Wondering- Queens Park Rangers 0 Watford 0

It can make or break your day. Especially one like today. We've been out for a lovely day at my cousins house. Our kids have spent all day playing with her kids. We've eaten well, had buckets of tea, had lots of laughs and a lovely time.

But from 3 I kept wondering. And wondering. And I think would it be rude to start checking my mobile?

Eventually I quietly disappear to the loo and then discover I can't get a signal.

My son wants to watch Spongebob. Cool, I'll sneak a look at Sky Sports News whilst looking for Nick Toons. Oh, they don't get the sports package.

So I have to hang on wondering.

But this makes the way home a bit more exciting. Maybe we've won. Maybe we've won well. Or maybe we've been thrashed. The defence has let us down again?

The expectation has built and built. I dash in the house leaving my wife to sort out the kids. I ignore the dogs who can't believe that having been on their own for 6 hours the first human through the door has no interest in saying hello to them. I get to the computer and wait the 10 seconds or so it takes for it to get going and go to the BBC website

Oh, nil nil. Not even an exciting nil nil. A 'the only thing to say about it is Priskin and Helgusson heading wide' type of nil nil.

Oh well.

How It Could Have Been- Watford 2 Bristol City 4

I'm trying to think of the last time I enjoyed myself less at the Vic. Maybe England v Denmark Under 21's. This afternoon I was ill (genuinely, not hungover) and despite it being a sun filled afternoon it was bloomin' freezing in the Upper Rous. Sometimes trying to maintain a 'not going early' policy is difficult. Today it was tested after 30 seconds.

In the programme Dean Austin continues the club mantra of how passing football is the way the game should be played (grrrr). It struck me that had Simpson et al been prepared to wait until the end of the 2004/5 season when we sacked Lewington, we could have had Gary Johnson as our manager. Had this been the case, by now, I reckon we would've been playing the sort of great passing attacking football we witnessed from City this afternoon.

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.

We obviously got a rollocking at half time and started the second half in better fashion. So it was completely careless to concede another straight after Raziak had got us back into the game, albeit from a deflection.

The own goal that got us back to 3-2 is probably the only reason to watch the Championship tomorrow (if indeed it is on) as it was probably the best goal of the afternoon. A great cross from Tommy and a brilliant header from the City defender ballooned the ball over their keeper. Even after that they still looked the more likely to score at the end and we can't begrudge them the fact they did. Had we got a point it would've been highly undeserved.

No one played that well. The usual good players did okay and the usual bad players performed as expected. BR's decision to take off Harley was roundly booed. Lewis Young looks like he needs a lot of weight training and a few balti pies to beef him up a bit. Despite scoring, Raziak looks like a poor mans Priskin, ironic as under Aidy, Priskin looked like a poor mans Raziak.

I saw my Dad after the game who enquired if BR has signed his contact yet. "Hmm, pity" was his response to the news. I think thats a little harsh, but it might become a common view if we perform poorly against a QPR side who we ripped apart under Malky.

Life in a Northern Town- Derby County 1 Watford 0

Pride Park is yet another new ground that conjures up memories of the play (and was it a book too?) the Albatross. Parking parking everywhere, but not a space for the football fan. Even the KFC had a guard minding the entrance. So you are made to park well away from the retail park that surrounds the ground and then trudge through thousands of parking spaces that you could've used, if only you weren't a football fan. Crazy.

Despite Derby reckoning its in the Midlands all the accents were very whippet sounding and the Salvation Army band really were playing before the game. They were a hundred times better than the bloke who worked the PA system at Derby. He put himself up for rubbish announcer of the season with the classic 'And now lets welcome the Derby County ball boys!!!'. They then did themselves no favours by running down the Centre line and then branching out round the Centre Circle. This would have been fine if they were cheerleaders, or maybe primary school age ballboys but as they were hulking great teenagers it looked naff and camp, but mainly just naff. Then we had a Peter Kay-esque mega mix of all the songs you are ever likely to hear teams run out to. The famous bit from Carmina Burana, the Boys are Back in Town and One Vision were just a few of the delights served up. We were even inflicted with two doses of Mariah Carey but luckily not in the opening montage.

Derby included both Stewart and Ellington in their line up. Stewart received a mixed reception whilst Ellington got precisely what he deserved. He didn't dissapoint the away support either. We really shouldn't have given him the three easy chances to score that we did, but each one ended nearer the corner flag than it did the Watford goal. What a waste of money indeed. Interestingly the Derby fans didn't exactly seem to have taken to him either, with no obvious 'Dukes' shouted when he was on the ball.

