Watford look to bounce back from "lowest moment" in FA WNL Play-Off
Watford were relegated from the Championship with almost the last kick of a ball last season. Now, they are fighting back and looking to return at the first time of asking.
“Those scars show for a while,” says Watford head coach Damon Lathrope, ahead of this weekend’s FA Women’s National League promotion play-off against Nottingham Forest.
This will be the last time both regional champions don’t go up, but for now there is only one prized promotion spot up for grabs, for two sides who have put in 12 months’ worth of hard work to get this far, to the Barclays Women’s Championship.
Watford are looking to return at the first time of asking, and the scars Lathrope refers to relate to what happened just over a year ago, when the club was relegated by a 97th-minute free-kick from Coventry United’s Mollie Green, in a winner takes all relegation clash on the final day of the season.
While United’s ‘great escape’ was rightfully lauded, Watford were the forgotten victims of a dramatic and painful day, and former assistant Lathrope had to pick up the pieces of a broken squad when he took over as head coach last summer.
“They will haunt players for a long time when you lose in that manner,” he admits. “We knew it was a big job to come in and change the mindset and change the culture around the club. We freshened it up, brought quite a few new faces in and I feel like they’ve evolved into a really strong group mentally.”
Lathrope was also able to hold on to the experience of the likes of former FA WSL stars Helen Ward and Gemma Davison, senior internationals for Wales and England respectively, who have helped guide a young squad through a turbulent period and on to the verge of a first-time return to the second tier.
“It wasn’t how it was meant to happen…”
This weekend’s game will be particularly poignant for Ward who will retire from football whatever happens on Saturday, and she’s hoping to go out on a high after the heartache of last season.
“Probably one of the lowest moments in my career,” she admits. “It wasn’t how it was meant to happen, but it had been a struggle all season. It wasn’t just one moment, it was an accumulation of performances and it was disappointing knowing it had been in our hands for so long and we let it slip.
“It did take a while to get over. I know a few of the girls felt the same and having time to think about it was difficult. A lot stuck with Watford wanting to rectify what happened, nobody really jumped ship. It’s a good group of people and Damon has set his mark on the team, how we wanted to be as a team, our identity and gradually we came back with a fresh attitude.”
Ward jokes she has not been able to make plans for retirement given the nature of the title race. Going into the final day, Watford had to beat Billericay and hope rivals Oxford United slipped up at Ipswich Town, which they did, and she admits it was “strange” going into the last game not knowing if it was her last or if she’d have one more game.
“I’d love to go out on a high. How I feel will depend on the result, but I’m pretty sure I’m ready for it. I just want to do well for the players and the club.”
With Ward’s experience often used from the bench, defender Megan Chandler has been one of the leaders of the team this season, wearing the armband regularly and another of those who stuck around after the end of last season.
Chandler works in digital marketing by day from 8am to 4pm before heading off to training in the evenings, where Watford train twice a week before a Saturday morning session, and she describes her emotions over the past year as a “roller coaster”, as she looks to lead the team back to the Championship.
“It was tough, probably one of the most heart-breaking things to go through as a player,” she admits. “No one wants that on their CV, but it was a huge learning curve on how to improve the environment to stop that happening. I personally took a few weeks out to reflect on a tough, tough season physically and mentally and then you have to park it or else you’ll never get past it. You’d never embrace what’s happening this season so I came back in pre-season with a fresh mindset.
“For those here last year, going from that to a title race, it’s definitely been different. We have used that as motivation to be better and the new girls coming in have been a breath of fresh air. We’ve created a new environment where it’s more positive.”
How have they gone about it? Lathrope praises the “nice blend” of young players brought in and the experienced heads such as Chandler, Ward and Davison, and he’s particularly relying on that edge when it comes to Saturday’s one-off play-off against Nottingham Forest.
In last month’s FA WNL Cup final between the two sides, Forest came out on top in extra-time in a 3-2 thriller, but there was little to separate the two performance-wise.
“I know the young players lean on that experience, but the overriding feel is they take confidence from each other,” says Lathrope. “They’re in a really good place. We’ve got a good chance because of the environment and the feel-good factor around the place.
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“There will be the nerves, of course, because they care and they’re desperate to win, but that word in the ear from Hels, Gem, those players, will reassure the younger ones. The message from us is to go and do what you do best, play with no fear, we don’t want anything to change just because it’s the final.”
Lathrope says he has tried to keep things “normal” throughout the week, not moving from the usual schedule, except for the fact a Saturday game means there will be no morning training session on the weekend.
Chandler also admits the team have to view it as “just another game”, even that’s easier said than done, but believes it will stand the side in good stead to get the job done.
“It’s one more and hopefully we get our reward,” the defender says. “We’re preparing normally and I think that’s helping. I think it depends on the type of player you are and your experiences. The younger players might feel more nerves than the experienced heads, but as a squad we try to just have that focus and we play our best football when we relax and enjoy it, so I like to think everyone has that another game mentality.”
Ward admits herself she knows the experience she holds will be “valuable” come the weekend, and praised the team for bouncing back from the cup final defeat to win consecutive huge league games to put themselves in the position they find themselves in this week.
“We’re not silly, we know things went our way elsewhere, but we were in good form,” says the former Wales forward. “We’re feeling good, we’ve got players back from injury. Everyone knows their job, knows their role, we’re quite adaptable and have a few ways of playing and that’s all credit to the coaching staff and the manager.
