Read David Hytner’s full match report here:
That’s your lot for this one - have a look at Gregg Bakowski’s MBM of Swansea v West Ham now - that’s over here.
Well, as desperate as Liverpool were for most of that game, Watford were excellent. Ighalo and Deeney were as excellent as ever, and Liverpool were largely shut down in midfield by Capoue and Watson too. For Jurgen Klopp...well, we’ll just say there’s still work to do.
Full-time: Watford 3-0 Liverpool
Peeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.
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90 mins + 3: Ibe cuts in from the right and tries a left-footed shot, but drags is well wide. Klopp hugs Flores on the sidelines and congratulates him on a game well-won.
90 mins +2: Both teams seem to have accepted that this is how the game is going to end, now. Liverpool have a corner that pinballs around the box a bit, but it’s eventually cleared.
90 mins: Three minutes of added time to come.
89 mins: Watford really have been excellent here. Liverpool haven’t been any good, obviously, and they never really recovered from that early goal, but they haven’t been allowed to settle by a relentless set of Hornets. Hats off to Quique and the boys.
87 mins: Final change for Watford - Adlene Guedioura is coming on, and Ighalo has a chance to take a bow and the applause from the home fans.
85 mins: Beautiful goal that. Moreno is caught in possession about 40 yards from his own goal, Ighalo powers towards goal and lays it off to his left, then the ball finds Behrami on the right. He clips a cross into the middle where Ighalo has taken up residence, and he heads past a flailing Bogdan from about eight yards out.
GOAL! Watford 3-0 Liverpool (Ighalo 85)
And that would be that.
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84 mins: Liverpool haven’t looked particularly penetrating since Klopp’s dice-throw attacking substitutions a few minutes ago. One of those newbies, Benteke, is carelessly caught offside while looking right down the line on the left.
82 mins: Sakho’s torrid afternoon continues. He gives away a free-kick by clambering all over Ighalo like he’s a kiddies’ climbing frame.
80 mins: “Hulloa. Me again,” announces Christopher Burke. “This may be oversimplifying, but why do the Liverpool players look as though they’ve never in their lives faced pressure high up the field? Presumably, under Klopp, they practice it all the time, meaning they will have all faced it as well. I know training and matches aren’t quite the same, but still it’s odd to see them so skittish, to a man, under pressure.”
79 mins: Another change for Watford - Abdi is off, and Valon Behrami comes on.
78 mins: Britos gets a booking for dragging Benteke down as they were both chasing a through ball. Only the presence of a few other defenders saved him from harsher punishment, there.
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77 mins: Liverpool win a brace of corners, but the danger is averted when Gomes claims a cross above Ibe.
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76 mins: Change for Watford - delightful pint-sized Scotchman Ikechi Anya is on, replacing Jurado.
75 mins: Capoue completely mugs off Lucas, charging out of defence, but Liverpool get away with it when Ighalo takes an uncharacteristically poor touch. Meanwhile, Can is down after receiving an accidental flailing arm from Deeney to the chops.
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74 mins: Double change ahoy for Liverpool - Lallana and Firmino are hooked, with Jordan Ibe and Christian Benteke coming on in their place.
72 mins: Britos makes an unconvincing clearance that falls to Can in space, he has time to measure the shot but doesn’t get a huge amount of power behind it, and Gomes saves.
70 mins: Lucas deals with Ighalo’s threat by simply shoving him to the floor. That is, I believe, against the rules.
68 mins: Sakho’s bad day continues. Deeney mugs him on the right, but his low cross is blocked at the near post. Oh my.
66 mins: Save! The ball drops to Henderson at the back post, he has time and space, measures the shot but Gomes makes a fine save, tipping the effort over the bar. Henderson looks as if the world is against him, that cruel fate has intervened again to deny him.
65 mins: Adam Hirst is pining for a Gray’s Sports Almanac: “Odds for the following league accumulator at Christmas…
- Chelsea below Bournemouth
- Liverpool not able to overhaul Watford
- Manchester United level on points with Crystal Palace
- Arsenal and Manchester City fighting to not lose ground on leaders Leicester.
“You could have retired on a quid bet made in early August.”
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63 mins: Oh my! Sakho is having One Of Those Days. A ball is played into Ighalo, the Liverpool defender slips and those limbs flail absolutely everywhere. Ighalo is free on goal, it looks like it might be game over but Bogdan actually stands up pretty well and makes a fine save.
