Position Battle: Who will marshal the Watford defence next season?
Seven defeats from their final eight Premier League games of the season saw Walter Mazzarri’s Watford finish just one place above the drop – and new man at the helm Marco Silva has a big job on his hands to steady the ship at Vicarage Road.
A strong start to last season was quickly undone by a disastrous December and start to 2017, meaning the Italian’s days at the club were numbered.
That was due in large part to his inability to decide on three or four across the back, with Watford starting 20 games with a back three and 18 with a flat-back four during the Premier League campaign and shipping a whopping 68 goals – fourth worst in the division – as a result.
The Hornets wasted no time in offering the job to Silva, incredibly impressive in five months at Hull City, and the former Olympiakos and Sporting Lisbon boss will need to work out exactly who to mould his defence around sooner rather than later.
Genk’s Omar Colley, Le Havre’s Ferland Mendy, Schalke’s Dennis Aogo and Hull’s Harry Maguire have all been linked with a move to Vicarage Road, but Silva does already have options at his disposal.
Sebastian Prödl
As a starting point surely Silva must look no further than last season’s club player of the year, Sebastian Prödl, but the place next to him – or either side in a back three – is up for grabs.
The man-mountain Austrian started the most Premier League games of any defender at Watford last season with 32, averaging 5.5 clearances per game as well as 1.6 interceptions, and boasted a pass completion rate of 84.1 per cent.
Standing at 6ft 4in, Prödl is also an asset at set pieces – an area Silva will be desperate to tighten up with Watford conceding the third-most goals (17) from the dead ball in the Premier League, and former side Hull (21) the worst.
Craig Cathcart
The Northern Ireland international was immense under Quique Sanchez Flores in 2015/16, but has been in and out of the Watford side all of last season and only started 12 Premier League matches.
The quickest and youngest of all the contenders here, but still no whippersnapper at 28 years old, Cathcart will be hoping he can put niggling injury worries behind him and play more of a central role under Silva.
Miguel Britos
While he was, like Cathcart, a shadow of the player he was under Flores last term, there’s no denying that tough-tackling Britos has the physicality to excel in Premier League football.
After honing his craft on the tough streets of Uruguay, the 31-year-old was sent off in his final game for Napoli before moving to Hertfordshire for headbutting Juventus’s Alvaro Morata in the face.
He was also dismissed in his first game for Watford away at Preston, but after settling down and into life in England, Britos developed a decent partnership with Cathcart and kept his enthusiasm for contact.
His stats for last season were far less impressive – making just 1.3 tackles and 0.7 blocks per game in 27 league matches started – but Britos has proved himself happy to put his body on the line to keep the ball away from danger.
Younès Kaboul
The former Tottenham Hotspur or Sunderland man either flattered to deceive or stole the show for Watford last season, with his inconsistency exasperating for Hornets fans at times.
He scored more goals and produced more tackles, interceptions and blocks per game than any of Prödl, Cathcart or Britos, but in truth that was overshadowed by several defensive howlers over the course of the campaign.
