Watford 1 Sheffield United 2 (04/01/2025)
01/05/2025 10:01 AM
1- Yes, I know.
In my defence, Cardiff was the day before a trip to Mum & Dad’s. QPR was the last day of the holiday, back at work on Thursday. A holiday which was spent being very ill for a brief period and then feeble and coughing and so tired for a more prolonged period and, yes, I could have crammed in some thunks on either evening or both but no, I didn’t, because I was, yes, tired and both experiences were terrible and I really didn’t want to write about them, much as it can be therapeutic and much as the record, such as it is and whatever purpose it serves should be free from such reporting biases.
Anyway. Back at Vicarage Road, the prospect of more football is rendered attractive by the Graham Taylor matchday even if I do rather wish that the presentation of it could be rather less earnest, rather less forced. But the scarves are great and the old clips are great and seeing old faces again is great too. Ross Jenkins, Steve Terry, Steve Sherwood, Gary Porter and Ian Bolton have been relatively frequent visitors over the years; applauding them won’t ever get old but it’s not new. Brian Pollard and Trevor How haven’t been presented for a while though, ditto Keith Cassells whose kit Mum’s Aunt used to sponsor back when that was a thing. Paul Franklin, entertainingly, proves to be as awkward and ungainly an interviewee as he was a centre-back.
The thing that strikes me about this warts and all rogues’ gallery is that some of the time they were crap. Clearly not all the time, since they are representing 1977-83, the climb up through the divisions culminating in finishing second behind Liverpool and so forth. But even the good ones, the better players, were shit sometimes. I remember Dad coming home… before I went to games, I would have been about 6 and therefore he in his late twenties…. slagging off Dennis Booth after a match. Not often… probably only once. And he would have been terrified (then, not surprised now) to know that this would lodge, be remembered stain my impression of Dennis Booth, no doubt unreasonably, some 45 years on.
But Steve Terry had bad games. Shirley got awful stick at times. Ross Jenkins delicately referred to his notorious “sticky start” at Vicarage Road pre-GT in his interview. Cally had some absolute shockers. Whisper it, there were times when people would grumble about GT on the way down Vicarage Road. They’re all still legends, obviously.
In the context of which, it’s gratifying that for the most part the current lot aren’t being flayed for this recent dip in form, not even for the repeating and frustrating failings that have been a problem throughout the season. Football fans are ridiculous, but not that ridiculous, and there seems to be an appreciation, mercifully, both that we’re doing quite well with what we have and also that it’s been quite fun, actually. There are exceptions, obviously… see below, and also as an aside see the clown on the right side of the stand at QPR who revelled miserably in our wretched display, maintaining a numbingly tedious and incessant commentary throughout that eventually caught the attention of Rangers fans to our right. “Shit Russell Brand” was the best chant of the day, and a far better approach to the individual than my encounter with the same guy at Blackburn two years ago.
2- Sheffield United are decent. No better than that… you’d be tempted to suggest that they’re on a par with the side that went up two years ago with unimpressive consequences, and certainly had we claimed something from this encounter it would have been merited.
Nonetheless, we didn’t. The Blades have lost four league games this season, against Leeds, Burnley, Sunderland and Middlesbrough; in two tetchy games against us they won one at Bramall Lane from which we could have burgled something but didn’t, and one here from which we merited something but didn’t get that either. That tells a story.
Tempting to say, “I wish we had a bit of that”… but we have had, until now, at home at any rate. One wonders if, but for Cardiff and that breaking of that home record, we’d have got something here too. We have been defiant, we have been finding a way. We have been too good, at least at Vicarage Road. Beating Preston here next time out is quite important, one suspects.
So we’d just about got to the point where I was about to say to Felix that “well we’ve not conceded an early goal, that’s a start”, when Sheffield United scored. We’d begun the game fairly well ourselves, but Dan Bachmann had already denied Andre Brooks with the sort of save that we rather take for granted, and a first minute Ryan Oné flicked header to a right wing cross had gone rather too close to our right hand post for comfort. The goal came from a sharp link-up between Callum O’Hare and Gustavo Hamer, the sort of blokes who are great when they’re on your team but annoying bastards otherwise. O’Hare burrowed past a challenge and played a pass inside Mattie Pollock who was caught on his heels allowing Hamer to finish well.
3- It says something for us that we came back from there, both in terms of the scoreline and the performance. Two lamentable defeats and a goal down to a promotion-chasing side would be enough to test the mettle of any side and few will have been confident as O’Hare and Hamer performed their slap-worthy choreographed celebration in front of the Rookery End.
Pre-match, there had been much questioning the line-up. As the defeats mount up there’s a danger of re-defining what had previously been strengths as weaknesses… “why can’t he just settle on a formation” was heard on the way up the hill afterwards. For me that remains a strength, the ability to fiddle with things without sacrificing what’s working for the most part. As it turned out, the plan for the attack was to play Baah and Vata as a two, sort of, which worked better than I would have expected until it didn’t. Certainly we had extra oomph allowing us to compete in midfield, and two mobile forwards… but Vata’s lack of physicality was exposed a couple of times and whilst Baah is stronger he’s not a target man and our lack of something to hit became more obvious as we went behind and had a game to chase.
