Sheaf Saint

That wasn't the one I was thinking of. Just googled it and it was actually Boxing Day 2005, not NYD. https://www.espn.co.uk/football/match/_/gameId/185144/southampton-watford

I haven't. He's got some good attributes but still needs to mature a bit. I can guarantee he wouldn't have stood off and marked nobody instead of closing down the attacker like Stephens did for Watford's second today.

Really? That surprises me. I can't think of any wins we've had there in that time, but I can think of a few disappointing draws. Last season for one, and the Doucoure handball equaliser in the pre- VAR days in the PL also springs to mind. I also vividly remember going to the match on a cold New Year's Day in the mid noughties when we were utterly woeful and got tonked 3-0.

I have to disagree. A semi-fit Azaz up against the physicality Watford showed in the first half wouldn't have been able to impact the game in any way.

I'm actually not as despondent as many seem to be. Yeah there were clear issues in the performance overall, but I've seen us play much worse than that in the past and win. We started well and looked the more threatening, but Watford's entire game plan in that early period was to kick lumps out of Scienza to neutralise him, and it worked. After the second of the awful tackles, he was pretty anonymous and didn't get into the game at all. Watford then capitalised on two diabolical errors of judgement from our wonderful captain and found themselves with a two goal lead despite creating very little up to that point. They were never going to be able to keep up the intensity from the first half, so it was inevitable that we would come back into the game, and we actually had the better chances overall (we had more than double their xG in the end). Just couldn't convert the best ones - the Larin one shortly after he scored and then THB's defender's finish in stoppage time. There's things that need addressing. We badly missed Jander in the middle, and neither Dobbin or Matsuki had good games on the wings but are both capable of playing better than that. The fact we're still bringing BBD on when chasing a game is concerning, but clearly we're still not done in the transfer market yet. Would have been nice to start the season with a win to all but wipe out the points deduction, but Watford away has always been one of our bogey fixtures for as long as I can remember.

Defender's finish, that.

Having had a reduced pre-season after playing in the WC, he was never going to last 90 mins today.

FFS Downes. Trying to get yourself sent off when you're out only fit DM is beyond fucking stupid.

He scored twice against us last season, for a very average Preston team. There's more to come from him for sure, but not if we play him as an out and out winger like today.

I take your point. But if we knew he was leaving, there's not a chance he would have been risked today, especially against a physical team like Watford.

Cyle Gerrin!!!!!

Actually it wasn't overall anywhere near as bad as the first half against Boro in the playoffs. But the difference being we at least (somehow) managed to avoid conceding in that game.

We started brightly but those two crunching tackles on Leo clearly rattled us. The only positive I can think of right now is that Watford can't possibly maintain this level of intensity in their press for 90 minutes. They will tire at one point and we have a much stronger bench than they do.

It looks like they regularly are.

He was pushing up and was the one that was dispossessed. What I cannot understand is why Stephens didn't come over to close him down and instead decided to mark nobody in the middle. Captain Fan-twat-stick.