Jon Harley was brilliant for Watford and even survived getting kicked in the head during the first half. Incredibly our only reward for this was a free kick. Neither Priskin or Mariappa faired as well, both having to come off with knocks.

Its interesting how much of a difference Priskin seems to make to us under Rodgers. He was a constant pain in Derby's side and whilst he was on the pitch we looked like we always had a chance. As soon as he went off, despite all Hoskins enthuiastic running, it always looked like 0-0 was the best we were going to do.

However, our defence still looks shaky at best. Had we gifted those chances to a striker better than Ellington we would've been 3 down by half time. One problem is that when we are attacked we play so deep. We invite teams onto us by only getting tackles in once in the last quarter of the field. This is especially annoying once we've gone a goal down as we did with 7 minutes left when Hulse headed past Loach. To still then be defending so deep makes it look like we've given up.

Special mention should go to Lloyd Doyley who, despite being the least likely player to flourish under BR, looked like his new boss is rubbing off on him. During the second half he received the ball in an awkward position on the wing with two Derby players closing in. There was a slight groan in the away end that turned into a 'Doyley for England' chant as Lloydy turned both of them!

Minutes later though he showed that he is still our Lloyd by accidentally putting the ball out for a throw in when he meant to pass it to the opposing keeper following an injury. This led to the unusual sight of the Derby keeper taking a throw in. Wonder what the odds on that would've been?

I assume Nick Wright was in the Hornets contingent as at one point we broke out into a 'Nicky Wright Wright Wright' chant. Either that or I've missed the news that we are doing a retro chant once a game. Another old boy, Craig Ramage, did the Derby equivilent of Harry's 50/50 draw at half time to lukewarm appalause from all sides of the ground.

Like the song by the Dream Academy the whole afternoon and team had a lacklustre feel about it. Recently on bHappy it has been stated that the we are completely lacking in anyone with the aggressive passion of a Mooney or Robbo. I'd stated previously that I thought Bridcutt might be our version but as the weeks go by he looks more like the rest of them. Where has his arrogant streak gone? He looked totally ineffective when he came on for O'Toole.

Its great that Tommy Smith is currently wearing the armband but I have to agree that we need a cheerleader just to get everyone going, the team and the fans. Wouldn't it be nice if we could bag Helgusson once his loan at QPR finishes.

Marshball- Watford 2 Coventry City 1

"The game passed a pitch inspection at 1.30pm but..."

I arrived to hear a Steward chatting to the people in one of the food kiosks of the Upper Rous and he was clearly preparing them that the chance of going home early was definitely an option. In fact judging by the way he then shrugged his shoulders he was implying it was clearly a matter of when not if.

The pitch didn't look playable. It reminded me of 8 years ago when the Burnley game was postponed a few minutes before kick off due to a deluge. That day the rain fell in one huge cloudburst and I think the only difference with today and why we went ahead was that it was constant rain so the ref had kind of got used to how bad the pitch looked. But to the untrained eye it looked dangerous and it should be a relief to Mr J Moss that only one player, Ross Jenkins, was stretchered off towards the end and doesn't appear to be badly hurt. One wonders had someone sustained a career threatening injury whether the officials could be sued. But after seeing how Stuart Atwell was treated with his 'mistake' earlier this season I'd imagine they'd be awarded the FA Cup Final to officiate and the matter would be quietly dropped.

So the atmosphere at the Vic ironically resembled that of the Marie Celeste for at least the first half hour or so as everyone waited for the referee to come to his senses. There didn't seem much point in getting behind the team 100% when any goals scored would be cancelled by the abandonment.

But it never came. And so the two teams played a new game called Marshball which was entertaining and intriguing but required little of the skills that are usually seen at the Vic. The main thing needed this afternoon was an ability to judge how far the ball was likely to go when passed and how much power it would need. This varied greatly depending on whereabouts on the pitch a player was at the given time. Up near the Vicarage Road end the ball played fairly normally, whereas down by the Rookery/Rous corner flag it didn't move at all.

Oddly the team playing down towards the Rookery seemed to have more of the chances. In the first half we really could have been 2 or 3 up by half time. Whereas the second half was much more even and we had a few scares. But despite having fewer chances in the second we took them and so deserved to win the game.

Priskin should have had a penalty in the first couple of minutes when his legs were taken out from under him by a Cov defender who wasn't anywhere near getting the ball. The ref seemed to decide to put it down to the conditions and nothing was given. He made amends in the second half when again Priskin's legs were assaulted and Tommy Smith duly obliged from the spot.

