Watford vs Norwich review.
4-4-2 sucks.
Line-up thoughts.
Good grief this first half was bad from a Watford perspective. I said before the game that the line-up was nonsense as I believe the 4-4-2 approach has more negatives than positives. We don’t have the personnel to play a two man midfield currently. Louza and Kayembe whilst can be serviceable as a pairing in some games, in most games It’s Louza having to do all the work whether that be dropping to receive, creating space to receive, doing all the progression, backing up the front two; It’s too much work for one player. On top of breaking up the Bola + Maamma partnership which has been so good the last few weeks. The centre-back pairing also do not compliment each other as Keben isn’t the best ball player but can be very dominant 1v1 and tracking runners, albeit having a howler in the last month or so, and Pollock who’s slow, reactive and whilst is fairly good on the ball, is on the left side of the back four so he can’t really optimise that part of his game which equals horse shoe possession and hopeful long balls which lead to most of the time, nothing. This team will thrive off fewer direct balls, 4-4-2 template ditched and have someone more creative just off the 9 so they can connect the midfield without needing Louza to give up so much space. I promise you if we slightly tweak the system and utilise our fitness off the ball and get our attacking players closer together we’ll be so much better.
First half.
Without question Norwich were the better side for the first 35-40 minutes, Watford had glimpses but couldn’t figure out how to bypass Norwich’ high and aggressive press. All analysis is theory, nobody but the coaches and players know how they set-up and what their strategy is for the game, but if I was to guess, I’d wager Norwich pressed with a front 6 for two reasons. 1) Watford are not great at playing out from the back as previously mentioned so the opportunity to win the ball back high is tipped in their favour and 2) they have 6 players in close proximity to Louza and Kayembe so if the ball goes long, they’re there to win the second ball and spring quickly. They also guided their press to wide areas too and then blocked off the pass into Doumbia or Kjerrumgaard.
It also doesn’t help that Watford in build-up from the back, sometimes have both their central midfielders completely split from opposite sides of the pitch to one another so if the ball is turned over, the entire middle part of the pitch is vacated. Norwich also weren’t in a man-man press, it was all zone for numerical reasons. They didn’t attatch themselves to Louza, they got numbers around him to win the ball back should the pass go into his area. However, given Louza is in my eyes, the best player in the league, he figures out if he drops into the back three on the far side; and given it’s a press to a zone, the Norwich players won’t follow and instead will open up a passing lane on the inside of the pitch. Watford had two attacks in the first half that were good moves from deep and that was both times one of the central midfielders dropped and allowed one of the wide players to move inside and play the ball to them. That’s how you beat a press and it’s how Watford eventually won the game, which I’ll get to second half.
The first Norwich goal comes from Watford losing the ball from the press we spoke about where they forced the ball wide and into K9 who couldn’t bring it down and play it wide and instead loses it in the middle of the pitch and three passes later it’s in the back of Baxter’s net. There’s multiple reasons as to why this goal is so bad from a Watford perspective. The continuous nature of failing into their trap of forced press wide > long ball > second ball lost. And then reactive and passive defending. I don’t put too much blame on Bola, I don’t think he does too much wrong in terms of blocking the back-post, but Sargent does really well to get his body in front with a quick double movement. The situation benefits the striker always in that scenario because the read is always with the attacker. The failing to stop the cross and close down the player delivering from Ngakia is a bigger problem in this goal between the two fullbacks.
I do want to point out that Kayembe had a simple tap in from a corner after a K9 header across goal but for whatever reason Pollock went steaming in and cleared it off the line. It wouldn’t have been deserved but it was a huge opportunity to get back into the game and our own player cleared it.
When Norwich had settled possession, Watford were fine, the shape was good, the distances for the most part were fine. There was only two occasions where they got through and one of them was because Kayembe and Louza weren’t close together enough but luckily no shot came from it. The second time Norwich got through was just through good play. Given Watford’s shape is compact off the ball, Norwich also kept small distances between players to receive and then play it wide where all the space was, usually to the side of Ngakia, which isn’t his fault, it’s purely tactical to leave him 1v1.
