Penaranda still on hold

ADALBERTO PENARANDA is facing yet another wait to play for Watford.

The Venezuelan striker’s work permit has finally come through more than two years after he signed for the Hornets from Italian club Udinese.

But now boss Javi Gracia has told him he will have to wait even longer – as he has too many strikers.

Penaranda, 21, is behind Andre Gray, Troy Deeney, Isaac Success, Stefano Okaka and Gerard Deulofeu in the Watford pecking order.

And Gracia admits: “At the moment I have 27 players and nine of them will be out of the list to be involved.

“Okaka is waiting on his chance. Andre and

Troy were on the bench last game and all deserve to play.

“We have different options. Penaranda is a striker who is different than others we have, but I see him as a striker.

“We’ll see when he’s ready because in this moment he needs time. He was awaiting his visa and work permit but in this moment I can say he’s available but we’ll see when I decide he has to play.”

Gracia has dilemmas over his entire team selection for today’s home clash with Liverpool.

He said: “If you ask me about all of the players I have in this moment I can say that all of them are important. “Speaking about the last game against Southampton, we started playing with Isaac Success and Gerard Deulofeu as the strikers.

“It depends on the game as we can change in different games. I think Troy played very well in the last game, but Andre as well.

“In this moment we have different options for that position and I’m really pleased with all of them. I have to decide and we’ll see what we do in the next game.

“I think all of them are happy when we win and, after that, if they play more time than others they’ll be happier. “I think they have a collective target as a main objective and after that they are competing to play and competing to have more time to show what they are able to do. All of them want to win.”

Gracia is keen to get his team back playing after working on ideas over the international break. He said: “It’s been good to see a few more games. We’ve had more time to rest and it was good for us.

‘‘We have done some good work over the last week, we will see if we are able to show in the game what we are able to.”