Vydra tops Zola’s shopping list
WITH the January transfer window just days away Watford boss Gianfranco Zola has vowed to tie down the best of his on-loan talent permanently – including the striker who helped down Brighton, Matej Vydra.
The Czech Republic international, who is with the Hornets for the season on a temporary basis from Udinese, scored two goals in two second-half minutes to take his season tally to 12.
Also on the scoresheet for the in-form Vicarage Road outfit was Troy Deeney – his eighth goal in nine games coming before David Lopez’ penalty for the Seagulls.
But despite seeing his troops extend their impressive record to just one defeat in 11 league games, it was the thought of securing the services of some of his 14 loan stars permanently that had Zola purring.
“Matej Vydra was excellent, he was outstanding, but the whole team did very well,” said the former Chelsea and Italy star.
“There are a lot of loan players but we are looking to sign them, they are not just here for a short amount of time, we want to keep them permanently, the ones that are good enough for us, so that’s what we’re going to try to do.
“What we can achieve I don’t know, it is a long and tough Championship but we are there, we deserve to be there and we are going to keep working hard to make sure we stay there.
“The first 15 minutes (Brighton) were really coming at us and causing us problems because they are a good team, but then we found our rhythm, we found our passing and in the end you could see it was a deserved victory.
“We worked very hard, in this Championship or in any league you have to earn your right to play the football.”
Deeney opened the scoring by burying the ball into the bottom right corner after latch- ing onto a through ball from Vydra on 54 minutes.
Their lead lasted ten minutes until Manuel Almunia fumbled and allowed Kazenga LuaLua to steal the ball and he was brought down in the area by Tommie Hoban – Lopez converting the penalty.
But Vydra scored twice in the space of two minutes to crush a spirited display from the Seagulls.
The Hornets top scorer restored the lead on 68 minutes when his long-range shot was deflected in and his second came when he was one-on-one with the keeper.
And it left Zola’s old Chelsea teammate Gus Poyet at a loss to explain his Brighton side’s loss of form – without a win in four.
“I think we started well, we were the better team, especially with (Andrea) Orlandi running through but as soon as we lost a bit of positioning the game became equal and a bit too open,” said Poyet. “I don’t like games that are attack for attack, chance for chance.
“They had a couple and we had a couple and we tried to address that at half-time to try to win the game and it was totally the opposite, there was three mistakes in the same action to allow them to score the first one. After that, I think Watford was the better team.
“When you are on top you need to score, because especially with the way Gianfranco’s team play, they are going to have the ball.”