Joined
Oct 8, 2015
Messages
2,224
Reaction score
1
Points
36
So, you might be wondering why I haven't put out any updates for my King of Rome story but the reason was that I've decided to try out something new. When FM16 came out last November, I really wanted to start a Sir Alex Ferguson challenge just for my own entertainment, not to post anywhere and I ended up with Watford. Playing around with them, I just gave up on them because my tactics were not good enough. Now that I've grown to be a lot more patient with the game, I decided to give them another go as they're a very interesting team to take over at the beginning of the game. I'll still update my King of Rome story when I have time and of course my chairman game but as of right now, this story will now be my main focus. So without further ado, welcome to the not-so Golden Boys.



View attachment 134103
May 13th 2015View attachment 134104
The man who led Watford to a 13th-place finish in their first season back in the Premier League since the 2006/2007 season has left the club after a season in charge as he was not able to secure a contract extension at the Hertfordshire-based club. Many fans are said to be disappointed with his departure considering how well he did in his first season with a newly promoted side and they hope that the next manager will be able to do as well if not better than him.
Walter Mazzarri
and Roberto Martinez are widely seen as favourites to get the job but some rumours are saying the Watford board wants to try something new and maybe not necessarily go for a high-profile manager who would cost a lot more. One thing's for sure, it will be a very interesting summer for Watford and their fans and we could see some huge changes for the Premier League side, who will face ex-Championship teams Burnley, Middlesbrough and Hull City in next season's edition of the English top tier.

View attachment 134102

[video=youtube;13g1n-8XfyU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13g1n-8XfyU[/video]​
 
View attachment 134092


View attachment 134091
Watford chairman announces Letellier as new manager
View attachment 134090
The Hornets have made a very interesting announcement today in which Hugo Letellier, a 36-year old French manager with no previous real managerial experience, has been appointed as the Watford manager until June 2016. No one really knows anything about this completely unknown man who comes in as a huge surprise to all the Watford fans and in general football fans around the world. Everyone does seem quite excited to see what he's capable of though as he will not have the pressure to succeed as much as if Pep Guardiola had been appointed for example.

View attachment 134089
 
Chapter 1: Pre-season 2015 and transfers

View attachment 134055


View attachment 134054
3rd August 2015

Watford arrivals:

We've been quite an active club in this transfer window and in our first post of the 2015/2016 season, we give you a quick run down of each of the new signings along with some more information on the players themselves.

First up, loan signings:

View attachment 134053 Rolando was our new manager's first signing in charge and in our opinion, it's quite a good deal both for us and Newcastle. With Steven Berghuis out on loan, we don't really have any players who can play on the wings and Aarons is a very exciting young English prospect who needs time in the top tier to develop. There doesn't seem to be a future fee involved but we are paying 100% of his wages, although they're not very expensive (at least that's what we were told) so it's not really a big deal.

View attachment 134051 Another great signing for us. During the pre-season friendlies, we saw our manager mostly use either a 4-2-3-1 wide formation or a 4-4-1-1, both of which require a capable attacking midfielder and Correa does just that. He was impressive in our pre-season games, scoring twice and assisting once in 5 games and he really looks like he could be a key-player for us come the start of the season. His pace, dribbling and first touch are all we need up front to make sure we create chances up top. Again, no future fee involved and with his release clause at £26 million, it's unlikely that we'll make a move for him at the end of the season.

Now, onto the more serious signings and then we'll give you a pre-season review:

View attachment 134050 Our manager's first proper signing since his arrival and how fitting that he'd be a French one. Gourcuff was a free agent and you know what, despite his injury problems we think he could be a huge player for Watford in the upcoming season. He can play as an attacking midfielder and a centre-midfielder to help Capoue in the more defensive areas of the pitch and he was also a key player in our pre-season, scoring once and assisting once in 4 games. An experienced playmaker who will definitely provide not only quality but also squad depth.

