Claudio Ranieri made his entrance to English football for a fourth time as he earlier this month took charge of Watford. He has a past at Chelsea, Leicester and Fulham. He had to step down at Chelsea after a first season under the ownership of Roman Abramovich and moved on to other options in 2004.
After being absent from English football for eleven years, he turned surprisingly up at Leicester and as we all know guided the club to a sensational Premier League win in 2015/16, but sadly after a run of bad results in PL action getting sacked just a few months after his magical miracle on grass.
Ranieri moved to France and was in charge at Nantes for a while before coming back to Premier League in 2018 and taken on board at struggling Fulham, but just lasted a few months and moved on to Roma for a short caretaker spell. Since then been at Sampdoria, but stepped down from this position in the summer before entering the doors at Vicarage Road and again returing to Premier League action.
His first game in charge was a difficult fixture, playing Liverpool. He had little or no time to prepare his team and they were heavily defeated and the worst possible start was a fact, watching on as his Watford team had to see 5 goals conceded and 0 goals scored.
No one really had any hope of a good result this Saturday with a new difficult game coming up, this time away to Everton. It all started terribly, getting one goal behind, after just 3 minutes play. But with a formation change and a better foundation Watford fought back and Joshua King found the net after 13 minutes and the teams were equal after the first half.
From this point on Watford started lift themselves and Claudio Ranieri had made a number of shrewd changes from his terrible start as especially Joshua King made a special impact. The Norwegian international did not play against Liverpool now taking the top forward role, which he loves to play in, moving Ismaila Sarr out on the flank. Ranieri had also made his system change, playing four in the back, five in midfield with Joshua King operating in that single postion up front.
Looking at the Watford line-up you do start to think. This is a side of experienced players, a number of internationals and also having that age that you ofen see in teams doing well and not getting carried away. King was of course one change from the previous match v. Liverpool, but not the only one. Of course moving Sarr wide gives a different dimention as the Senegal international is a much better alternative in this position.
Femania, Dennis and Rose were the three changes from the Liverpool game, with Tufan and Ngakia being named in the starting set up as the first half probably became a bit of getting to understand each other with another magnificant twist done after Richarlison did give Everton a 2-1 lead after 63 minutes.
Straight after this goal from Everton, Claudio Ranieri made to vital substitutions bringing on Dennis and Pedro for Tufan and Sarr. Slovakian midfielder Juray Kucka scored the 2-2 equalizer from a great header after 78 minutes with a desperate Everton team not able to balance their efforts and a sharp Joshua King managed to score both the 3-2 and 4-2 goal, which made this evening a fantastic event for the newly promoted manager getting a full recovery from his first game accident a week ago.
So will Claudio Ranieri again be succesfull in English football, can he bring the results to the table that the owners at this club hugely would love to see happen, and does he have the players needed to bring those results forward.
Looking at the Watford squad you do see a group of quality and with the inclusion of Joshua King being played in the role he loves and getting back to goalscoring ways after 15 months dry and really showing Goodison Park and Everton fans what he is all about, you start to wonder if Ranieri has brought life back to a very mature player who has proved himself at Premier League level for several seasons with Bournemouth.
This Watford team do have a blend and rythm that looks like thay have a winner formula and with players such as King, Cathcart, Kucka, Sissoko and Sarr in there, you will of course have qualities and experience that are so vital when getting results in this heavy and difficult league.
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