Cov came back quickly with Clinton Morrison (who else) scoring in a crowded penalty area. But JJOT restored the lead with an excellent strike after he picked up a cross that was meant for Priskin but was too high to reach its target.

The whole team played well, adapting to the conditions and looking more up for it than their opponents. Six points in four days puts us above our next opponents Derby, and we should go to Pride Park with plenty of optimism whether we have to play football or marshball.

All Change

New chairman, albeit an interim one, new manager and now a new chief exe.

Some who were calling for change in the boardroom still seem to think disaster is on the horizon. But I think we have to give it until after the transfer window closes to see how it all plays out before judging.

Hopefully the next development will be the return of the Salads.

Roeder- "Anyone who can put up a case that Watford deserved to win is in fairyland".

Roeder reveals himself as another one of those managers who want other factors to decide football matches rather than goals.

What does he want? The panel of Strictly to decide who gets the points? We scored two Glenn, you scored one. Deal with it.

Triumph Over Adversity- Watford 2 Norwich City 1

It is fair to say we haven't had many things go for us this season. Injuries and bad officials have plagued us and even when it seemed we'd finally got some luck it wouldn't last for the entire 90 mins.

Well last night was no different and it was to our credit that, for once, we still came away with 3 points.

Norwich battered us for the first 15 minutes. They played the sort of football I think we are meant to be playing and our defence looked fragile at best. Only Scotty Loach looked convincing. I was just beginning to imagine a 3-0 reverse when Bridcutt headered a perfect ball to put Priskin clear of his defender with only the keeper to beat and he duly obliged to give us a surprise lead.

After that Norwich abandoned their fancy football and became a lot more cynical and nasty but were far less effective than they had been. We improved and as always under BR when our passing moves came off they looked very impressive.

In the last couple of minutes of the half de ja vu from last week threatened when we hung on despite a series of Norwich attacks. If we'd been playing a better team it would've been level at the break but luckily Lita was more interested in being petulant than he was in scoring goals.

The officials, who had by and large been okay in the first half, then made two shocking decisions one of which cost us the goal. On two occassions from corners a Watford player was brought down in the box but neither the ref or linesman on the Rous side saw anything at all.

From the second of these Norwich went straight down the other end and scored.

But our response was fantastic. Unlike against Donnie we knew exactly what was required and duly delivered within two minutes. Tommy Smith on the scoresheet yet again.

We hung on particularly in the 3 remaining minutes, although the Rous linesman had time for one more shocker when he didn't give a blatant hand ball against Norwich when Priskin otherwise would've been through on goal again.

Special mentions should go to Bridcutt who is the only bullish aggresive player in the starting 11 despite his tender age. He is the kind of player we'd hate if he was in the opposition. One day he'll be immense probably not at Football League level either.

Priskin was also great, again. Such a shame the man behind me who loathes Priskin wasn't there. In his post match comments it was good to hear BR reveal he has already solved the Priskin conunderum that Aidy never did. He might be tall but its his feet that are the good bit, not his height.

So BR's first win and such a vital one given Norwich's win at the weekend. A nice little gap is appearing between us and the bottom 4. A win on Saturday and we could say we're mid table. However I do worry that when or if we sell Tommy in January this might all have been a false dawn.

Improved- Birmingham City 3 Watford 2

Didn't expect the points but at least the word is that it was an improved performance again. That's all that was to be hoped for from today. Great that Priskin is scoring regularly and that Jenkins got his first. Bring on Wednesday.

Mixed Messages

I've had conflicting reports of what actually happened at Monday's meeting and what it all means.

My Dad's friend who went said how impressive Simpson was covering many but not all of the interesting issues. Marlon wanted to go becuase he was offered the chamce to earn 3 times the salary he was on at the Vic. Aidy kind of blew the bank on Ellington. He said he was the last part of the jigsaw to make the team become a success and obviously was an outright failure. The decision to go for Brendan was because it was felt could get a lot of decent loan signings in. I wonder how relevant this will be come January.

He didn't go into the reasons behind letting Boothroyd go, although maybe he felt he'd already done that with the needing a rest comment. He also didn't comment on the money situation.

Having heard all of this at half time during the Spurs match I felt a little more pacified, although this was probably partly due to the performance of the team.

Reading the WO website today however blurred things again with Ollie's broadside against the Iron Curtain running of the club, gagging orders on departing staff and the difficulty in gaining access.

I do wish he hadn't used the phrase roasting when commenting about Simpson and Ashton as it conjured very unpleasant images!

