Best of the rest: How Marco Silva transformed Watford after a forgettable season under Walter Mazzarri
When Watford were recruiting in the summer they wanted someone proven, who spoke English and played expansive football, to take them in a fresh direction - Silva has done just that
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Your support makes all the difference.It is too early for the Premier League table to take shape but the most impressive of the league’s lesser 14 teams so far this season has arguably been Watford - even though they head into Saturday’s trip to Swansea City off the back of one of the most one-sided games of the season, a 6-0 defeat at Manchester City. Pep Guardiola’s team have a habit of making their opponents irrelevant and it should not be held against Marco Silva’s side.
Watford already have an impressive away record so far this season – winning at Bournemouth and Southampton – and there is no reason they cannot continue that at the Liberty Stadium tomorrow. Silva emphasised consistency at his press conference this week, and moving beyond the City game as quickly as possible. “We need to continue doing what we did before then,” he said. “It is important to us that we play our game, with our ideas and philosophy, to achieve good results.”
What has been so impressive about Watford in the first few weeks this season has been how quickly Silva has been able to make his mark, to put some life into a side that had gone utterly stale during the forgettable season under Walter Mazzarri. When Watford were recruiting in the summer they wanted someone proven, who spoke English and played expansive football, to take them in a fresh direction. They went for Silva, who turned down Crystal Palace and a big job at FC Porto to take over at Vicarage Road.
Since his arrival, Silva has been a constant presence on Watford’s Hertfordshire training ground. He is described by those close to the squad as a ‘players’ manager’, who always takes training, rather than leaving it to others, and speaks at length to every player, even the ones who are not in the team. He is also, like every modern manager, an obsessive details man who has a plan for every player in every game.
Silva has already got his squad playing his aggressive football, winning the ball high up the pitch and breaking at pace. That style - the polar opposite of Mazzarri’s football - was so successful for him at Estoril, Sporting CP and Olympiakos, and nearly kept Hull City in the Premier League too.
It helps that Watford had a good summer in the transfer market, adding the youth and pace that had been lacking from the squad over recent seasons. Coaching Watford means sacrificing the power he might have enjoyed at Palace to benefit from the transfer market expertise of Gino Pozzo and Filippo Giraldi.
So Silva could not sign every player he wanted, such as Benfica centre-back Jardel, who was out of Watford’s price range - but Pozzo and Giraldi did deliver the youth and Englishness they wanted in Nathaniel Chalobah and Will Hughes, and Chalobah has already impressed and forced his way into the England squad. There was a view in the Watford squad before the start of the season that the one thing the squad lacked was pace in behind, with every player always wanting the ball into feet. But Watford signed Richarlison and Andre Gray who already look to have sparked up a dangerous partnership.
There is always the question of Troy Deeney, still on the bench, but Gray is more mobile than the popular club captain. The former Burnley striker has been sacrificing himself for the team at times, and if Deeney were to come back in as target man then Gray could get play off his flick-ons.
This is a question for Silva to solve but so far he has shown that he learns quickly. The target for this season is safety first, but if survival is confirmed by January then there is an expectation for one or two winter signings to help the team attack the top of the table after that. Then the ambition is for a push for the Europa League places in his second season once new players are on board. Silva took tiny Estoril into that competition in his first managerial job, after rescuing them from the brink of oblivion. Getting Watford there should not be quite as hard.
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