ANYTHING IS POZZO BLE!
Watford’s Italian owners have taken their three clubs to the top flight so now...
ALMOST three decades have passed since Watford started a top-flight season which did not end in relegation. It was 1986-87, the final campaign of the first Graham Taylor era. They finished ninth and reached an FA Cup semi-final. It also happened to be Giampaolo Pozzo’s first season in football.
Pozzo had just bought Udinese, rescuing his local team, which was in financial disarray and engulfed by a corruption scandal.
The Italian businessman has since made Udinese part of the Serie A furniture while devising, along the way, one of the most successful operating models in modern football.
He bought Granada in Spain and up they went to La Liga, where they remain.
He bought Watford and up they went, too. And the mood inside Vicarage Road is that, unlike the last two brief appearances in the Barclays Premier League, this time they can stick around.
In fact, the Pozzos are privately planning for European football, which they realise will spark complications of multi-club ownership and awkward UEFA questions about control and influence.
But these are problems to solve in good time. Right now, belief is strong in Hertfordshire, where the Italian owners soothed the early cynicism with an investment of £20million, to clear debts, build a new stand and create a winning team playing attractive football.
Signings this summer are already into double figures. The Pozzo model is based on a prolific recruitment strategy and Watford’s promotion to the Premier League provides a new bounty to invest.
While the three clubs claim to operate as independently as possible, they share the resources of a trusted network of scouts and a database of information to help talent identification.
They have three scouts working in each of their target countries and an international committee, where senior scouts from each of their three clubs meet regularly to share knowledge and discuss priorities.
Under Pozzo, the Udinese scouting department has proved brilliant at maximising Europe’s free movement of labour and sourcing affordable talent from unfashionable markets.
They were quickly into Ghana, from where they signed Stephen Appiah, Sulley Muntari and Kwadwo Asamoah and were in Chile and Colombia when clubs wealthy enough to boast an efficient intercontinental scouting system were focused on Brazil and Argentina.
Alexis Sanchez is the most celebrated talent discovered. Also, Juan Cuadrado. Pozzo developed a reputation, akin to Daniel Levy’s at Tottenham, for buying cheaply and demanding top dollar when he sold.
Several young players did not make it, raising a moral argument, but purely in economic terms, it has proved a success and the trading figures ensured Udinese recorded profits and consistently over-achieved.
Since the Pozzos acquired Granada and Watford, more than 50 transfers and loans have been struck within the family circle. Odion Ighalo was signed by Udinese from Lyn, in Norway, in 2008, spent four seasons on loan at Granada before moving to Vicarage Road last year. He is one of only two to play for all three clubs. The other is Alexandre Geijo.
Initially, Ighalo signed on loan until, in October, Watford terminated the loan and signed him permanently when Udinese cancelled his contract. In eight years associated with the Italian club, he had played only a handful of games for them.
These type of trading conveniences have drawn envious glances and criticism from rivals, who claimed such a multi-club arrangement offered an unfair advantage.
The first year for the Pozzos in Hertfordshire was defined by a fleet of loanees from Udinese and Granada, giving Gianfranco Zola access to the likes of Matej Vydra, who scored 20 as his team reached Wembley in the play-off final.
After a year at West Bromwich, Vydra was back at Vicarage Road last season and has signed permanently this summer for an undisclosed fee, thought to be more than £5m.
Watford’s rise to the Premier League, however, represents a significant power shift because central prize-money payments and television revenue will dwarf anything Udinese and Granada can command.
Queens Park Rangers, bottom of the Premier League last season, were paid £64.8m in TV and prize money. This season, in the Premier League, the projection is for clubs to bank at least £90m, so Watford will likely attract the best players in the Pozzo orbit.
There has been a heavy investment since promotion and yet another new head coach.
Quique Flores has replaced Slavisa Jokanovic and is the fifth different head coach inside a year, but this has not disturbed a club with a European structure akin to Southampton’s and Swansea’s.
The head coach’s responsibilities go little further than coaching the players, picking the team and speaking in public. Any good coach, who understands and accepts this system, should slide into the role without damaging the club’s rhythm or direction.
From the outside it seemed chaotic and yet inside Watford is at peace, reassured by the fact they have ridden out the managerial changes.
Giampaolo’s son, Gino, has been the club’s sole owner since last year and is not one to court publicity, but he has said: ‘We are here for the long term. This is not a case of a foreign owner with an injection of money looking for a quick return. We wish to establish Watford as a Premier League club, self-sufficient over time.
‘Longevity is the key to success. It is only over many years that success can be judged.’
Gino has moved his family into the London area and is a constant presence at the training ground, where he has installed five new stadium-quality pitches at a cost of £2m.
At the same time, the academy has been upgraded. Watford are proud of the emergence of Tommie Hoban and of captain Troy Deeney, signed from Walsall five years ago.
All in all, it has been an impressive first three years at Watford. The next test is the Premier League, and they are better equipped to survive than since the heady days of the 1980s with Taylor and Elton John.