62 mins: A cross from the right goes into the box and Abdi just does enough to put Lallana off and shield him from the header, the ball falls to Moreno on the left but he hammers a cross back, and it sails over everyone’s head.
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61 mins: Another of those big diagonals from Henderson, this time from the right on the halfway line, finds Lallana at the back stick, but his looping header floats wide.
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59 mins: Ighalo tries that delightful ‘chop/scoop’ thing that has become so useful for him and, frankly, leaves Sakho on his arse. The ball into the middle looks for Jurado, but the winger can’t quite get an effort on goal and it bobbles out.
58 mins: Another ball into the Liverpool area, in Sakho’s general direction, causes a few problems, but it doesn’t quite drop for Ighalo.
57 mins: Liverpool counter at some pace, as Coutinho stabs it through to Origi on the right channel and for a moment it’s two vs one. Coutinho screams for the return pass and bawls his colleague out when it doesn’t come, but it didn’t especially help that the Brazilian was standing offside for the majority of that passage.
55 mins: Lucas v Deeney and Ighalo could get ugly, a hint of which is given as the Brazilian is outscrapped, and Can has to dash back to bail his chum out. Surely it would be better for the German to play back there?
53 mins: Watford dash forwards after another moment of uncertainty from Sakho cedes possession, and Deeney threads a pass through looking for Ighalo, but it’s too heavy and Sakho had recovered to put the striker off his stride. Or push him over - whichever you prefer.
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52 mins: Henderson gets down the right, loops it high to the back post where Moreno tries a delivery of his own, but it’s cleared.
50 mins: A long ball over the top looks for Ighalo, Bogdan charges out and a million Liverpool fans say a quiet prayer...but the keeper claims it, climbing all over the striker it has to be said.
49 mins: Mac Millings has been on: “Mr. Naylor’s 19th-minute comment reminded me that, watching the Cup Final at age 12, I thought heading the ball out of Steve Sherwood’s hands and into the goal was the worst thing Andy Gray would ever do. Wrong again.”
It was just....banter.
48 mins: Liverpool looking much more purposeful after the break. Can scoops a ball over the top looking for Origi in the right channel, in a very similar spot from which Ighalo scored earlier, but the Belgian’s shot isn’t powerful enough and to the near post, so Gomes claims.
47 mins: Early chance for Liverpool, as Origi knocks down a cross in the box and Lallana tries to get over a shot, but it’s blocked, it falls to Coutinho but he can’t get an effort in. Moreno then finds himself in space aplenty at the back post, but slips just as he tries a shot, and it goes wide.
46 mins: We’re back. Liverpool actually haven’t been *that* bad in their build-up play, it’s just at either end of the pitch they’re struggling. Which, admittedly is quite the caveat. And, immediately after typing that Firmino hits the ball out straight from kick-off.
Mark Judd has a seasonal message for all to take heed of: “Liverpool losing. A small crumb of comfort for this Man Utd fan. Always pays to remember there are those worse off than you.”
You would say this is another example of this baffling and illogical Premier League season, but this is actually seventh beating ninth. A rare case of the form book and established order being respected this season.
Half-time: Watford 2-0 Liverpool
Peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.
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45 mins + 2: Excellent control from Ighalo on the left, and he tries an ambitious curling ball through for Deeney, but it’s overhit and even Bogdan can’t make a mess of a simple claim.
45 mins + 1: Liverpool defend a corner with uncharacteristic competence and go on the counter, but a combination of Origi, Henderson and Clyne don’t make as much of it as they could/should’ve done.
44 mins: Coutinho makes some room on the left and flings a pass out to Henderson on the right, but he made his run just a little early and is flagged offside. The Watford crowd are most amused.
42 mins: Watford eventually take the corner, which Watson fizzes into the near post on the inswing, Lallana misses and Bogdan just about manages to shovel it out before a third embarrassing goal goes in. Looks like it’s Lucas in defence for Liverpool, rather than Can. Oh boy.
40 mins: That’s it for Skrtel, who may have done his hamstring there. Interestingly, it’s not Toure who comes on but Divock Origi, so you’d imagine that Can will drop back into defence and a significant rejig further up the pitch.
39 mins: Gomes humps one downfield and Deeney gives Skrtel a little nudge, causing him to concede a corner and injure himself again.