View attachment 134049 Now here's the big one. Federico Bernardeschi, most expensive player in Watford's history. That's quite a lot of pressure on the promising 21-year old Italian winger but man are we happy that Letellier signed him up. He's one of the world's most exciting youngsters and in the future will definitely prove to live up to that £8.5 million fee which surpasses our previous club-record fee of £6 million for Capoue from Tottenham last season. I'd say he was the least impressive of the new signings during pre-season but he also played less games and we're confident that he'll come up big this season in the league. A quality winger who can score goals and run down the wings with ease, nothing better than to put some pressure on the defenders that we'll face this season!




Pre-season review:

Now that you all know who Watford signed this summer, let's just take a look at how we did in our friendlies. We played a total of 7 games from the 11th of July until today and well, let's just say we haven't had the best of pre-seasons yet. Obviously, Letellier was trying out new formations and systems every game so it wasn't that easy for the players to adapt every time but with 2 wins, 4 draws and 1 loss from our pre-season, I think we didn't do great. Just one loss from 7 games is pretty decent but we never really faced any extremely tough oppositions although our last 2 games were much better which is good ahead of our Premier League opener against Liverpool in 5 days.

View attachment 134048 So that was our last pre-season friendly and it went really well with a lot of goals, chances and possession for us but Hempstead do play in the National League South, so it's not exactly an incredible victory. Overall, I just don't think we were ready defensively. We conceded 8 times in just 5 games and then kept two clean sheets in our last 5 games which doesn't sound that bad but kind of is going into the Premier League, a very attacking league overall. We did score quite a few goals though, 13 in 7 games which is almost 2 goals a game which is promising. Our best game was probably against Vitesse when we beat them 2-0 at home and our draw with PSV but other than, it was never anything that special.

View attachment 134047
Overall our best performers were Correa and Watson, which was great to see because it means our signings or at least Correa have fit in the system well already. We had to wait until just 4 days ago for our first win of the season so although we're all a bit worried for the Liverpool game, it's what comes next that's a bit scarier. This month we face Liverpool, then Premier League champions Leicester, then Swansea and then Bournemouth. Other than Aston Villa last year, there are no bad teams in the Premier League and all the teams we're facing are really decent so I hope we'll get a couple of good results to start off the season well and get the players fired up for the rest of it, otherwise it could get bad.

In terms of formations and systems, here's what it looks like Letellier could play:

Either a 4-2-3-1 wide system for games where we're expected to really dominate and win the game (or just to be more attacking);

View attachment 134045
Or a more counter-attacking/defensive 4-4-1-1 to make sure we control the midfield and still manage to get forward to try and make things happen up front when we get the ball;

View attachment 134044
The best thing to do against Liverpool would probably be to start off with the 4-2-3-1 and test the waters a little bit and see if we manage to pressure them enough before then switching to the 4-4-1-1 if we're getting completely dominated and can see that we just won't get anything from the game if we keep attacking like that.

Anyways, this was our pre-season review and our transfer review for Watford, tune in on Saturday at 3pm for our first game of this Premier League season against Liverpool at Anfield! Remember that if you can't watch it on the TV, Watford's Twitter will be putting out updates every now and then along with the team sheet before the game starts!
 
Chapter 1.1: Liverpool away, first game of the season

View attachment 133937


View attachment 133936
8th August 2015

First game of the season review:

So I'm writing this outside of Anfield right now after our first game of the season against Liverpool and before I say anything, let's just show you all how we got on with some screenshots from the club's Twitter account.

View attachment 133935A very strong team indeed that we put out there with Bernardeschi, Gourcuff, Correa and Zuniga all making their debuts for the club with Ighalo on the bench controversially. Looking at the players in the starting 11, it seems like Letellier opted to go for the 4-2-3-1 in the end, let's see how we do with that.

View attachment 133934View attachment 133933
View attachment 133932Now this was the start of the game and honestly, it just seemed like the players weren't in it. We were way too attacking and every pass was just not good at all and going straight to the Liverpool players which ended up costing us a goal really early on. A pretty bad tactical decision on our manager's part in my opinion.

