Wolves 1-1 Watford

Wolves grabbed a late equalier through Bakary Sako as the winless run continues under new boss Dean Saunders. Almen Abdi had given Watford a first lead, but the Hornets were unable to hold on to the three points.

- Given the failure of the three man defence, Dean Saunders chose to move to a more regulation back-4. Perhaps unfortunately, it was Danny Batth who missed out, with Saunders choosing the more experienced pairing of Roger Johnson and Kaspars Gorkss. I was critical of the formation last week, but I had absolutely no problem with Saunders trying something different; he just didn't do it properly. After all, how long has 4-4-2 failed us for? And ironically, tonight's visitors Watford arrived second in the league, with a back three showing that with work, patience and the right players, it can be an effective formation.

- The game quickly settled into a rhythm that would stay with the match pretty much up until the final 15 or so minutes. Watford had the extra man in midfield and used it well, with on loan Chelsea midfielder Nathaniel Chalobah distributing the ball to the flanks. Watford's three man defence all appeared to be far more comfortable on the ball than Gorkss, Batth and Johnson did last week, and they were happy to move the ball around, effectively leaving Kevin Doyle and Bjorn Sigurðarson chasing shadows as between them, they couldn't get the ball back from Watford's three defenders. At this point, just when it looked like Doyle and Sigurðarson were giving up, out would come Jamie O'Hara to chase the ball down. The problem with this was that it left Karl Henry pretty much on his own against three Watford midfielders. While it can be pleasing for the fans to see a player pressing, it can also disrupt the positioning of the team. Pressing is good IF it is done as a team - one player breaking ranks doesn't work.

- Maybe it was due to O'Hara's willingness to push forward, but the returning Stephen Hunt played far too narrowly. I couldn't work out whether this was under instruction from Saunders to try and add an extra man in the middle, but it didn't work at all. Even if Hunt's ability to control and pass a ball hadn't disappeared two years ago, he didn't help the team with his inability to hold his position, effectively meaning that there was no outlet ball on the left wing. And on the other flank, Bakary Sako is not a right winger. When I saw he was playing on the right, my first thought was we’d try to get the ball to him, allow him to cut inside and get a shot away on that left foot of his, but he never really got the chance. Again, having Sako on the right meant that he wasn’t getting chalk on his boots, and had a tendency to drift inside. For a team playing 4-4-2, with two wingers, we played incredibly narrow.

- Now, Watford obviously had a man advantage in the centre of midfield and a man advantage at the back. They played Troy Deeney and the prolific Matěj Vydra upfront together. Whether it was intentional or not, we defended reasonably deep, presumably to stop the sort of problems that saw Christophe Berra sent off at Vicarage Road earlier in the season. They had one excellent move in the first half, which resulted in Kaspars Gorkss *just* managing to toe the ball away to stop Vydra getting on the end of Deeney’s ball in. In the second half, Fernando Forestieri came on for Vydra and wasted two clear chances that he really should have scored from. I’d been very impressed with Forestieri in the first game, but he should easily have been on the score sheet. Deeney in particular looked furious with Forestieri’s two misses; after the second, I thought Deeney was going to remonstrate with Forrestieri, but another Watford player ushered him away.

- So, Watford now have a man advantage in midfield, a man advantage in defence and two v two upfront. So surely, there must have been space elsewhere on the pitch for us to exploit. And there was, but we didn’t. One of the problems with wingbacks is that they can be overloaded if the opposition is able to push its fullbacks forward effectively. I’ve already mentioned that Sako and Hunt were quite narrow (and I thought Sako was generally poor until he switched to the left flank when he sprang into action), but this meant that there were acres of space for the fullbacks to push forward into. This was how Cardiff cleverly took advantage of our back three last week, but I suspect that Malky Mackay is slightly better tactically than Dean Saunders. But, both Jack Robinson and Matt Doherty had space to push forward into, and neither really took advantage of it. While Doherty defended well against Almen Abdi, I’m struggling to remember him crossing the halfway line once. Robinson on the other flank did slightly better, but never looked like he was ever going to create anything.

- It seems strange to think that, while in theory, we had the numerical advantage on the flanks, yet it was former Italian international Marco Cassetti who was constantly free on the right flank, especially in the first half. With Hunt going wandering, Cassetti was able to constantly attack Robinson. What he did well was attack from deep, running on to the ball, in contrast to the way that Doherty and Robinson both found themselves too far forward too often last week. As Cassetti’s starting position was so deep, it meant that he was really Hunt’s man to pick up. But, given Hunt more often than not wasn’t there, it meant he often had 20-30 yards with which to run onto the ball and attack Robinson. It was noticeable that Cassetti had Watford’s first real attempt on goal. I also couldn’t work out whether Cassetti’s crossing was poor – as soon as the ball left his boot, I thought it was a good cross, but fortunately always just evaded a Watford forward.

- Late on, when we were chasing the game, Saunders made a double change, then one more substitution which was both interesting and annoying at the same time; David Davis replacing Karl Henry. The interesting part was who replaced Henry as captain. No, not Roger Johnson, and with neither Kevin Doyle nor Stephen Ward on the pitch, it was handed to goalkeeper Carl Ikeme. This did leave me to wonder where Johnson stands in the captaincy pecking order at the moment? The substitution was annoying as I don’t understand why you bring on David Davies when chasing a game. Yes, he has a number of qualities as a player, but very few of those are attacking. Saunders did this against Blackpool when behind, and had Davis ready to come on against Cardiff last week before bringing on Kevin Foley instead. There is no way that Davis is the best option to come on when chasing a game – the likes of Słavomir Peszko must be seeing these substitutions and tearing his hair out.

- Speaking of Peszko, probably our best right winger, I reckon Saunders has now played Foley, Sako, Peszko, O’Hara, Sigurðarson, Doyle, David Edwards plus Adam Hammill coming off the bench and Matt Doherty playing a match as wingback on the right flank in his nine matches in charge. Problem position? Or a lack of faith from Saunders in the players?

- A missed opportunity? Watford’s midfielder Ikechi Anya is a former Halesowen Town player who found his way to La Liga and now to Watford. Well done to @AndrewDHipkins for spotting that.

- Finally, in the last 12 months, Dean Saunders and Terry Connor between them have taken charge of 19 games – the equivalent of half a Premier League season. I don’t need to tell you how many games they’ve won…

- And finally finally, with Dave Edwards and Wayne Hennessey on the playing roster, Dean Saunders, Brian Carey and Pat Mountain on the management team, if we can’t win on St David’s Day, is it ever going to happen?