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Watford confirm Roy Hodgson appointment with Ray Lewington joining him

Roy Hodgson - Watford confirm Roy Hodgson appointment with Ray Lewington joining him - TOM JENKINS
Roy Hodgson - Watford confirm Roy Hodgson appointment with Ray Lewington joining him - TOM JENKINS

Roy Hodgson and his long-term assistant Ray Lewington took Watford training for the first time on Tuesday having agreed a deal to the end of the season with an option to extend if they can save the club from a second successive Premier League relegation.

The 74-year-old, who had seemed to have retired at the end of last season when his Crystal Palace contract expired, agreed the terms of his deal with Watford earlier in the day to become the 17th manager appointment, excluding caretakers, in almost 13 years. The deal was negotiated by the former Wimbledon, Tottenham and Manchester City defender, Ben Thatcher, who is now working as an agent.

Hodgson will primarily be assisted by Lewington, 65, who worked with him during his time with the England team and with Palace, and himself managed Watford from June 2002 to March 2005. The pair inherit a side that is 19th in the Premier League and – while cancellations make the relegation picture more difficult to judge – are the only club among the 92 in the top four divisions who have not yet kept a clean sheet in the league this season.

Hodgson worked for the Pozzo family, Giampaolo and son Gino – who own Watford – when he was manager of Udinese in Serie A in 2001. The time in charge of the Pozzo family’s Italian club remained a bone of contention for a man whom Watford would be the 22nd managerial appointment in a professional coaching career that began in 1976. Hodgson was sacked by the Pozzos at Udinese having reached the quarter-finals of that season’s Coppa Italia.

Hodgson goes straight into a must-win game against Burnley a week on Saturday. Watford are still without arguably the club’s leading player Ismaila Sarr who was injured by Donny Van de Beek in the last minutes of the 4-1 home win over Manchester United on Nov 20 – one of only two victories secured by the previous incumbent Claudio Ranieri. Sarr has a partial ligament tear.

Watford are eager to see Hodgson impose some kind of shape on the team after the version of 4-3-3 preferred by Ranieri. Defensive structure is a priority. They have taken one point from eight games since the United win and been knocked out the FA Cup.

His predecessor Ranieri gave Hodgson his blessing as he left the training ground. In response to his sacking the Italian said to Sky Sports News: “That’s football - but I believe with three new players, Watford can be safe and this fantastic manager [Hodgson] has arrived.”

In the current window Watford have signed midfielder Edo Kayembe, 23, from KAS Eupen in the Belgian top-flight; Hassan Kamara, 27 a left-back from Nice; and Samir a Brazilian centre-back from Udinese, also 27. Meanwhile they still have others missing from the current squad. Nicolas Nkoulou, the centre-half and former Cameroon captain is also injured, as is loanee Nigerian midfielder Peter Etebo. William Troost-Ekong is on his way back from the Africa Cup of Nations after Nigeria’s elimination. Morocco’s Adam Masina and Imran Louza are still on duty in Cameroon.


Why Premier League's most unstable club turned to Hodgson

By Sam Dean

At first glance, it is easy to see why the most unstable club in the Premier League has turned to a manager whose calling card is stability. Watford know what they will get with Hodgson, a master of Premier League survival and a coach who brings organisation and structure to even the most chaotic of teams.

There can be few more reliable options for a club in Watford’s predicament, 19th in the Premier League and reeling from the most demoralising of defeats by Norwich City last week. Perhaps Hodgson has even usurped Sam Allardyce in the “top-flight firefighter” rankings, following Allardyce’s relegation with West Bromwich Albion last season.

Supporters of Fulham, West Bromwich Albion and Crystal Palace will no doubt be nodding their heads in approval of Hodgson’s appointment, even at the age of 74. Those three clubs all turned to Hodgson in times of need, and in all three cases he not only secured their top-flight status but also allowed them to dream of bigger and better things than simply avoiding relegation.

In contrast to Watford’s erratic decision-making and squad-building, Hodgson offers a steady and sensible approach. His training sessions are notoriously rigid, with the team’s defensive shape seen as the overriding priority, and there can be no doubt whether the new-look Watford will have a more defined structure than they did under Claudio Ranieri and Xisco Muñoz this season.

Hodgson’s four years at Palace, from 2017 to 2021, are proof of what he can offer a smaller club in the modern Premier League: discipline, hard work, character. Under Hodgson, Palace finished 11th, 12th, 14th and 14th in the division. Such was the relentless steadiness of his tenure that some Palace supporters even began to complain about his “negative formations” and “safety-first approach”, as described by the Holmesdale Fanatics fan group last year, despite the survival he guaranteed each year.

It is safe to say, surely, that there will not be any Watford fans objecting to a “safety-first” approach at Vicarage Road in the coming months. Now is not the time to start a long-term rebuild with exciting, young players. It is the time for organisation, clean sheets and cool heads. Hodgson, along with his assistant Ray Lewington (himself a former Watford manager), emphatically ticks all of those boxes.

There are reasons for concern, though. Hodgson is inheriting a vastly different team to the one he took over at Palace in 2017, and there are serious questions to be asked of the quality and depth of this Watford squad.

At Palace, from his first day in charge until his last, Hodgson largely relied on a small group of players. These were seasoned professionals, mostly British, with extensive experience in English football and an appreciation of what it takes to grind out results in challenging moments. In Hodgson’s last two seasons at Selhurst Park, Palace were the oldest team in the division.

Compare the team that Hodgson inherited at Palace in 2017 with the squad he now has at Watford, and it is clear that he faces an altogether more challenging task at Vicarage Road. In Hodgson’s first game as Palace manager, he selected 11 players with a combined total of more than 1,300 Premier League appearances. Eight of his players, including the likes of Scott Dann, James McArthur and Jason Puncheon, had more than 100 appearances in the division.

The Watford side that was thrashed by Norwich City, on the other hand, boasted just three players – Tom Cleverley, Moussa Sissoko and Joshua King – with more than 100 Premier League appearances to their names. The likes of Samir, Hassane Kamara and Edo Kayembe were making just their second appearances for the club.

Hodgson’s track record suggests his arrival could be good news for the likes of Ben Foster, who has played under his new manager before, and Craig Cathcart. Perhaps even Danny Rose, frozen out under Ranieri, could make an unlikely return to the fold.

There are not many of these players, though. Where are the Andros Townsend, Joel Ward, James Tomkins, Gary Cahill-type figures who Hodgson relied upon at Palace? Watford’s squad is instead composed of talented youngsters, inexperienced recruits from abroad and ageing forces: Cleverley, Cathcart, King and Sissoko are all in their thirties.

He also has less time to work with. When Hodgson took over at Palace, replacing Frank de Boer in September 2017, the season was only four games old. Hodgson needed time to impose his methods, winning only once in his first eight league games. Watford have already played 20 games this season, and are yet to keep a clean sheet. They require an instant uplift.

At least there is firepower for Hodgson to work with. Only three players have scored more Premier League goals this season than Emmanuel Dennis, while King has found the net more than 50 times in his top-flight career. Joao Pedro is an exciting option up front. Ismaila Sarr, when available, is a potentially devastating attacking weapon.

If Hodgson can tighten up his new defence, these are the players who can make the difference at the other end. It is a tough ask for him, though, and it will be fascinating to see whether his steady approach to management will work at a club where the turbulence never seems to stop.