View attachment 133931
View attachment 133930
View attachment 133929So there we are losing 2-0 at half-time which to be honest, against a team like Liverpool, isn't that bad of a result for us but it's the performance that has been quite poor. Passes are inaccurate, we have most of the possession but can't really do anything with it and all our shots go completely wide.

View attachment 133928View attachment 133927View attachment 133926At this point we really started to push on and made some great moves but unfortunately it seemed like we were still unable to produce anything in front of goal which was really disappointing because we really were the better team for a while.

View attachment 133925View attachment 133924View attachment 133923And that was the end of it, thankfully. Today was really just a day where both teams played well and tried to take their chances but in the end, Liverpool were more clinical and it was their day, not ours. I don't think the performance in itself was that bad but it's true that we really have to do better in front of goal against Leicester if we want to come back from this devastating result. Honestly, looking at the match stats, we at least deserved one or two goals so it's really disappointing.

View attachment 133922
They do support my points though of us not being able to pass the ball and shooting on target and taking our chances. Imagine if those 14 shots had been on target, we could've easily gotten at least 2 goals and if those passes completed had been more accurate, we wouldn't have lost this badly. There's no point dwelling on it now obviously but it should teach us a lesson ahead of the Leicester game. Liverpool played a 4-4-1-1 too so maybe we should consider playing with our 4-4-1-1 system and see what we can do with it. My Watford Man of the Match award is going to have to go to Capoue though, he was outstanding and definitely our best player today, even better than some Liverpool players on the pitch today.

View attachment 133921
 
Chapter 1.2: First home game of the season against the champions, Leicester

I've decided to format this story in a way that I will make those game reviews for all the big games (against rivals and big Premier League teams) and the rest will just be monthly reviews so for example, the next update will feature our next 4 games and then there will be a game review for the Crystal Palace game in September. Let me know what you think!



View attachment 133867


View attachment 133866
15th August 2015

Watford vs Leicester review:

So I just got back from Vicarage Road where we played against Leicester, the current Premier League champions, and it was really important for us to do well to try and forget about that Liverpool result. Just like the last game review that I did, I'll show you some screenshots from the club's Twitter and make some comments throughout too.

View attachment 133865I'm not gonna lie, when the stadium announcer shouted out the names of the players who were playing today and I heard that there were no changes in our lineup from the Liverpool game, I got a bit scared. We got beaten 4-0! Hopefully Letellier made some tactical changes to really do better with this team though.

View attachment 133864View attachment 133863Really not a good start to the game and again, it was a missed pass that cost us the goal. If there's anything we need to do a LOT better this season, it's going to be passing the ball to each other. Already 1-0 down and I have a feeling it could be another bad day for us just like against Liverpool...

View attachment 133862View attachment 133861Phew. Finally we score a goal! It was such a great goal to watch and what a way for Anya to step up and prove everyone why he's starting on the wing for us today. This gives us a lot of confidence and to be honest since the Leicester goal, we've been looking like the better side!

View attachment 133860View attachment 133859View attachment 133858Yes!!! The whole stadium went wild when Prodl scored and what a header from him. I don't know why they said it was a scrappy header because this was a banging header in the bottom right corner. We're leading against the champions!

View attachment 133857View attachment 133856What a win for the boys today. I think all the Watford fans in the stadium today were extremely proud of the players and how they fought for the win today despite going a goal down so early on in the game. We get some crucial points and hopefully now it can set the tone for our next few games! Overall the game was really, really tight but I think it shows once again that we're a strong team capable of great things. We played well against Liverpool but didn't get the result, we played well today and we got the result. It's as simple as that.

View attachment 133855
There are the stats and as I said, a really, really tight game. We got the victory and we probably deserved it looking at our average rating but it could have gone either way. Really pleasing to get our first win of the season against the Premier League champions though. Next up is Hull City and then Port Vale in the Capital One Cup! Let's hope our good form continues.
 
