SMOOTH OPERATOR
Watford pitch snookers rivals
PHILIP ZINCKERNAGEL claims Watford’s snooker-table pitch is worth extra points in the promotion race.
And the Danish winger says they are in the right frame of mind to complete their charge for automatic promotion after a hardfought sixth win in seven games.
Bang on cue, Xisco Munoz’s side are stringing wins together and building momentum.
And after Adam Masina’s winner – the Italian defender’s first goal in 13 months – both managers praised groundsman Scott Tingley’s pristine surface.
Zinckernagel, who scored 19 goals and provided 24 assists in 28 games as Bodo/Glimt won the Norwegian Eliteserien last year, said: “The boys have a strong mentality and we all believe in it, but it’s different to last season.
“Everything went our way, we scored five goals every week and we almost destroyed the league, but the competition here is much higher than in Norway.
“You get the variety of pitches – at home, the surface is perfect and nice to play on, but other places like Millwall and Blackburn, it’s been very difficult.”
Watford have won 44 of their 66 points on Tingley’s pitch – the best home record in the league.
But Forest skipper Joe Worrall was unimpressed with the Hornets and turned his fire on his side’s lack of goals.
Worrall said: “It’s frustrating – we need to do more at the top end.
“We had eight corners and not a lot of first contacts on them. As solid as we’ve been, we can’t keep relying on clean sheets.
“The amount we’ve scored over the season [28 goals in 35 games], it’s not enough. Watford went into the top two with this win, but I didn’t think too much of them.
“They didn’t play that great.”