We did equalise through again a back-post header from a corner from K9, which was a targeted area it seemed like. But I do want to get straight to the second Norwich goal. Is this one of the worst goals you’re likely to see from a defensive standpoint? From Keben running backwards and not even looking at the ball, Baxter’s awful attempt at the save, Ngakia completely stopping, Pollock being slow to close down the cross and Kayembe looking at the ball and not covering the spare man at the back stick. I mean goodness gracious me. It can’t get any worse can it?
Second half.
Max Alleyne, our best centre-back, who’s not getting hardly any minutes, finally comes on for Keben. After the game Javi commented on this change, saying: Almost immediately there’s a difference in possession with Louza now dropping into the back three and after 15 seconds, created a better opening than the entirety of the first half. That simple tweak completely throws off a zonal press as I mentioned earlier. That doesn’t mean Watford still weren’t vulnerable from the counter, because of how many men were committing forward to get that equaliser. The difference in most of the second half was Norwich’ press was 30 yards back rather than in our own half. Partly due to the tweak by Watford in possession and out of possession by getting more players central for the second ball, Pollock being on the right side where he can finally plays good balls down the line and not going as long. In the first half we averaged 13% of long balls, second half only 8%. When you can’t get out the natural resort is to hoof, but when you have options to play out as we did, the game becomes a lot easier.
The intensity was up a notch too in the second half, as well as the line we held from the back. Watford were higher up the pitch and didn’t allow Norwich to settle into their rhythm like they did first half. The game was being played a lot more on Watford’s terms in the middle of the pitch too. Again comparing from first half to second half, Watford only made 10 midfield recoveries, in the second half? 24. Norwich won the ball back 4 times in the first half in our attacking third, only once in the second half which came in the 92nd minute. The difference between the two halves from an intensity point of view for Watford was one that was needed. Did we also give up a big chance? absolutely, but that also came from pressing high and winning back and if It wasn’t for a Kayembe needless flick and instead playing the simple pass and retaining possession, that chance doesn’t come about.
I’m not going to sit here and say it was all Watford’s doing to get back into the game because fitness wise they dropped off massively and maybe that played a part in their passive shape more or less from the entirety of the second half and that led to the equaliser. They had to run more to cover more and that means more space to exploit. Watford move it quickly from one side to the other and Ngakia puts in a great cross and It’s an even better header of the ball from K9. Can we please start putting crosses into the box to his head rather than spam the low cross every time? I don’t have an issue with it being Bola low cross and Ngakia high cross, but I do want us to play to the strengths of our strikers.
Wasn’t long after Watford completed the comeback with a lovely move down the left side. Why Javi wanted to break that partnership up between Bola and Maamma satan only knows, but thank god he made the switch back to it when Giorgi went off (fingers crossed nothing serious) and that ever so present trivela pass from the Moroccan wonderkid that he loves to play to Bola was played through and Bola put a lovely ball across for Ince to smash home from the penalty spot.
From this point on nothing really happened. 17 minutes, Norwich had three shots, two of which were blocked and two of them came from the same corner. Watford were good for about 25 minutes of this game, Norwich were better for the majority of the first half and the rest was utter crap of no team knowing how to defend turnovers. I can’t speak on the Norwich side of things but for us we have to bin off the 4-4-2 now. We’re fine when the opposite team is playing out from the back but any form of turnover and it’s murder on the dancefloor. So much space to exploit, players far too high. It’ll be our downfall if nothing changes and we continue to be careless in that aspect of the game. Even if it means moving Kyprianou next to Louza and having Kayembe and Ince ahead for the time being as Giorgi gathers his fitness backup properly. Irankunda on the right and Mammaa off the left. Alleyne next to Pollock too. It makes too much sense to me for this to be our line-up and I don’t know why there’s a reluctance to play it, especially vs teams who play with only two central midfielders as we’re numerically outnumbered in settled possession and in turnovers.