Last edited:
Chapter 1.3: The preparation to our first rival game

View attachment 133843


View attachment 133842
18th September 2015

A review of our last four games ahead of our Crystal Palace clash

We've had a couple of games in preparation of our first game against a rival this season, Crystal Palace. We faced Hull City, Swansea and Bournemouth in the Premier League and played Port Vale in the Capital One Cup 2nd round. Overall, we had a fabulous month and continue our good start to the Premier League season since that opening day defeat to Liverpool.

View attachment 133840
So there we go! 3 wins and one loss is really decent considering we're predicted to finish 15th in the league this season and we're sitting in 8th ahead of our game against Crystal Palace. They've been doing really well too lately so it'll be a tough game but with our last few games we can definitely get the victory. The game against Hull was crazy and to be honest, the one against Swansea was really easy. The players got complacent at the end of it which was the only reason we conceded twice but Ighalo has been on fire so far and Bernardeschi is finally starting get fired up and score goals.

We got some statistics since the start of the season too to analyse what we've been doing correctly and not correctly:

View attachment 133835
So the stats do actually show that we're not doing well against teams that play with a 4-4-2 formation and that makes sense; the game against Bournemouth we lost and against Leicester we conceded a lot of chances. It's great to see our 4-2-3-1 doing so well as we've scored so many goals in the league this season so far but it's true that defensively, we're just not there. Or at least we're too open in front of our box which means that Letellier should find a way to actually close down that space in the middle and put one of our strong midfielders just ahead of the defence as a DM so make sure that we close down that space and concede less!

View attachment 133834
View attachment 133833
View attachment 133832
So as you can see, the games against Hull and Swansea were pretty close but we got all points against them, which is good, it means we don't have to be pushing extremely hard for good results. The match stats from the Bournemouth do support the previous stat which said we're weak against 4-4-2s and Bournemouth definitely deserved the win so hopefully we'll find a way to counter that later in the season. Up next now, Crystal Palace!

View attachment 133831
 
Who doesn't like a linecoigne Story. Btw What a fantastic beard
 
Chapter 1.4: End of September 2015 and Manchester City at home

Who doesn't like a linecoigne Story. Btw What a fantastic beard
Hahaha cheers mate, only wish I could rock something like that in real life :D I hope you enjoy this story btw ;)



View attachment 133824


View attachment 133823
3rd October 2015

Leicester in the League Cup, Southampton and Manchester City

After a really solid win against Crystal Palace, we faced Leicester in the Capital One Cup and Southampton in the Premier League, both games key to continue our good run in this so-far pretty successful season. Here's what happened:

View attachment 133822
A great win against Leicester AGAIN which sees the lads go through to the 4th round where we'll play Stoke! The game against Southampton was very nervy too but we got the win too which was fantastic. What a great start to our second season in the Premier League!
All of this has been written right after the Manchester City game which just took place at Vicarage Road so let's talk about how we did in that game too shall we?

View attachment 133821A very strong lineup for this game against City, hopefully we can get a solid result against the 2nd-placed Premier League side. Last time we faced a major title contender, it was on the opening day against Liverpool and we lost 4-0 so we really need to do better today.

View attachment 133820View attachment 133814It was an incredible goal and Bernardeschi has proven to be such an incredible player in the past month, it's just such an honour to have him as a part of our squad! He truly is a wonderful player and I think there could be a lot of clubs trying to get him at the end of the season.

View attachment 133812View attachment 133811What a great first half we played. Honestly, the game ended about 5 minutes ago and I'm still just amazed at how well we played in that first half. The second half though, is another story.

View attachment 133809View attachment 133808View attachment 133807What a result for the Hornets! When I said the second half was a different story, I just meant we had even better chances and defended so well! Letellier moved down one of our centre midfielders in the defensive midfielder role and since then we've been incredibly solid defensively and offensively! What a season we're having. I'll put a screenshot of the table right now and I have to say, who would've thought that an unknown 36 year old manager would manage to get us in that position after 8 games?

View attachment 133806
This game against Manchester City gives us a huge boost in confidence and we're 2nd in the league, which is just unheard of. Can we pull a Leicester? Let's not get ahead of ourselves Watford fans, we're doing well but we've not even gone through a tough period yet and that'll come eventually. Our next 4 games are against Tottenham, Everton, Stoke in the Capital One Cup and Chelsea so we've got a LOT of work to do still. That win against Manchester City though is definitely our best win of the season so far.
 
