GRACIA SHUFFLES A WINNING HAND

AT WATfORD, it seems there is very little that manager Javi Gracia cannot achieve right now. After setting a club record by starting the Premier League season with three wins, the coach has now ended another Watford hoodoo. His club had not advanced beyond the second round of this competition since returning to the Premier League, losing their last four League Cup games under four different managers in a dismal run stretching back to 2014. Those defeats came against lower league opponents, as Watford fell to Bristol City, Gillingham, Doncaster and Preston. A quick glance at the team-sheet confirmed Gracia’s priorities lie elsewhere, with a firm eye on a home match against Tottenham this weekend. Here he rested all 11 of their players who started the victory over Crystal Palace last Sunday. Yet those who started were imposing and deservedly won this game through goals from Isaac Success and Domingos Quina. Quina, a summer signing poached from West Ham, scored with a magnificent strike, sending a shot searing and dipping from 30 yards into the top corner. The 100 per cent per cent has buoyed Gracia, who said: ‘We want to win every game. I don’t know what we can achieve but let’s see where this mentality takes us.’ Reading, who were a penalty shoot-out away from the Premier League when they lost the play-off final against Huddersfield only 16 months ago, have since plummeted and are without a Championship victory this season. Manager Paul Clement made eight changes — ahead of Saturday’s clash with Sheffield Wednesday — and shorn of their finer talents in front of a crowd of just over 9,000, his Reading side were short of zip. ‘Watford deserved it,’ Clement said. ‘We are not damaged goods. We have to brush it aside because we have a big game on Saturday.’ Watford played with the greater purpose and should have taken the lead when Ben Wilmot was denied. They did score in the 37th minute when Success applied the finishing touch to a fluent move involving the returning Nathaniel Chalobah and Adam Masina. Success has endured a disappointing time since signing for what was a £12.5m club record fee in 2016 but this was only his second goal and he was loaned out to Malaga last season. He spurned further chances to double Watford’s lead but Quina’s brilliance wrapped up the victory shortly after the hour mark.