot 2017-12-15 at 10.24.25Screen Shot 2017-12-15 at 10.23.57

 

1st December 2007- Championship, Watford 1 Bristol City 2

Substitute Darren Byfield’s injury-time goal saw Bristol City condemn leaders Watford to a third defeat in a week.

A whole lot better than Tuesday, for starters, but all the more frustrating that the result was the same – we didn’t half look brittle defensively throughout, however tidy some of our attacking play.

http://watford.fcdb.info?s=40867&id=4782