Deeney explained how Watford targeted Fred as a weak link in the team
Troy Deeney has revealed that Watford players targeted Manchester United’s Fred in their recent Premier League game, though praised the player for always trying to be positive.
The clubs faced off at the end of February, with United winning 3-0 to avenge their defeat at Vicarage Road, though the they had several excellent chances in the first half and thought they had scored only for VAR to rule out Deeney’s goal.
The Watford captain says the team felt they could get chances on the break if they pressed Fred – who has enjoyed a good season – saying he took too long on the ball.
Asked which players made a difference for the Red devils in the second match, Deeney told The United Stand: ‘I thought Bruno [Fernandes] was very good, surprised me how good he was.
‘I liked Fred – although he gives the ball away a lot he always wants it. So sometimes you see a player lose the ball and then they just go safe, backwards, left, right, he’s just like, “Alright, I lost it, but next one”.
‘Because we targeted him. We targeted him, not the manager, but on the pitch he gave the ball away two or three times and we were like, “Let him have it and then we’ll jump on him”.
‘We probably won the ball back four or five times in the first half. We tried to do that because we know he likes to take four or five touches instead of maybe doing the two.’
On the match itself, Deeney said: ‘3-0 I think it was, but that wasn’t a fair reflection of it was it, in reality. Our first half – it’s probably happened about four years in a row – every time I play at Man United I’m like, “How are we losing?”
‘I don’t mean this nasty, but there’s times where we’ve battered you in terms of like – you’ll always have possession – but chances created, should have scored, we were better. And then I’m like, “We’re losing 1-0? What’s happened here?”
‘I think two things: we can probably get a bit carried away, in a sense of like: “this is going better than [we thought] so let’s be more attacking” and kind of get lax on the defensive part.
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‘But also you have to look at the players United have got, you’re talking levels to football. Martial, Rashford, Bruno, Iggy. Just look at who you’ve spent money on, and in five years in the Prem we’ve spent £30m once. It doesn’t mean we can’t compete, it doesn’t mean you always get it right when you buy big, but it’s just levels.’