“We’re feeling good, we know what Forest have to offer, they’ve had a fantastic season and do what they do very well, but that Cup game means we really know how each other plays.”
What helped Watford get here was a huge win against rivals Oxford United on the penultimate day of the season.
Had Oxford won that game, Watford would have been out of the race, while a win for the Hornets put them in a position that if Oxford lost to fellow title rivals Ipswich on the final day, a Watford win at Billericay would give them the title.
All of that transpired, but it wasn’t without its close calls. Trailing 1-0 to Oxford at a buoyant Vicarage Road on a cold, wet Thursday night, the hosts needed a huge second half to avoid another home heartbreak.
“It was a sink or swim moment,” admits Lathrope. “We showed how far we’ve come as a group, everyone stood up to be counted where it would have been easy to fall away and hide and crumble.”
Two superb second half goals sealed a momentous win, one which set up the final day title swing, and as the players enjoyed a chorus of ‘Sweet Caroline’ with their supporters after, it was a moment where demons were laid to rest on their first return to Vicarage Road since that fateful day last year.
“The biggest barrier was being back there,” says the head coach. “Some of the players hadn’t stepped on that pitch since the Coventry United game. But like I said, what you do day in, day out gives you the best chance to overcome that. It was an opportunity to show everyone on the outside how far they’ve come.
“We knew we had it in us. For seven or eight games we knew there was no margin for error. The mistake a lot of people make is when something haunts them, they don’t confront it and we spoke about that openly. We spoke about using it as a tool to learn and stick together and show the character to become a successful football team.”
Ward and Chandler both praise the intervention of former goalkeeper Sophie Harris, who has recently come on board since retiring from playing, for a passionate half-time team talk which helped spark what Chandler describes as the team’s best half of the entire season.
“We knew the magnitude going into it,” she says. “Maybe the occasion got the better of us in the first half. Sophie did a huge team talk at half-time, said we’d worked too hard to come back this far and fall. We had 45 minutes to show what we could do as a team and I don’t think we’ve performed like that all season.
“That game itself felt like we’d won the league. We’d been on a journey, a really tough journey and for us whatever happened after that we knew we’d at last given ourselves the best possible opportunity.”
Ward admits some players were “unsure” about whether it was right to make their return to Vicarage Road such a big game, with memories of last season still all too fresh for some.
“I just said ‘look, that’s last year, we’re a different side now’. Last season, we sat back hoping not to concede. Against Oxford we went for it. We attacked, we were brave and those demons are gone now.”
Lathrope admits some may have viewed their post-match celebrations as “over the top”, but admits it was about much more than just the three points, it was a defining moment in this team’s moving on process, especially back at their home ground.
“It was a big moment for this group to realise they were mentally strong and had that character to do something special. The mentality shift has been outstanding, that’s been the most pleasing aspect for me. People don’t see the work the players do, that’s been the backbone of the success we’ve had and whatever happens it will hold this group in good stead for the future.
“Players can fall by the wayside if they’re not cut out for it, but we feel we kept hold of the right characters and right people. Adversity is inevitable in football, we had to make sure we came out the better end of it.”
On how they did it, he adds “It was about having time and installing values in the culture. That over time in a season they dealt with situations the best way possible. It takes some getting over to go down in that manner and the ultimate test is back in those high-pressure situations, how your mind and body reacts.
“We’ve had someone come in this season to focus on that because we know it’s so key and the players have responded positively to it. I’m very confident in saying those players in the squad are now in a much better place to overcome tough challenges.”
“You almost have that stigma attached to you. You automatically get put in a box…”
Chandler is well-placed to offer an insight into the different mindset from last season to this, and is open and honest about the challenges it brings a footballer personally to get relegated, let alone in the fashion Watford went down.
“Your mentally shifts a little bit. You go from thinking ‘oh god we’re probably going to lose again this weekend’ to ‘I don’t want this feeling to go away’ and I think having so many in the team who had gone through that awful spell helped.
“You almost have that stigma attached to you. You automatically get put in a box, people look at you as the team that loses all the time and we’ve worked hard to change that. To not be the Watford that got relegated at 90+7, but the Watford that wins games and I think we’ve done well and worked hard to change that.”
This weekend will be about calm heads, as forward Ward puts it. With all thoughts of her own personal situation set aside, she admits it’s been a buzzword that has been used a lot in recent weeks.
“We’ve used it a lot. Whatever happens, remaining calm, not panicking and when you have those experienced heads you remember football is a long game and it only takes a second to score a goal.
“That’s what Sophie said against Oxford. She’s been there and done it too, she’s had some great things to say, she talked about our belief and how together we were and we have to keep remembering that.”
Whatever happens, Watford may have a good chance of bouncing back next season if worst comes to worst, with the announcement from the 2023-24 season both champions of the north and south league will be promoted for the first time.
That decision has come too late for the victims of Saturday’s winner takes all clash, but Lathrope is both positive about the future and realistic about what will need to change if they do return to a Championship where they will be two relegation spots next season.
“We’re not naïve enough to think it’s not a big step up. There would need to be a lot of work going into everything, every aspect of the programme to make sure we give ourselves the best chance to compete.
“It’s tough enough as it is, let alone with two going down and we’d have to build on what we’ve done this year and add to that. On the flip side, if it doesn’t go our way on Saturday, I’m very confident the foundations we’ve put down this year, keeping hold of the majority of the players, we’d have a really good shot of being in the same position this time next year.”