Having worked in the media for 14 years I can see both sides. The WO is considered by many fans to be one of the communication tools in getting info about the club, indeed other than the programme and some free papers it was the only one for many years.

However times have changed a hell of a lot and its completely unrealistic for the WO to expect the kind of exclusive access it used to enjoy.

For me neither ever comes out of their various quarrels particularly well. In fact, they only ever lessen my opinion of both in each and every case that has come up so far. The club seems far too quick to over-react and put up statements on the OS. The paper seem to quick to whinge and hark back to the ark without realising that probably half its readers neither remember, nor care how things used to be.

So I'm no clearer what I think really. I still wonder where the money's gone. I'd like to hear what ex-employees have to say. I wonder why Aidy really went. The fact we've got a boss in on the strength of his ability to act in the loan market hardly reassures about his credentials or the state of the club. Ironically, the appearance of the once questioned Salad Brothers kind of makes me feel a bit better about the future.

Better- Watford 1 Tottenham Hotspur 2

This was better, much better. For a start Rodgers had obviously told the team that they didn't have to follow his instructions 100 per cent of the time. So we had Loach kicking it out when appropriate and we didn't pass it around the defence when the clock was ticking down.

Everyone was up for it too. For once the home crowd were noisier than the away end. How often is it you hear a 'we forgot that you were here' aimed at the Vicarage Road end? It felt like one of the classic cup nights of the 80s. It started that way too.

We battered their goal for the first 15 minutes winning a succession of corners. The plaudits for our goal on telly went to Tommy Smith but the man who really made it was Jon Harley who was immense all match. Aaron Lennon looked especially surprised at the hard time he was being given. Harley won a 50-50 ball in our half and then raced away with it. He passed to Smith who crossed it to Priskin, who again proved that he is much better with his feet than he is with his head, turning two spurs defenders and slotting home. We went mad and a shortly after Brendan was accepted into the fold with a Brendan Rodgers' yellow army chant.

Our goal then lead a charmed life for almost the rest of the half. Loach tipped over brilliantly from Lennon and Pavlyuchenko hit the bar when he was clean through one on one with Loach.

Unfortunately we then presented him with another one on one with Loach. Jenkins tripped Jenas right in front of the ref. It was such a clumsy challenge that from where we were sat it looked like a dive and the ref was duly abused for the rest of the match, however Sky never lies and it was a clear penalty. Loach nearly got it too. He went the right way but the shot was just too quick for him.

Had it been saved i think it would've been our night. But Spurs now had their tails up whereas we looked prepared to hang on for penalties if we got the chance.

Darren Bent ruined this by getting a lucky deflection and at 2-1 to Spurs you never felt we'd get back into it.

But this was a vast improvement on the Donnie result and all the more impressive considering the opposition. I thought if we played as we had on Saturday we'd get battered. Credit to BR that he put the things that went wrong on Saturday right. If we continue in the same vein things could be much better than the pessimistic bit of me was expecting.

I think its a shame we've got high flying Birmingham next up. I don't think we expect anything out of that points wise other than another improved display. Norwich on the other hand should hopefully be the game where we start to reap the results. Given they are our bottom 6 rivals its fairly important we do.

So long Simpson

Farewell Graham. Thanks for all you did early on in your reign.

However I've still got some questions about what happened towards the end.

What did happen to the money we received from the Premiership season, the parachute payments, and the sales of players, in particular Shittu and Henderson?

Why did you go on for so long about us being financially okay (even after Elton's remarks) before revealing we were in trouble?

Why say you are going to ring fence money for the East Stand when it then gets spent?

Why did you part with Aidy when you yourself resigned less than a month later?

Why did you then lead the hunt for new manager when you must have had an idea you were going?

Why is it that you suddenly wanted to start seeing football played 'the correct way'?

If you've been a Watford fan as long as you claim you must realise that our biggest successes as a club have come from playing a more direct style. Yet you've now given us a manager who hankers after playing a type of football that has never been a success at Watford. A man who thinks Doncaster are a team that play football the right way. Couldn't you have got us a man who liked the way Wolves, Birmingham, Hull or Stoke play?

Having installed him you've now left us with this mess.

I said a while ago I didn't want us in a Newcastle type of situation. Actually, in hindsight, maybe Mike Ashley has done the right thing. I think I'd much rather have Malky in charge on a caretaker basis until we know the future of the board and who the new chairman will be.

As it is we have a new unexperienced manager who can't even call on the person who gave him the job in the first place for direct support.

You inhertied a right old mess. You mended the club. Made it better. Made us love it again. Then, money reared its ugly head and everything went wrong. You leave us in a similar mess.