Cleverley baffled at how Watford failed to beat Plymout
When he addressed the media following the game, a disheartened Tom Cleverley emerged from his seat in the stands, still baffled by Watford’s defeat at Plymouth.
Up until the last seconds of the game, the Hornets head coach must have been enjoying what he was seeing from his unique perspective, even if he was serving a one-match touchline ban.
Then, in the final minute of stoppage time, he saw his old teammate Andre Grey score to tie the score at two and deny Watford their third away victory of the year.
“This season, a lot of people have questioned our leaky defence and away performance, but tonight, I’m honestly not too sure how we’ve conceded two goals and not picked up three points,” Cleverley remarked.
“Goals are sometimes scored against the odds, and we win that game nine times out of ten if you make Plymouth as small as we did tonight.
We can’t just claim it was a freak goal when we look at ourselves; we ought to have done more to disappear at 2-1.
We had a lot of transitional possibilities, but I didn’t think we were clinical enough.
“I would rather say that we weren’t clinical enough at 2-1 up than that it was about how we defended our box in the final 30 seconds.”
Even when two points vanished into the pitch-black Devon night, Cleverley did not punish his team too severely.
He said, “I can’t be too upset with the players because it was everything we asked for.”
“I thought the players were tenacious and aggressive, and they won duels and second balls. We wanted a true underdog mentality when we don’t have the ball.”
“Then, during possession, we shown true poise and composure, and I believe we fulfilled every request I made prior to the game.
“They score a lot of late goals, so we just didn’t get that third goal you always feel you need when you come here.”
We have been undone today because of that.
