25th August 2013- Championship, Watford 1 Nottingham Forest 1 Leave a Reply http://watford.fcdb.info?id=5072 Nottingham Forest returned to the top of the Championship despite a sweet strike by Watford’s Lewis McGugan denying his former side victory. Watford-1-1-Nottingham-Forest-BBC-SportDownload Both are little men with big ambitions but there the similarity ends. Gianfranco Zola is urbane and mild-mannered, Billy Davies fierce and feisty. And it remains true that teams naturally reflect their managers. The curse of the ex-player came back to haunt Nottingham Forest at Watford, but it could not stop them reclaiming top spot. Forest weathered the sort of second-half fightback that is becoming Watford’s custom and would have had maximum points again but for the high-class save, low to his right, with which Manuel Almunia kept out Ishmael Miller’s goalbound shot. In my head, we always draw one-all with Forest. It’s kind of an unwritten rule. Not strictly true in reality of course; nonetheless a glimpse at the record books reveals ten such outcomes in the last 30 league encounters spanning almost 30 years. It feels as if I’ve seen at least that many. Share this:TwitterFacebook
1st September 2011- UEFA European Under 21 Championship Qualifier, England Under 21s 6 Azerbaijan Under 21s 0 (played at Vicarage Road) Leave a Reply Stuart Pearce’s England Under-21s thrashed Azerbaijan to start their Euro 2013 qualifying campaign in style. Stuart Pearce’s England U21 side made a bright start to their Euro Championship qualifying campaign with a 6-0 rout of Azerbaijan. Six goals, six debutants, three points and no sign of a sea change. England could not have wished for a more comfortable start to their attempt to qualify for a fourth successive European Under-21 Championship as they disposed of Azerbaijan with ease, but there was nothing here to suggest that they will fare any better in the 2013 finals in Israel, if they get there, than they did during June’s dispiriting performance in the 2011 tournament. A journey of 2,250 miles begins with a single step, and although England were scarcely bothered by their Caucasian visitors in their opening European Championship qualifier, it was an encouragingly cohesive display from the side that Stuart Pearce hopes will lead him to Israel in 2013. Hornblogger: I remember fondly the last Under 21 international at Vicarage Road which took place 23 years ago.  My mate Laurence and I refer to it regularly because it was at the time, and probably remains, one of the most boring games we’d ever witnessed.  For years afterwards we ceased using words like boring, dull and grim and instead would use ‘Denmark Under 21’s’ to describe anything bad that happened. Share this:TwitterFacebook
20th February 2010- Championship, Scunthorpe United 2 Watford 2 Leave a Reply Scunthorpe rescued a point through Gary Hooper’s last-gasp penalty after going behind to Watford in injury time. Share this:TwitterFacebook
2nd February 2010- Championship, Watford 3 Sheffield United 0 Leave a Reply Poor defending contributed to the Blades’ defeat as Tom Cleverley took advantage of sloppy play to open the scoring before half-time. Heidar Helguson capitalised on more slack defending from the visitors to score the second before Don Cowie completed the scoring from a free-kick. How very badly did we need to play against a side as accommodating as the Blades. For twenty minutes we looked quite tentative, and then… it wasn’t merely a matter of noting that our opponents weren’t as good as their position suggested. More that a United side comprised of a pick-and-mix of second tier journeymen (many of them ours…) scrawled this in large, difficult to miss paint-spray all over their penalty area every time a ball went anywhere near it. Nonetheless, it took an unchallenged flap from Mark Bunn and a couple of unexploited free headers before we realised that this was there for the taking, and took it increasingly confidently. Share this:TwitterFacebook
7th November 2009-Championship, Watford 2 Preston North End 0 Leave a Reply report:From the first minute where Preston’s defence watched a cross float to the far post with the immobile, distracted air of kids at a firework display it was evident that fun could be had. http://watford.fcdb.info?s=36566&id=4885 Share this:TwitterFacebook