Head coach Quique Sanchez Flores has said he feels the international break was ‘perfect’ for Watford ahead of this weekend’s tie against Arsenal.
With players out on international duty largely all coming back with success from their time away from the club, Flores told the Official Site that with some players getting a rest, and others a change of scenery and the confidence shot, it should leave the club well prepared for Arsene Wenger’s boys.
‘It’s perfect, because all the time the players go to the national team and come back it’s perfect for us. Anya is very offensive and he scored, Cathcart is participating in set-pieces and he scored, so it’s good because we need to transform this kind of situation for Watford. It’s not always easy for the players to refresh when they are with the national team because they have a lot of pressure and a lot of matches. When you pass to the national team it’s a moment to keep focused and to try to keep a high performance, but we are working in this profession so we know how it works in football. Football is non-stop until the last moment of the last match. We have one-month-and-a-half to go, so we have to keep working hard to keep our good feelings.’
With 12 players out on duty the last fortnight, Flores did say that obviously somewhat hampered preparations for Arsenal but it’s an issue the opposition would’ve had as well, so you have to make the best of it.
Of course it also means that he’ll leave the starting eleven selection to the last minute to see how everybody is freshness wise.
‘We will wait until the last moment. We have been continuing to train with 10 players here and we have transmitted the idea of the match, but for these players returning this is the beginning. I don’t like to lose time so we have trained since the beginning with a small group, but still transmitting the idea of the match. (Thursday) is the first day we are going to check how the international players are, and tomorrow we will prepare more for the match and explain things to the players. It’s not the best scenario for a coach, but we have to accept that this has been the calendar since a long time ago and we know that during the break we are going to lose maybe 10 or 12 players. It’s not just for us, it’s for every single team. We need to be ready and in this case we try to have the best training we can because we have to keep the high focus in the next match.’
With it only being three weeks since Watford put Arsenal to the sword in the FA Cup, he knows that will also be a good confidence shot ahead of the game for them.
‘We know now that we can win at this stadium because we did it a few weeks ago, but we should know also that for sure Arsenal will want revenge, they are not happy to have lost a few weeks ago. We are going to find a very difficult team because they will want to win. We need to play with the idea to recuperate good feelings and to try to do a good match. Of course we know that it will be tough, because of the team, because of the players. It is not easy but we’ll play with the idea to be competitive and we’ll try to win.’
Nordin Amrabat was also singing from the same hymnsheet in his own pre game interview.
‘Of course, it`s great to be back. I`m happy that I`m back and I can see my teammates again. It`s nice to be here and now we can look forward to Arsenal. It`s a big game at the Emirates Stadium and the second game against them in a short period. I think they want revenge because we beat them in the FA Cup and they are a big team with big players. But we are ready, we beat them three weeks ago and hopefully we can beat them again.’
He ended by saying.
‘We have a lot of confidence from the last meeting, but that was a different game. That was the FA Cup and this year we are FA Cup fighters, but this is a different competition. For them it is really important to win, but it is the same for us also. It`s a different game, but we are ready and have a lot of confidence going into it.’