38 mins: Jurado, who has looked pretty lively, tries to slip a ball through for Ighalo but Skrtel intercepts.
Eyes down, here’s Conor Murphy: “Half-time pundit bingo: Souness to highlight Liverpool’s failure to complain to ref following foul on Bogdan, as symptomatic of lack of leadership in the away team.”
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37 mins: Lallana tries to run through the Watford defence but, perhaps with no thanks to the slightly bobbly surface, just shows a little too much of the ball to Ake, who steps in and makes a solid challenge.
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35 mins: Paul Devlin riffs on Liverpool and relationships: “With the honeymoon period well and truly over, hopefully Klopp is now experiencing his four year itch with some of these players. It is a damning indictment of the Liverpool transfer policy if recent years that so much has been spent on “creative” players and “strikers”, but it looks like only Coutinho can dig them out of this hole. Married to a leaky defence and constant adulterous goalkeeping, it is no wonder that Liverpool’s relationship with the upper half of the league is on the rocks.”
34 mins: More from the Quique Sanchez Flores lookalike dept., this time from the Guardian’s Dan Lucas....
.@NickMiller79 Flores is more Noah Taylor for me pic.twitter.com/ih52JGxUZa
— Dan Lucas (@DanLucas86) December 20, 2015
33 mins: Oh my. Almost another massive gaffe from Bogdan, who bafflingly tries to punch what should’ve been a routine ball through, bouncing ahead of the Watford forwards, it hits Lucas and nearly bobbles back and into the net, but Skrtel was there to mop up. Eeesh.
32 mins: Skrtel is back on the pitch, but he’s moving a little like Old Man Steptoe. He wins a header but limps away after landing from a very small jump.
31 mins: Doesn’t look great this, for Skrtel. He’s limping towards the touchline after receiving fairly extensive treatment, and Kolo Toure is on standby.
29 mins: Skrtel goes up for a header and wins it, but lands with something of a thud, if a man of his frame can do anything else when returning to earth. He does require some treatment though, with his lower back looking like it’s taken the brunt.
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28 mins: Clyne gets down the left and clips a cross to the back post, looking for that aerial powerhouse Coutinho, but Nyom is there to head behind. Coutinho takes the corner, and Gomes offers Bogdan a lesson in how to calmly claim an inswinging corner.
27 mins: Jurado goes down off the ball crying foul against Clyne, but nothing doing there from the ref.
26 mins: Clyne looks as if he miscontrols a ball on the right and takes it out of play, but nothing is given. The ol’ ironic cheers go up a few moments later when the ball does go out and a throw is given to Watford.
25 mins: Liverpool have been scrappy since the second goal. Moreno dithers over taking a throw a few yards from Klopp, who gives him both barrels.
23 mins: Christopher Burke has been on: “A friend pointed out to me last year as we were watching Sakho flail around with the ball at his feet that he’s nonetheless a very competent passer out of the back. It’s just that “composed” isn’t the word you would use to describe his bearing. But I’d rather him with the ball at his feet and the pressure ratcheting up than Skrtel or, God forbid, Lovren or Lucas.”
22 mins: Moreno and Nyom - winner of the ‘Name That Most Sounds Like A Fast Car Going Past’ contest - clash, blame is thrown from both sides but it was the Liverpool man who was late. Both men go down requiring attention, but after they both clamber to their feet there’s a short ticking off from the ref and everybody goes about their day.
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21 mins: Ake looks rather lively down the left for Watford today. He belts down the flank and wins a corner - or, at least he should’ve won a corner, his cross deflecting off Clyne, but a goal-kick is given.
20 mins: “Hugh Laurie is really an amazingly talented guy, isn’t he?” writes Marie Meyer. “Jeeves & Wooster is just not to my taste, and I had issues with the premise of “House”, but in both cases I admired his performances. What he’s doing now at Watford is remarkable.”
19 mins: History lessons...
@NickMiller79 Re Watford's goal, I'm imagining it as payback for the other Merseyside club's first goal in the 1984 Cup Final. Hope so!
— Gary Naylor (@garynaylor999) December 20, 2015
18 mins: Jürgen doesn’t look happy. Watford’s high-pressing game today is a classic ‘own medicine’ trick. Lucas tries a big diagonal but it’s over Moreno’s head on the left.
