NO EXCUSES!
Gomes: If we don’t keep improving the owner will keep changing everything
HEURELHO GOMES does not recall his first Watford encounter with any great affection. ‘Horrible,’ he winced, referencing an empty, condemned stand and a dressing room not big enough to accommodate his Tottenham team-mates as they prepared for a League Cup tie in 2008.
‘Eleven had to change and then move out to make space for the others, it was tiny, horrible. And the pitch was horrible. And now it’s unbelievable; you can see the stadium, the facilities, the pitch — pitches like this one.’
Gomes stands on a sharp new artificial 3G surface, opened by the Watford FC Community Sports and Education Trust with the help of a £250,000 grant from the Premier League and the FA Facilities Fund, opened in the town to support grassroots football.
His sons, Flavio and Luiz, train at another similar community venue nearby, in Elstree. It is worlds apart from his early days chasing a ball in the dirt on a cattle farm, in a backwater of the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. ‘No grass, no pitch, just open land,’ said Gomes. ‘You cannot compare.’
Watford hope the Brazilian is able to repel Liverpool’s prolific attacking unit today and two players he knows well: Roberto Firmino and Philippe Coutinho. ‘Firmino I played with at Hoffenheim,’ said Gomes, who was loaned to the German club from Spurs in 2013.
‘There were quite a few Brazilian players and the city is so small and we got together for barbecues.’ Gomes remains in close contact with Firmino. ‘We have some of the same friends,’ he said. ‘We post pictures on Facebook and comments and make jokes. I could see he was going to be a great player. He was just at the beginning. It was a big move from the second division in Brazil to Germany and now he’s playing for Liverpool, he’s probably living a dream.’
Firmino has prospered under Jurgen Klopp. ‘I believe it’s because he knew him from Germany,’ said Gomes. ‘Klopp for me, along with [Mauricio] Pochettino and [Pep] Guardiola is one of the best.’
Gomes signed a new contract in July that ties him to Watford until the end of next season, by which time he will be 37.
He has been a constant at Vicarage Road despite playing for six different managers in less than three years. He describes manager Walter Mazzarri, his latest boss, as a ‘tough man’ and slaps the back of one hand into the palm of his other.
‘He points the finger, he tells us what to do. And you know if you don’t follow him you’re going to have a very difficult time. Fortunately we are following what he wants. And he is happy.’
Since joining in the summer of 2014, Gomes has learned to trust the instinct of owner Gino Pozzo. ‘His family are in football for 25 years,’ said the keeper. ‘You can see we are improving, as a team and as a club. He’s never satisfied, that’s why I believe he changed the managers. He would change anything.
‘We want to improve and the owner is there every day to look and if we’re not improving he will change: change the players, change the manager, change anything that’s stopping the growth.’
Heurelho Gomes was speaking at the official reopening of the Meriden Community Centre which is run and managed by Watford FC’s Community Sports and Education Trust on behalf of Watford Borough Council.