Sky Bet Championship: Slavisa Jokanovic praises table-topping Watford

New Watford boss Slavisa Jokanovic believes his Watford side are good enough to stay at the top of the table following their comfortable 3-0 victory over Sheffield Wednesday at Hillsborough.

Watford took a 1-0 lead midway through the first-half when Odion Ighalo tapped home a teasing Matej Vydra delivery in the 24th minute.

The Hornets then doubled their lead before the break when Almen Abdi latched on to a Fernando Forestieri pass on the break before the winger bent the ball underneath the unfortunate Keiren Westwood in the Wednesday goal.

All three points were then secured when Vydra got in on the action as he cleverly chipped the ball in to the roof of the net and give Jokanovic the best start possible to his reign as Watford manager.

Jokanovic said: "I am very happy. It is definitely a great day for us but this league is very tough so we have to try to improve and control games as well as we have today.

"We can stay top of the league but it will be tough. It was important for us to have good offensive players today, but everyone defended brilliantly.

"We played with three strikers today and they understood what we wanted, finding the gaps and playing very well. I am very happy and the team must be very happy."

As well as praising his whole squad, Jokanovic was quick to highlight the impressive performance of loanee Sebastian Bassong.

"He played a very good game today and was very important for us. He has played many games in the Premier League as well as in the Championship too, and he is going to be a very important guy for us in the future," Jokanovic added.

Sheffield Wednesday manager Stuart Gray admitted his side came up short against one of the best sides in the division.

He said: "We've put crosses and shots in, but one thing we are doing is playing against a team where you have to be switched on defensively.

"Unusually Keiren Westwood made an error for the second goal and that is probably the only mistake he has made since he has been at this football club.

"I said to the players at half-time that you are going to have setbacks, so we went into the second half trying to play but we came up against one of the best teams in the Championship today."

Gray added that he was disappointed with the performance of the match officials.

"I have seen their first goal and the boy is blatantly offside," he said.

"As soon as he put the ball through I thought the linesman was just going to stick his flag up and I think 10,000 fans appealed at the same time."