Report | Watford 2-0 Argyle
Watford 2
Rajovic 17, 73.
Argyle 0
Argyle are out of the Carabao Cup following a 2-0 defeat at the hands of Watford at Vicarage Road.
Hornets centre-forward Mileta Rajovic scored a goal in each half to give Watford safe passage into round three, in a game where both sides had made significant changes to their line-ups.
Argyle made nine changes coming into the game, with Darko Gyabi and Brendan Galloway, the two players who began the match at Queens Park Rangers on Saturday, continuing in their roles.
Dan Grimshaw made his Argyle debut in goal, playing behind a defence that consisted of a back three of Galloway, Kornel Szucs and Julio Pleguezuelo. Matty Sorinola and Nathanael Ogbeta took their places as wing-backs, either side of a midfield trio of captain Jordan Houghton, Darko Gyabi and Callum Wright. Michael Obafemi, making his first Argyle start after coming on as a substitute at QPR, was joined up front by Mustapha Bundu.
Watford came into the game having won all four of their games so far, three in the league and a first-round demolition of Milton Keynes Dons in this competition. For their part, they made seven changes to a team that won 2-1 at home to Derby County on Saturday.
The opening ten minutes felt like a feeling-out process, with Watford having much of the ball, but Argyle containing their efforts.
The first raising of heartbeats came from the Greens, with a move down the right side seeing Sorinola send in a stunning low ball across the penalty area, with two defenders scrambling to prevent the arriving Ogbeta. From the half-clearance, Wright picked up the scraps but shot over the bar.
Within five minutes, Watford took the lead. Ryan Porteous made a run from deep to get down the right flank, and with Gyabi unable to engage, sent a ball towards the near post. The arriving Rajovic still may not have been fancied to score, and his back flick possibly was more in hope than anything, but in a blur of legs the ball went goalwards, through Grimshaw, and dribbled in.
Frankly, there is no sugar coating matters – it was hardly the start that a goalkeeper wants on a debut, but just after the half-hour mark came a glorious chance for Watford to double their lead, only for Grimshaw to make a save, the quality of which he might struggle to equal should he rack up the total appearances between the sticks of Larrieu, Craig and Crudgington combined.
Watford sent in a cross to the far post, where Rajovic had peeled off, and nodded down to Tom Ince. The latter, as he shot towards the corner, must surely have expected the net to bulge, but Grimshaw arched to his right and pushed the ball round the post.
Argyle’s best chance to equalise before the break came via a breaking of the lines by Sorinola, who slid a ball through to Wright, making a run in an inside-right position. Entering the area, Wright had a choice between shooting and squaring to Obafemi, haring into the centre.
Wright chose the former option, and it was probably the wrong one. He possibly knew so, too, hitting his shot into the goalkeeper’s hands without full conviction.
Wright was often looking like Argyle’s biggest threat, though, and before the interval whistle sounded, he again found space in a similar position, this time taking the correct option to shoot, but dragging slightly wide.
Grimshaw was called into action soon after the restart, reaching across really well to his right to push round a header from Watford skipper Ken Sema, and it was the hosts who continued to apply pressure in the opening to the second period, searching for a second goal to give them daylight in the tie.
Argyle adjusted, first moving to a four-at-the-back, with Pleguezuelo sliding to right-back and Sorinola moving in front of him, before Sorinola was withdrawn in favour of Ryan Hardie, and Obafemi headed to the right flank.
Grimshaw, who had briefly looked to have a muscle strain before continuing, made another low save to his right, from substitute Rocco Vata, increasingly making the goal conceded look the anomaly, rather than the example. He then flung himself in front of another Rajovic goalbound effort when 2-0 looked a certainty.
And then it was.
A Watford cross was deflected skywards, and it was Rajovic, goalside of Szucs, who hooked the dropping ball beyond Grimshaw’s reach, and put the game out of Argyle’s.
Hardie had the best opportunity to narrow the discrepancy in scoreline, ceasing upon a loose backpass and flicking it beyond Jonathan Bond in the Watford goal. The ball, though, struck the foot of the post and then exited the scene.
Argyle kept at it. The effervescent Obafemi won a free kick on the right which substitute Adam Randell teed up for Gyabi to blast, but his powerful shot was charged down.
Argyle resume action in the Sky Bet Championship on Saturday, at Home Park, with the visit of Stoke City, in the last game before the season’s first international break.
Argyle: 31 Dan Grimshaw, 3 Nathanael Ogbeta, 4 Jordan Houghton (capt) (20 Adam Randell, 74), 5 Julio Pleguezuelo, 6 Kornel Szucs, 11 Callum Wright, 14 Michael Obafemi, 15 Mustapha Bundu (7 Ibrahim Cissoko, 73), 18 Darko Gyabi (32 Will Jenkins Davies, 85), 22 Brendan Galloway (16 Lewis Gibson, half-time), 29 Matty Sorinola (9 Ryan Hardie, 65). Substitutes: 21 Conor Hazard (gk), 2 Bali Mumba, 8 Joe Edwards, 10 Morgan Whittaker.
Booked: Houghton 45.
Watford: 23 Jonathan Bond, 3 Francisco Sierralta (15 Antonio Tikvic, 64), 5 Ryan Porteous, 7 Tom Ince, 9 Mileta Rajovic (20 Mamadou Doumbia, 75), 10 Imran Louza (39 Edo Kayembe, 24), 12 Ken Sema (capt), 22 James Morris, 24 Tom Dele-Bashiru (52 Leo Ramirez-Espain. 75), 34 Kwadwo Baah (11 Rocco Vata, 64), 45 Ryan Andrews. Substitutes: 41 Alfie Marriott (gk), 6 Mattie Pollock, 12 Moussa Sissoko, 37 Yasser Larouci.
Booked: Morris 41, Dele-Bashiru 45, Tikvic 84.
Referee: Andy Davies.
Attendance: 8,319 (671 away)
