Walter Mazzarri bemoans defensive errors in Watford's loss to Southampton
Saturday 4 March 2017 18:46, UK
Watford boss Walter Mazzarri was left to rue his side's defensive errors as Southampton ran out 4-3 winners at Vicarage Road on Saturday.
Troy Deeney had given Watford an early lead but the hosts were 2-1 down at the break after goals from Dusan Tadic and Nathan Redmond.
And following Stefano Okaka's equaliser, the striker spurned a brilliant opportunity to fire Watford ahead just moments before Southampton took the lead when Manolo Gabbiadini pounced on a Heurelho Gomes error.
Mazzarri refused to single out any individuals but admitted he will speak to his Watford side to address the costly errors.
"We saw last week that they are a strong team when they played in the [EFL Cup] final against Man United. We made some mistakes defensively but they are a strong team and credit goes to them," Mazzarri said.
"When we lose we lose altogether. There were some individual and collective mistakes but I will speak about this with my players.
"Late on, we almost made it 3-2 but then on the counter attack they managed to score to give them the advantage. We were unlucky."
Okaka appeared to react angrily to being substituted late on, but Mazzarri laughed off the incident saying the Italian had asked to be taken off after suffering a minor injury.
Mazzarri was then quizzed on the importance of their next two league matches against Crystal Palace and Sunderland with Watford currently nine points above the drop-zone.
"Yes, they are very important," he said. "We need to prepare very well for these next two games so that we can increase the gap between ourselves and the bottom three."