Chapter 1.5: Tottenham away, the real test for top 4

View attachment 133771


View attachment 133770
18th October 2015

Our battle for top 4

Good morning Watford fans! So it's the day after our game against Tottenham and although most of you might have watched the game or made the trip to East London to see it, let me just give you a little rundown of how we did in case you don't know the score yet.

View attachment 133769So we aligned a strong side for this Tottenham game but with quite a few players out suspended or injured which will make this game even harder for us. Bernardeschi got injured on international duty with the Italy U21s and he's out for at least 5 months so we are really going to need to work hard to try and keep our good form going.

View attachment 133768View attachment 133767View attachment 133766View attachment 133765View attachment 133764Definitely not a good first half for us and we look a lot weaker without Nyom and Bernardeschi on the field. It's a big blow but hopefully we can limit the damage or just come back from this in the second half. Not many chances for us so hopefully we'll get more of those too.

View attachment 133763View attachment 133762A disappointing result but deserved. Chelsea and Liverpool played their games in hand and we're now in 5th, just ahead of Crystal Palace and Tottenham. Spurs were superior out there and definitely deserved the win today so there's nothing to complain about from our side. We weren't good enough and our good run comes to an end as we come back down to Earth after an amazing month and a half. Next up is Everton, then Stoke in the Capital One Cup and finally Chelsea in the Premier League.
 
Amazing detail and graphics, man! Really enjoying it. My main save on this FM has been with Watford too, they're a fun team to use! On the old update Holebas was an absolute beast as a wing-back at LB. Was named player of the year in the Premier League in my first season :p
 
Amazing detail and graphics, man! Really enjoying it. My main save on this FM has been with Watford too, they're a fun team to use! On the old update Holebas was an absolute beast as a wing-back at LB. Was named player of the year in the Premier League in my first season :p
He had a slow start for me to be honest, but has been doing better as of late! Hopefully he can keep it up during our big games :) and yes they really are a fun team considering they were just promoted (at least with the default database since I'm using the updated one with the relegations and promotions update) and have a really decent squad!
 
yes this has been a good read so far mate,so much so that im tempted to start my own saf challenge.Wanted to do a lower league save but might postpone that until fm17
 
yes this has been a good read so far mate,so much so that im tempted to start my own saf challenge.Wanted to do a lower league save but might postpone that until fm17
Thanks mate, really appreciate the support :) a lower league would definitely be a bit late imo, which is why I started a save in the Premier League instead!
 
Chapter 1.6: Chelsea at the Bridge

View attachment 133196


View attachment 133195
31st October 2015

A difficult away game

Good afternoon Watford fans, I'm here outside Stamford Bridge right now just ahead of the game against Chelsea which will definitely be a tough away game but if we work hard enough, there's no reason for us to get a good result against them. They're 3rd in the league and we're 5th and we're in with a real chance of showing what we're capable of. First, let's look at our two fixtures that followed our loss to Tottenham in London about 2 weeks ago.

View attachment 133194
The Everton draw was tough to take because we played quite well and that defeat to Stoke was probably even worse considering it was in the Capital One Cup but thankfully, it means we just have the FA Cup to take part in now later in the season and we can really focus on the Premier League. Considering the season we've been having, it would definitely be good to make sure we finished as high as possible from here! So that's it for my preview on the Chelsea game, I'll post some screenshots from Watford's Twitter at the end of the game and hopefully it'll be a good result for us. Come on the Hornets!

View attachment 133193View attachment 133192View attachment 133191View attachment 133190View attachment 133189Not the greatest half from us but trailing just 1-0 isn't that bad at all. Hopefully we can build on that and try to maybe get at least a point from the game? That would be good. If we don't though, we should still stay in 5th as we have more points than Crystal Palace and they're currently losing I think. Come on the Golden Boys!

