Manchester United travel to Vicarage Road to face Watford this Lunchtime and do so having suffered back to back defeats in all competitions. Defeat in the Manchester Derby last Saturday was then added to do with a loss to Dutch league leaders Feyenoord in Thursday’s Europa League encounter.
The main talking point and focus was once again on Paul Pogba. The former Juventus man isn’t living up to the tag of the World’s most expensive player. In the four matches that he has played for United since his return he has failed to register a shot on target. That’s not what you want when forking out £89m for the privilege of his signature.
Thursday saw United revert to a 4-3-3 formation and one that arguably is set up to get the best out of Pogba but again his input was less than expected. The caveat could be that it wasn’t a full strength United side but even so you would have expect more from the French international.
It’s quite apparent that the weight of that price tag is weighing down Pogba and his manager Jose Mourinho has told him to forget about the transfer fee and focus to returning to the kind of form that led to a summer long transfer saga to capture the 23 year old.
A good place to open his account would be Vicarage Road but that’s not to say that Watford will make it particularly easy for them. They will be buoyant after their 4-2 win over West Ham at The London Stadium last Saturday. A victory which saw them record their first win of the season.
Walter Mazzari’s side came from 2-0 down as West Ham imploded in front of their own fans. Troy Deeney’s weighted lob was arguably the pick of the goals while Etienne Capoue scored what is already his third of the season. He is quickly becoming a favourite fror FPL managers across the country.
That first win would have been a very welcome result as they hadn’t picked up a point since their opening day draw at Southampton. With the transfer window now shut behind us, Mazzari can look to get his new signings bedded in as Watford look not to just to Premier League safety but aspirations of a top half finish.
If that is to happen then they are going to need goals, and just from the partnership of Troy Deeney and Odion Ighalo. This time last season the goals in the first half of the season had The Hornets in a European place with the highlight being a memorable win over Liverpool last December.
But after Christmas the goals dried up and it wasn’t the sole reason for the departure of previous manager of Quique Sanchez Flores. Naturally when the goals dry up then the league position tends to slide down the table and that is exactly what happened to Watford.
If Deeney and Ighalo can carry their form throughout the season then Watford should be able to steer clear of the dreaded drop zone but first they need to worry about the visit of United and a side looking to bounce back after defeat to arch rivals Manchester City last weekend.
The scoreline suggests that the game was closer than it was but City were well in control before Claudio Bravo did his best to undo all his teammates hard work. That defeat saw lose their domestic 100% record and they are already 6 points behind City albeit with a game in hand.
I think United will be able to bounce back from that defeat and they can’t really afford to not win as giving City possibly a 6 point head start at this early stage of the season could prove incredibly costly. I think they will reduce that gap to three though with a win at Watford. United to bounce back this lunchtime.