Valérien Ismaël spoke to the media following Watford’s 2-0 defeat to Leicester City at the King Power Stadium, with a late brace from Jamie Vardy deciding the contest in the home side’s favour.
Covering a range of topics, including his side’s performance and the Daniel Bachmann red card, read what the Head Coach had to say below…
On the game as a whole:
We have improved a lot since the Leeds United away game. The first half was good, we knew before the game we had two game plans. The first one was out of possession we needed to show big solidarity. You know you will suffer here; their quality is very high and their possession game is excellent. We had to work together. The more difficult the game is, the more you have to stick together.
The second part of the game plan was when we get the ball, we need to believe in ourselves and make them defend. We needed to create chances because here you won’t get a lot of chances, two or three maybe. But when you get them, you need to take them.
I thought in the second half, out of possession and until the goal we were solid, but we lost the ball too quickly. We didn’t make the right decisions. It’s a lot to take when the opponent is coming in wave after wave. Then you have to be really strong. I thought we were much better as soon as we conceded the goal. We were on top. Good situations, creating chances and we had the big chance at the end with Ryan Porteous; maybe if he saw Matheus Martins on the left, it could have been better for us.
On bravery and ruthlessness:
From open play, we were strong, solid and compact, but at some point, you need some luck. From one side I say yes, we have improved a lot, and now we need to work on the next bit. We need to be braver with the ball, believe in ourselves more, and when we’ve got the chance, be ruthless. One chance at the beginning of the game and one at the end. We have to take at least one of those or both to make sure we can get a result.
On Daniel Bachmann:
I spoke with him, and I said we could avoid the first yellow card. We had a meeting before the game and when your captain is the goalkeeper, we choose one outfield player to speak with the referee in difficult situations. But if our goalkeeper runs 50 yards to the referee, then it can be dangerous and he gets a yellow card, so we can avoid the first one. I’ve spoken already with Ben Hamer – he’ll have to be ready for Tuesday.
On Ismaël Koné & Yáser Asprilla not starting:
We had players who came back yesterday with big jet lag. Ismaël Koné was already awake at 5am this morning. So, this is the reason. The other guys worked well for the two weeks, so they had the rhythm and we worked tactically a lot with all the players. That’s why we wanted to let the players we worked with play because of their understanding of the game plan.