View attachment 133188View attachment 133187View attachment 133186View attachment 133185A disappointing result for us considering we've been doing so well in the league but overall it's not that big of a deal because we still are 5th in the league. We've been doing so well and I only hope it can continue now. Next match review will be for the Arsenal game on the 20th of December and until then we'll have games against West Brom, Middlesbrough, Stoke, West Ham, Burnley and Sunderland. Let's hope for good results then!
 
Last edited:
Chapter 1.7: Facing the Premier League leaders

View attachment 132982


View attachment 132980
21st December 2015

Huge game against the PL leaders

Good evening Watford fans! Before I get into the review of Watford's game against Arsenal, here's a little preview of it to show how the Hornets have been getting on ahead of our first game against a Premier League leader this season:

View attachment 132979
View attachment 132978
We still have very dodgy goal difference considering we're in the top 5 but a loss against Arsenal would mean we could go down to 7th. A win would take us 4th. It's an incredible achievement and to be honest, we've been on a good run in the league as of late and it'd be interesting to see how Arsenal will come against us but hopefully we'll get a good result.
Now, here's how the game against the Gunners went along with a little review from us:

View attachment 132951One of our strongest teams that we put out this season for sure but despite that, it will be a very tough game that could definitely see us come crashing down the table. We'll stay optimistic though and hopefully we can get a solid result.

View attachment 132949View attachment 132948View attachment 132946A very uneventful first half which isn't good for Arsenal but good for us! I'll definitely take a draw at the Emirates as a Watford fan. Hopefully now we can build on that and keep that result!

View attachment 132944What a goal from Correa! Let's go! What an important goal and what an amazing goal! I wish you would have seen it but it definitely was one of the best goals we've scored all season! A half-volley from outside the box and it goes in the top corner, incredible. Let's hope we can get an even better result now!

View attachment 132943View attachment 132942View attachment 132941What a result for us. It's disappointing to have conceded quite late on but Arsenal deserved it. They played really well and deserved at least a point. We climb above Manchester United to stay in 5th place halfway through the season which is an incredible achievement for a club of our calibre and hopefully we can keep it up for the second half of the season. Now, we'd usually write a game review for most big games but seeing as our next few games are all big games, we'll just do a "big games" month review to see how we did for what will undoubtedly be one of the toughest few games of the season.

Talking about this game though, we were pretty decent in terms of keeping possession and we might have only gotten 6 shots away but we defended really well and Letellier's decision to pull Capoue back in our system has proved to be very successful. We're conceding less and scoring the same amount which has resulted in our goal difference getting much better and hopefully it'll continue! However, looking at our schedule for the next month, we might struggle a little bit to do that. At least that's what I thought before this Arsenal game but I'm a lot more hopeful now. Anyways, see you in a month for our "big games" month review!

View attachment 132939
 
Chapter 1.8: Return from a 2-month break and plenty to talk about

View attachment 131812


View attachment 131811
8th March 2016
Two months full of success

Hello Watford fans! It's been a long time since our last post here and as you've probably figured, a lot has been happening in this second half of the season. We don't doubt that you've all followed the results closely and have looked at how we've been doing in the league but we wanted to post this to give you a little review of our own of January and February. First off, we have one new signing we should talk about:

View attachment 131810Jonathan Bamba is a Watford player for just £1.5 million! What a bargain. Now I won't lie, he's not exactly a player who is known all around the world but he will be, in time. His speed, dribbling and teamwork bring the club exactly what it needs now as well. With Bernardeschi finally coming back from injury at the time of writing this, Bamba will fit in perfectly on the wing as a pacey technical player who can assist Deeney and Ighalo very often. At 19 years old, I'm personally extremely excited to see how he does at the club.
As a little side note, we did also sign a new goalkeeper in Predrag Rajkovic but the FA didn't grant him a work permit and he had to go to Udinese on loan until the end of the season. We will announce him properly at the start of next season though!

