What would anyone have done much different than what Freedman did though?
Watford are a good side in this division and have two top strikers in Deeney (my one to watch - good article if I say so myself -
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] ) and Vydra, so most managers would plan to try to stop them.
Also playing away from home, so even though it is the norm for Freedman in most games, two defensive midfielders seemed to make sense.
From the brief clips of the goals I saw, the first two seemed to come from long balls over the top, to turn our defenders and exploit their lack of speed. Our new left back by all accounts had a stinker - not much you can do about that - other than drop him for future games.
If I'm right about the long balls over the top, the counter to that is for our defense to play deep - allowing less room behind them.
If we set up to stop them, we then have to sacrifice something and that usually means only one up fromt.
Interesting he didn't play Beckford - maybe he thinks now he isn't a lone striker player - which must people who have seen him seem to been saying for a while.
If he doesn't play Beckford then he has no other realistic choice but to play Cravies - perhaps he could have played the young kid Wilkinson - but first match of the season with two experienced strikers in the team ahead of him - I guess that might have been a gamble in that if it didn't work - and the chances it would not - the service would always have been poor to whoever did play - and he would have been up against properly experience defenders and not some other kids his own age and experience that he would have faced in his career to date - then Freedman would have his only two experienced strikers knowing he didn't have faith in them (and to many people having a belief in them, motivates them) and a young kid who probably would lose his confidence in his abilities if things had turned out bad for him. Better to introduce him gradually for the last 20 mins or so in games like this - away from home - to help him get established first.
So, Cravies up front, so who to help him? Mavies is injured (again!), that only leaves Danns and Pratley doesn't it?
Should Freedman taken a punt at playing Lee as the attacking (central) midfielder? Would have been interesting I think but Lee clearly doesn't like a tackle these days.
I can't really see the point of playing a 'jinxy' winger like Lee if we only play with one up front - other defeners have that chance to get back whilst he is running rings around the full back - I would have gone with pace myself and played Feeney.
Maybe Freedman is TOLD to play Lee and keep him in the shop window whilst the window is still open - realistically who would want to sign him if he couldn't get into even our team? We do need to get shut of him to save on his wages - money as we know is tight at the club these days.
I guess Bogdan is off. I'm not a fan of his but he did seem to play very well after he came back from being dropped last season. I can't understand why he didn't play yesterday - if he wasn't fit why was he on the bench and if he was fit why did he not start? Maybe a deal is going on in the background somewhere and it was thought better not to risk him just in case, but have him on the bench if something happened to Lonergan.
So keeper, back four, two defensive mids, lone striker, two supporting lone striker and a winger - that was the side that Freedman sent out and really one I couldn't disagree much with - can you?
I would have played Bogdan and Feeney myself but maybe Freedman wanted to do that also but maybe couldn't due to off field wheeling and dealing perhaps?
The fact is that we have a poor side and Watford had a decent one - we went to try to stop them scoring and get a point - but failed.
I don't think much would change whoever our manager was for that game - do you?
He does need to be very much more positive for home games and for away games against weaker teams - that is his failing to me so far.
I expected to lose against Watford - we did - hardly unexpected really and as such we should look to what players we can get in on loan AFTER the window shuts to improve us - so several more weeks of struggling to go yet before things have a chance to pick up.