Javi Gracia has outlined his ambitions for the 2018/19 season ahead of the campaign getting underway against Brighton & Hove Albion tomorrow.

The Hornets head into the clash on the back of a season which once again saw them flirt with danger before securing top flight status.

A summer in which clubs throughout the league have once again indulged in a habitual transfer window spend has left many saying survival will be harder to attain this term.

Gracia believes expecting the level of competition to be of a higher standard will only benefit his side as they look to kick on.

“I do not know if the standard is better but the best mentality to have is to think as if it will be,” Gracia said.

“For us, in this moment, it is important to have a high level of ambition and to moderate expectation while having limited needs.

“We will try to compete in every game and I do not think there is a higher target than trying to win every game. We are going to play every game with this as our objective.

“Our mentality is always to try and improve in our achievements and I prefer to be ambitious going into the season.”

The head coach was full of praise for Brighton’s style of play when quizzed on how he will approach tomorrow’s game and the Seagulls have strengthened well in the transfer market.

Gracia will be going into his first full season in charge of the Hornets after taking the reigns in January and performing an impressive firefighting job to keep Watford up.

He is looking forward to getting the season underway and feels he and his players have benefitted from spending time working together last term and in pre-season.

“It is always better to have time to work with players and spend more time creating the style of play and introducing the new players,” the Spaniard said.

“When I arrived last season it was difficult because the team were in a tough moment and we needed to improve results quickly.

“Now we have had more time working together, I think the players will be able to have a good season.”

If Watford are to improve on last season’s showing they are likely to have to tighten up in defence at set-pieces after struggling to keep teams at bay.

The problem has been present once again in pre-season and Gracia accepts it is an area he wants to see improved upon,starting tomorrow.

“We can improve all aspects and different phases of our game with the new players who have come in,” he said.

“We need to improve defensively as a team and defensively in the last games we conceded too many goals defending long set pieces.

“We didn’t compete for second balls and that cost us in games at the end of last season where we maybe only faced one shot, so we can improve.”