Now, let's get on with the January fixtures:

View attachment 131809
To be honest, this really was a fantastic month for the club. Deeney started picking up form and we've done really well in the league. The draws against Manchester United and Liverpool were both deserved and the win against Leicester I mean, wow! Another win against the reigning champions. We've been doing well in the FA Cup too and hopefully we can beat Bolton in the replay and go through to the next round! Now, here's how we did the following month:

View attachment 131808
Boom! Now that is the kind of month that Premier League title challengers have! Incredible. Ighalo finally scored again and Deeney continued his amazing form. Our game against Crystal Palace went very well and Bamba has really started to impress as of late. March has already started and well, we had fixtures against Manchester City and Tottenham and now have to play against Everton and then Chelsea twice (FA Cup and PL). Considering this will be such a big month with such big games again, we'll update you in early April with hopefully some great news! We did lose to Tottenham 2-0 and drew with Manchester City 1-1 with a goal from Rolando Aarons so hopefully we'll finish the month better. The Premier League table looks incredible for us though:

View attachment 131807
Watford in Champions League places! How about that! Let's hope the players can stay focused and do well against Everton and Chelsea and keep climbing the table. I'd just be over the moon if we qualified for the Champions League, what a historic moment that would be.
 
Chapter 1.9: Preview to our last game of the season against Manchester United

View attachment 131728


View attachment 131727
14th May 2016

Another 2 successful months leads Watford to chase CL football

It's been one **** of a season for us Watford fans, that's for sure. After 2 incredible months in 2016, we all looked to Deeney and Bernardeschi to perform well and keep this great run of form up and hope for a good end to the season and as we head into the last game of the season, it looks like we did do very well! Here are our March fixtures after the Tottenham and Manchester City games and where we were on the table following those results:

View attachment 131726
View attachment 131725
If you think about it, we've kind of pulled a Leicester. I say kind of because Leicester got promoted, finished 14th and then won the league. We got promoted, finished 13th and are now fighting with the likes of Tottenham and Manchester United as well as City for Champions League football. Maybe we're looking a bit too far ahead but you know what, looking at how tight it is in the top 3, we could just pull an upset and get CL football at Vicarage Road next season. Obviously March wasn't the best month for us getting knocked out of the FA Cup and drawing 3 of our 4 PL games but we still did very well considering the opposition. Now, it's up to us to impress in April and May so we can go into the final game of the season looking very strong.

View attachment 131724
Absolutely insane month for us again. Bernardeschi has proved to be such a key asset for us I really can't believe how good he's been. In 15 league games, he scored 14 goals! Just incredible. If at the beginning of this season you told me that we were going to be fighting for European places and our new record signing Bernardeschi was going to be one of the best players in the league, I wouldn't believe you. Now though, we've got some absolutely ridiculous news for all Watford fans out there:

View attachment 131723
WATFORD ARE IN THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE! Leicester shocked everyone last year with their amazing performances and their title win and this year it's Watford's turn to shock everyone as we've qualified for the Champions League and could even have a chance of finishing 2nd in the league! What an incredible season this has been, thank you for all your support throughout the season, reading our posts and commenting and arguing and discussing on this site, it's a historic season for the club and whatever happens now against Manchester United on the final day I'll still be just as proud of this Watford side as I am right now. Wow. Champions League football. Who thought a Watford fan would ever say that?! Letellier is a real wonder maker if you ask me and I'm just so impressed with his work here and hopefully he'll stay with the club for a long, long time. Our budget for next season has reportedly been set at about £34 million so we have plenty of cash to strengthen the squad for our Champions League campaign next year!
 
Chapter 2: A great end to the 2015/2016 season and some exciting signings

View attachment 131588


View attachment 131587
1st July 2016

Manchester United at home and new signings

It was outside Vicarage Road that all Watford fans celebrated the end of the 2015/2016 season as we finished it in style with a great result against Manchester United. Now do I really mean that? Maybe. As Watford fans we sometimes think that a 2-0 defeat is a good result against Manchester United so let's see how we did shall we?

View attachment 131586The last game of the season means our best team out there and that seems like that's exactly what Letellier did. When everyone saw the team sheet we all thought, "we definitely can get a good result now!".