The prospect of a “false nine” had been briefly and at most semi-seriously discussed pre-game in light of Tom’s team selection. It’s safe to say that Jezza’s name wasn’t mentioned in this regard; nor, surely, would anyone have expected his first goal, if it ever came, to be a poacher’s finish rather than something humped goalwards from well outside the area. Nonetheless, poacher’s finish it was to a fine, fine move. Not the last time that the visitors would be exposed down their left but Baah and Andrews form quite a tag team, particularly when this amount of guile is sprinkled on their physical attributes. Baah conducted this one, sucking players towards him on the touchline whilst inviting Andrews to bomb towards the by-line and finding him for a pull back that Ngakia tucked away.
As an aside, despite being made of biscuits and never quite nailing down a starting berth until now, you’d have to say that amongst all of our more celebrated names, he’s perhaps the one you’d put money on being back here walking around the pitch and taking applause, in forty years’ time. The one who might be a keeper, and who is demonstrating Lloyd-like personality in pursuit of a sustained professional career. No denying or depriving him of the joy of finally getting off the mark today, five years into his senior career.
Amongst the small number of senior players who’ve been around longer than Jezza, Dan Bachmann seems rather further from that level of appreciation. Prominent in what was left of the half was an incident in which Bachmann put Sierralta under pressure with a short pass, received a similarly unhelpful ball back and tried to dummy the on-rushing O’Hare under pressure. His opponent got a touch to the ball that sent it narrowly outside of the post to general disquiet on and off the pitch.
He screwed up, obviously. But to labour a point, Bachmann has never been a goalkeeper comfortable with the ball at his feet. That he is functioning competently – most of the time – in a team that is building from the back and demands that of him is to his immense credit. Whatever his failings in this regard now, he’s far from the nervous, tentative goalkeeper so visibly out of his comfort zone with the ball at his feet of a few years ago. Playing the ball with his feet is an instruction more than a choice, and that’s what screw-ups look like in that situation.
That he got away with it – not entirely by chance, since he’d succeeded in moving the ball to the non-goal side of him before the contact – didn’t spare him grief, nor a sarcastic cheer as he, apparently also under instruction, sent the next loose ball skywards. He reacted sensitively to that, and hard to blame him. Sillier still was a shout of “not to him!!!” as another long clearance found one of the many sturdy United heads in their backline, rather illustrating the limitations of the approach in the absence of a target man.
4- The half ended with a scuffle in front of the Rookery significantly inflamed by the swift and unnecessary arrival of Tom Davies following which both he and Imran Louza, who has racked up four yellows in his last five games, were booked. The embers continued to sizzle throughout the second half, fanned in part by a referee whose approach to every conflict was to shake his head and run towards the centre circle. This is, of course, more of a problem if you’re behind which we were from eight minutes into the half, the impressive Brooks cracking a fine low strike across Bachmann and into the bottom corner.
After ten minutes of not getting very far, another change in formation with Bayo introduced for Ogbonna. We were instantly more potent and within minutes Baah, now able to hug the touchline, burgled Harrison Burrows and bundled away from him. His pull back from the touchline was perfect but Chakvetadze’s finish wasn’t… too tentative, to close to the keeper with half the goal gaping. Vata, similarly liberated by Bayo’s presence, was denied on the follow up after Chak’s shot was blocked.
The lack of final product can be a frustration of course, but there’s a risk in overplaying it, as if it devalues or invalidates the many fine things that Giorgi does more reliably. There are surely few sights more enjoyable than Watford breaking towards the Rookery with Chak slipping between opponents or ricocheting off challenges and emerging with the ball at his feet. There was plenty of that here as we chased the game; Baah had Harrison on toast down the right, Vata was able to force another stop from Cooper with a fierce drive. We suffered, perhaps, from repeated attempts to invite a foul by burrowing into the box – albeit United were wise to it, knew where the line was and that the appeals largely came from the stands rather than our players. When a credible appeal finally came in response to an inadvertent but significant handball by Norrington-Davies, the referee’s response was predictable. We kept pushing… Andrews and Bayo both missed difficult chances, Jack Robinson flew in bravely to deny another Bayo chance from a left wing cross.
5- It wasn’t enough. With injury time ticking away United made what was by now a rare foray forwards, McCallum brought another fine save from Bachmann, a save that will rank below the earlier slip up in terms of what many choose to remember of his performance but which was more consequential.
More consequential still, perhaps, was what looked like a bad injury to the keeper that left him in agony on the turf and prompted the referee to end the game prematurely (albeit, presumably, with only seconds of added time remaining), meaning that we look set to be without unwanted Cruyff turns but also reaction stops and rapid charges out of goal to smother angles for some time. It’s a good job that the latter are required so infrequently.
Meanwhile… a fine game of football, and reasons for optimism despite the result. Three away games on the hop now – including the wild card at Craven Cottage – is slightly unhelpful as we slip back into midtable (yes, three points from the play-offs… but we’re behind Bristol City, a more informative marker) but there remains more that’s right than that’s wrong. Hang in there.
Yoorns
Bachmann 3, Andrews 3, *Ngakia 4*, Pollock 3, Ogbonna 3, Sierralta 4, Louza 4, Kayembe 3, Chakvetadze 4, Baah 4, Vata 3
Subs: Bayo (for Ogbonna, 63) 3, Larouci (for Ngakia, 71) 3, Sissoko (for Kayembe, 82) NA, Ebosele (for Andrews, 82) NA, Doumbia, Ince, Porteous, Morris, Bond
