Tag Archives: Mark Warburton

14th March 2009- Championship, Watford 2 Sheffield Wednesday 2 and Jimmy Russo’s first programme notes since becoming Watford chairman

Francis Jeffers was Sheffield Wednesday’s hero as his last minute penalty earned his side a 2-2 draw at Watford. The two in-form sides played out an entertaining spectacle at Vicarage Road that saw Marcus Tudgay head Wednesday into the lead, only for Mark Beevers’ own goal to give Watford parity going into the break. Jobi McAnuff thought he had done enough to earn the Hornets a maximum haul when he headed home after the interval, but it was Jeffers that held his nerve at the death to give Brian Laws’ side a share of the spoils.

I made the mistake of suggesting to ig after about an hour that the ref was doing OK. The ref then proceeded to lose it completely… Jeffers staying on after kicking Loach was extraordinary, Wood’s yellow card utterly implausible (if he fouled Priskin it was long before the covering defenders arrived), Cowie had a penalty shout ignored and plenty of controversy surrounded Wednesday’s late goal….

https://www.soccerbase.com/matches/results.sd?date=2009-03-14

https://www.11v11.com/league-tables/league-championship/14-march-2009/

10th March 2009- Championship, Watford 2 Nottingham Forest 1

Good stuff again. Another goal would have been nice, we were better than Forest but they weren’t so ineffective that a goal on the break was out of the question. And Forest looked too good to go down, obviously. Ha ha.

https://www.soccerbase.com/matches/results.sd?date=2009-03-10

https://www.11v11.com/league-tables/league-championship/10-march-2009/

14th February 2009- FA Cup Fifth Round, Watford 1 Chelsea 3

Chelsea were given a huge fright in their first match since the departure of Luiz Felipe Scolari but a Nicolas Anelka hat-trick helped them bounce back to beat Watford 3-1 and advance to the quarter-finals of the FA Cup.

Tamas Priskin gave the Hornets the lead after he sprung the offside trap to dink the ball over Petr Cech.

Watford had been pummelled for long periods, surrendered possession but defending wonderfully ruggedly to maintain parity, before Lloyd Doyley released Tamas Priskin.

A tremendous effort all round. Losing to Chelsea is no disgrace for a side at the bottom of the second division, and if we rode our luck more than once we also came close to levelling the game at 2-1 down. Lots of good individual performances… the wonderful Jenkins, rejuvenated Demerit, unrecognisable Priskin, bullish (!) McAnuff. But the team worked, for the most part.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008%E2%80%9309_FA_Cup#Fifth_Round_Proper

17th January 2009- Championship, Watford 0 Sheffield United 2

Sheffield United extended their unbeaten run to eight games, thanks to ex-Watford striker Darius Henderson. After a frustrating opening period for the visitors, Henderson headed into the path of Danny Webber who swivelled and fired into the net.

My brother speculated on the way back to the car that this may be the worst Watford team he has ever watched. I’d still have to cite Colin Lee’s late 1990 vintage as worse. But looking back, that side may have featured McLaughlin, Andy Kennedy, Mark Gavin… but it also featured David James, Gary Porter, Nigel Gibbs, Paul Wilkinson…. And the fact that we’re as much as having the conversation…???

https://www.soccerbase.com/matches/results.sd?date=2009-01-17

https://www.11v11.com/league-tables/league-championship/17-january-2009/

3rd January 2009- FA Cup Third Round, Watford 1 Scunthorpe United 0

Grzegorz Rasiak’s second half goal sent championship side Watford into the fourth round of the FA Cup at the expense of League One Scunthorpe.

We’ve seen some awful cup performances in recent years (in stark contrast to one era in our history in particular). But this was a particularly disconcerting flavour of awful. Lots of possession, very little penetration, an incomprehensible retraction back to a lone striker once we got ahead… it all felt a bit Vialli again somehow.

‘The band and the goal, that was all that was worth seeing’ I heard a bloke on the way out say and he was right. Still, its nice to be in the next round.

More games from 3rd January at https://oldwatford.com/tag/jan3

26th December 2008- Championship, Watford 2 Bristol City 4

http://watford.fcdb.info?id=4843

Maynard struck from the corner of the six-yard box after 23 seconds and doubled his tally after Scott Loach parried a shot from Ivan Sproule.

BBC-SPORT-_-Football-_-Championship-_-Watford-2-4-Bristol-City Download

Straight from the kick off their intentions were clear. No silly passing it back, or hoofing it out by the opponents corner flag. An instant attack resulted in a throw in. From it, they beat our offside trap and put the ball past Loach for 1-0. They continued the first half in the same manner and scored a second after Bromby failed to clear.

I’m almost glad they scored their fourth. Almost. Would have been too cruel to see City protect a one goal lead by jockying around in the corner to the cheers of their fans for five minutes. After all, it was ten years to the day since Gifton was doing precisely that to them, in the same corner of the pitch…

https://www.soccerbase.com/matches/results.sd?date=2008-12-26

https://www.11v11.com/league-tables/league-championship/26-december-2008/