View attachment 131585View attachment 131584Not a good start to the game at all and let's just say that we all through oh no when we saw Martial scoring so early on. Let's just hope we can perform better for the next 87 minutes.

View attachment 131583Get in! What a great goal from Bernardeschi and what a way to get back in the game! We can definitely hope for a good result now!

View attachment 131582I think I'm in love with this guy! 16 league games and 16 goals for him! He's just incredible I don't understand how no one has even tried to get him before we did! We're ahead now after going a goal down 20 minutes ago and we have a huge chance of even managing to finish 2nd in the league!

View attachment 131581A really good first half from us and hopefully we can keep this up and get the 3 points this afternoon.

View attachment 131580View attachment 131579View attachment 131578View attachment 131577What a way to end the season. I don't really know why the Watford media team said this was the 2016/17 season but oh well! 2-2 against Manchester United is a great result especially considering we were ahead for so long and also a man down for quite a while. Arsenal managed to beat Burnley by 2 goals to nil so unfortunately we won't finished 2nd but 3rd is historic considering we were predicted to finish 15th. Here's the table:

View attachment 131576
Wow. Just wow. Absolutely outstanding season from the boys and we have Champions League football at Vicarage Road next season, as ridiculous as that sounds. Thank you to Letellier and all the players for this incredible season I mean, I just don't know how they've managed to do what they did this season.
Now, let's move on from this amazing season and look ahead to the 2016/17 season. The media predicts us to finish 9th which is much better than last season but still probably not high enough considering we finished 3RD last year. Letellier has reportedly already spent the whole transfer budget and signed 4 players which sounds like he really is bringing in some big guns to the club. Our pre-season fixtures look like this:

View attachment 131575
Some big games, some smaller ones. Those games should give us a lot of confidence ahead of the Premier League opener and it'll be a great day (hopefully). Now though, let's take a look at the signings and let me just say, there are some amazing ones;

First up is Thomas Basila, a 17-year old French centre-back from Nantes:

View attachment 131574
Definitely a signing for the future and according to a lot of scouts around the world, he was a wanted man so it's incredible that we got him first. Whether he'll play in the first team or not next season is still unsure but I can really see this guy becoming a Watford legend.

Next up, a Premier League reject, an English bad boy who moved abroad but it didn't work out for him. The man Ravel Morrison:

View attachment 131573
With Correa now gone back to Atletico after his loan, we really needed to get a quality attacking midfielder who got fill in and hopefully do an even better job. I was surprised that Letellier decided to sign him considering his poor attitude but he looks like a great player who could be huge for us.

The third signing is one who will surprise many. He played for Atletico and Monaco, is currently with the Belgian national team at the EURO and played in a Champions League final last year:

View attachment 131572
He's equalled the club record transfer fee and looking at his stats from the EURO, he just looks incredible. His transfer value went up to £20 million when we signed him and now look at that, he's a Watford player. Everyone is really excited about this guy because he comes in as a better replacement for Rolando Aarons, gone back to Newcastle after his loan and we did really well to get him for so cheap.

Finally, our new club record signing, a young Belgian centre-midfielder who will definitely tear it up in the Premier League:

View attachment 131571
So there we go then, a lot of new signings who all make sense and are all really talented. Talk about that for a club who got promoted two years ago and is now playing in the Champions League with some of Europe's most talented youngsters! Oh yes, we also just got confirmation right now that we should announce Andrew Robertson as a Watford player by the end of the day! Again, With Zuniga gone back to Napoli after his loan we needed a backup/first team left-back to have along with Holebas since Dja Djeje is already a backup right back for Nyom and Robertson fits in perfectly. He's an attacking full back and has a bag of potential and it really looks like we've become a much, much stronger side this summer. We'll come back after the pre-season fixtures to round up departures/other signings and results! By the way, if any of you are wondering how Letellier signed all these players with just £35 million, don't ask me but apparently he's used a ton of clauses to make the future transfer values rise but keep the initial pay check as low as possible which is just genius. Anyways, come on you Hornets!
 
Top