Rocco Vata

he's he came out and said last week that he's basically continuing his professional football career to be an international footballer and to help Ireland get to a European Championships that they'll co-host in 2028 the fact that he doesn't have a squad obviously himself and Hunter Grimson have come to the agreement that if he's not playing then he's not involved and that seems to be a theme of yesterday's squad announcement that If you aren't playing, then you're not really going to be involved.

Pretty much the majority of those players, bar Rocco Vata, have played or started at least the majority of the games this season.

Even if you look at the goalkeepers, Cleveland Callagher...

Max O'Leary and Gavin Bizzuno Gavin Bizzuno's obviously got into the Bolton team but Mark Travers you thought would have been involved and he hasn't obviously played for Everton this season so he's out obviously Nathan Collins is a big miss out for four or five weeks with a calf injury that's your captain that's automatically a huge loss and I know we are very well stacked with centre defenders but he's a big loss either way so there's a couple of question marks who's going to play on the right at back three is it going to be a back three who's going to play right wing back who's going to be the second midfielder alongside Jason Malumby and yeah who probably plays up front alongside Troy Parrott you'd imagine Chidoza Agbene but yeah there's a lot of question marks but Liam Kitching is a player he's left footed He turns 27 in a few weeks time and he was an integral part of the Coventry City promotion team last year.

Jose Benet, of course, is there and Troy Parrott is there.

Before we get into Elding and Vata, because they are the talking points, really, an interesting thing to note that Jack Moylan is listed as a forward.

Would you read anything into that? David I'll start with you

yeah I think obviously I think Hal Grimson and Pine McCarthy and John O'Shea sees him as a real number 10 and obviously Brian Barry Murphy his coach with Cardiff has alluded to that as well in a couple of his post-match press conferences so far this season even though he has played him a little bit deeper yeah I think that is something like that on necessity yeah I think so it is interesting he definitely does probably his best work closest to goal I think that's maybe why he's there interestingly like Rocco Vata is kind of a the one out of the blue selection I think that we've had maybe Liam Kitching as well but look if you look at Rocco Vata's minutes this year he started one league game where he was taken off at half time and then in the other games he's played 32 minutes 25 17 23 13 he's been in and out of the Watford team but he is someone who has X factor I think as well he's a little bit different maybe to Harry Vail maybe a little bit different to Finneza's he plays in a similar position

different definitely different but I think as far as the X Factor goes I'd say he's got the same amount of it as maybe Azaz and Vale do but he's a lot more electric a lot more direct I would say would

probably be how I'd describe him I think to start the games though obviously Troy Parr is going to start and I think Chido Zagbene has just proved like he is so important to this Irish team and the way we play especially if we play with a five at the back and I

Yeah, I'd just like to say on the Jack Moylan thing first, I'm pretty certain that they see him in those two positions just off the striker.

And that's why he's named as in the forwards.

Mikey Johnson out injured at West Brom.

Rocco Vata, 32 minutes in a 2-1 loss versus Stoke.

Tom Cannon, 26 minutes in a 1-0 loss versus Wolves.

Chidozi Ogbene, 22 minutes in a 1-0 win versus Preston North End.

But yeah, I'm kind of quite, obviously Sammy Smolik's got an assist.

He could play up front if you really wanted him to.

Um, and then others kind of will do what you don't would get kind of get in there but yeah that's kind of it was a strike because obviously Troy didn't play tonight with less rotation reasons Rocco Vata got more minutes at the weekend he's still he's still not near his best he didn't have a great performance coming on but you can see he's just so low on kind of confidence at the moment he needs a goal he needs an assist he's something that will get himself back to his best because when he's at his best he's he's an unbelievable talent and own own elding didn't come on the weekend um and because of it was the cup they were like jacob didn't start either there were three nil up against ross county after at halftime i think they were um and then jacob came on for the last half an hour and they probably thought oh i imagine own elding was just there just in case and ross county made a game out of it obviously they're the second tier in scotland and Owen wasn't needed, so positive.

I think they play tomorrow night, actually, which will be quite good.

Mamadou Doumbia, he scored the winner.

Rocco Vata, still all 19, 20, 21.

Kind of at odds with the high them, fire them managerial policy they've got, because, you know, they've got these young players that they're developing, but obviously they need to be given time and managers aren't given time at Watford.

But one thing I noted in the pre-match news conference as well, that Captain Matty Pollock said, This is a line I heard from him.

I mean, just to be clear for people who haven't watched the game, he started with a 4-2-3-1 and the three was, is it Pochero? They always say Pochero when you listen to it on the commentary, but it looks like Piero.

But anyway, he was in the 10 role and he had Nabizadeh and Vata on the pitch.

And Vata's obviously sort of coming back, trying to find form.

And Abizada has slightly dropped off from his first two or three performances.

He doesn't look quite as confident as he did.

I think that is a habit that we're seeing with our wingers at the moment, actually, is that, I mean, it might just be because of those striking options are constantly changing and they're not necessarily learning those patterns, whether that is Kieran Gore or whether it is Dombier up front.

But they do just seem to be taking that extra touch at the moment.

Rocco Vata in that first half, who I thought came under some unfair criticism.