15 mins: Well, well, well. Deeney battles to win the ball in midfield, too easily from a Liverpool perspective, and shovels the ball over the top for Ighalo. Skrtel should probably deal with it, but Ighalo’s intensity and speed is too much, he creates enough space to get a shot away and hits one into the ground, across goal but beyond Bogdan and into the far corner of the net.
GOAL! Watford 2-0 Liverpool (Ighalo 15)
Oh my.
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13 mins: Henderson diverts from the previous theme and tries a neat pass down the right channel looking for Firmino, but the Brazilian is offside. Liverpool have had most of the ball since Bogdan’s blooper, but they haven’t done a massive amount with it so far.
12 mins: Henderson looks like he’s on ‘big diagonals’ duty today. He hammers two inside a minute, but neither come to much. Perhaps it’s the Stevie influence back at Melwood.
11 mins: Henderson sprays a pass from right to left and Coutinho controls, briefly struggles to get the thing from ‘neath his feet but eventually makes some room, shoots but it’s easily saved by Gomes.
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9 mins: Sakho is one of those players who always looks like he’s going to make a massive mistake, even when he doesn’t. He almost loses possession of the ball inside his own half but manages to turn out of it with the help of some flailing limbs. Can then powers down the left side and into the box, but can only win a corner.
8 mins: Lallana momentarily has some space on the right side of the box, the ball breaks to Clyne who shoots, but Ake blocks it nicely.
7 mins: Interestingly, the replays of the goal suggest Bogdan might actually have had full control of the ball before Ake nudged it out of his hands. If it was it was only for the tiniest of moments and his protests seemed like an embarrassed afterthought, mind.
6 mins: So much for Watford relying solely on Ighalo and Deeney anyway. Although the latter forces another chance by charging down a Sakho clearance, but his bent cross looking for his partner at the far post is cut out by a stretching Skrtel.
5 mins: Somebody show Bogdan this at half-time to make him feel better.
Bonucci. Great own goal 🙈 https://t.co/2iViuz5ISe
— Khaled Al Nouss (@KhaledAlNouss) December 20, 2015
3 mins: Watson whips the corner right under the crossbar, it looks like a routine take for Adam Bogdan but the keeper making his Premier League debut for Liverpool pats it down at his feet, tries to regather but Ake whips it away before he can take full control of it then stabs the ball in from about a yard out. What a start for Watford.
GOAL! Watford 1-0 Liverpool (Ake 3)
What a howler!
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2 mins: Sakho nearly gives the ball away to Deeney, but a long right leg scoops it away. Jurado then slips a nice ball inside Clyne for Ake to run onto, which he does and smartly wins a corner off the Liverpool full-back.
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1 min: And we’re away. Early on it looks like a 4-3-3 for Liverpool, or even a 4-1-2-3 given how deep Lucas is sitting already.
The teams are making their way out. There is what I believe the kids call a ‘tifo’ in the Rookery end. It looks quite nice. Can you have a ‘tifo’ in Hertfordshire? Damn right you can.
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“Rare game today,” writes Paul Ewart, “both sets of supporters love their managers. Add Brad Smith and Daniel Sturridge and that would be LIverpool’s strongest lineup this season. In an ideal world Bogdan would have a blinder while Benteke would score from the bench, Firmino having created mayhem in the interim.”
Brad Smith? Fair enough...
Of course the common thread between these two clubs is John Barnes. Here’s a piece by Gregg Bakowski from a couple of years ago on the great man:
So, no colossal surprises in the Watford team (indeed, no changes from the win at Sunderland), but a couple of notables in the Liverpool side. Simon Mignolet apparently has a slight hamstring twang so Adam Bogdan makes his first league start for the club, while both Christian Benteke and Divock Origi are on the bench, meaning Roberto Firmino is up top on his own. Looks like it will be more of a 4-3-3 system than the standard 4-2-3-1, unless Jordan Henderson or Emre Can play on the right. James Milner is out with a calf strain, and of course Daniel Sturridge remains thoroughly broken.
Team news
Watford
Gomes; Nyom, Cathcart, Britos, Ake; Abdi, Watson, Capoue, Jurado; Ighalo, Deeney. Subs: Behrami, Oulare, Guedioura, Anya, Holebas, Diamanti, Arlauskis.
Liverpool
Bogdan; Clyne, Skrtel, Sakho, Moreno; Henderson, Lucas, Can; Lallana, Firmino, Coutinho. Subs: Toure, Benteke, Allen, Origi, Ibe, Fulton, Randall.
Referee: Mark Clattenburg (Tyne & Wear)
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Preamble
Leicester are doing quite well at the moment, all told. Top of the league at Christmas, and five points clear no less when assorted sages (including one not a million miles from this MBM) insisted that they would be fo’ the drop. But there’s another unfancied lot doing rather nicely for themselves despite similar fortellings of doom. No, not Liverpool, but Watford, those pleasing Hornets who are buzzing around the upper bits of the table and having a lovely old time while doing it. They’ve won five of their last seven, and of the two they haven’t one was against Leicester and the other an unlucky defeat to Manchester United. What’s more, they’ve managed to take up a position just four points off the Champions League places by only having scored the same number of goals as Sunderland. You have to respect that.
And they’re doing it by genuinely being quite unfashionable, tactically speaking. Not many clubs use a strike partnership these days, but while Troy Deeney does tend to drop a little deeper, he and Odion Ighalo do form a genuine duo up top. And quite the duo they are, contributing a handy 15 goals to the cause already this season. The only problem/worry there of course is that the team as a whole only have 18, so having two players chip in with 84% of your goals isn’t perhaps ideal. Speaking of Ighalo, he spoke to Sachin Nakrani this week, and he seems like a very nice young man:
I thank God for the great year and successful season I’m having but I’m still the same me,” Ighalo insists. “It’s just the goals that have changed. My life, my training, my work, is still the same and I just want to keep going and giving my best for Watford.
“After the Championship I did believe I’d score goals in the Premier League – but not the way it is going now because I know the Premier League is more difficult. But I put in a lot of hard work during pre-season and maybe God said it’s my time.”
And then there’s Liverpool. Jürgen Klopp’s Kop lot haven’t quite got things together just yet. For every shellacking of Manchester City there’s a gentle fart of a performance against Newcastle, and while there are signs that he’s doing his thing for them Reds, it’s not there just yet. You get the feeling that he won’t quite get things as he wants until he has the players to do it, which he hasn’t at the moment. But if he can show signs of improvement in the interim, and perhaps even sneak into the top four (which a win here will put them two points off) then there’s plenty of reason for optimism at Anfield.
He’s talking a decent game though, at least. He said this week:
Our game is not that intensive, we are at the start of the development so we obviously have to do more, but it is not the plan to run 130 kilometres every week.
“The plan is to run the right moments, play clever so you know which spaces you have to close rather than having to run 100 metres back to your goal.
“We are not here for athletics, we are here to play football. We want to win games, but to start something new you have to invest more which is what we have done until now.”
All interesting stuff. Should be a decent old game this. Stay tuned and that.
Kick-off: 1.30pm GMT.
Nick will be here shortly. In the meantime, take a look at what Watford striker Odion Ighalo told the Guardian’s Sachin Nakrani about his remarkable 2015:
Tuesday afternoon and Watford’s first-team squad are taking part in a practice match at their London Colney training ground. It is an intense session leading to a blur of bodies, yet it is still possible to notice that someone is missing – Odion Ighalo. Soon the striker is spotted hurrying through the canteen holding a tray full of smoothies. “The physio told me to bring them to the guys in the gym, I was helping him,” he explains as we sit down to conduct this interview, one in which it becomes clear that Ighalo’s generosity of spirit stretches beyond being a juice carrier.
The 26-year-old goes on to speak about how he regularly sends a portion of his monthly salary to his family and a number of charities in his native Nigeria, with his desire to help those less fortunate than him formed on the back of an upbringing he describes as having been a “struggle” and that has led to deep humility within a deeply religious man. Over the course of our 30-minute conversation, Ighalo refers to God more than a dozen times – and more often than not in thanks for the life he leads now.
In professional terms that has meant goals, goals and even more goals. Ighalo has 26 to his name during this calender year, making him the top scorer across the whole of English football in 2015, with the one he secured for Watford in their 1-0 victory over Sunderland on 12 December taking his tally to 10 in his debut campaign in the Premier League. It is a highly impressive return and reason for Liverpool to fear before their visit to Vicarage Road on Sunday lunchtime.
“I thank God for the great year and successful season I’m having but I’m still the same me,” Ighalo insists. “It’s just the goals that have changed. My life, my training, my work, is still the same and I just want to keep going and giving my best for Watford.”
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