I knew the omens weren’t good for Sunday’s FA Cup semi-final when I did something that I’ve never done before as I stepped out of Wembley Park station and headed for the Green Man Pub.

I lost my tickets. That is something that I’ve never, ever done before. My heart sank. What was I going to do? How could I lose the tickets for Watford’s biggest match of the season?

Luckily, Wembley were kind enough to print off some duplicate tickets, even if it did mean a daunting hour-long wait. It didn’t stop me feeling like a right idiot, but I knew the omens weren’t good for the game.

And so it proved. Watford were knocked out of the FA Cup, as they were defeated 2-1 by Crystal Palace. The Hornets could have no complaints whatsoever.

For large parts of the game, Watford were second best. We froze on the big stage like we did in the Play-Off Final two years ago and that was hugely disappointing for me. Palace outfought us and were the better side on the day once again, so we can have few complaints with the score line.

Unusually our defence looked fragile, as Yannick Bolasie, Connor Wickham and, in particular, Wilfried Zaha tore us apart all game and there was no way that we could stop them. We seemed frightened to lay a finger on the tricky Zaha, who always seems to play out of his skin against Watford. You only have to look back to when the 23-year-old ran straight down the other end and nearly scored, after a corner of ours was cleared.

Both of Palace’s goals were avoidable and Quique Sanchez Flores and the rest of the team will be disappointed in the way we conceded them.

It was only in the second half that we really came back in to things, but even after we got back on level terms, we still didn’t seem entirely comfortable, especially at the back.

In attack, we struggled to create many clear-cut chances as we either took too many touches in promising positions or the final ball was poor. We missed a bit of pace and creativity, which would enable us to really stretch other teams when we attack.

There were, however, a couple of positives to take from Sunday’s game. Troy Deeney was excellent throughout, as he never stopped running all day and gave 110 per cent as always. He took his goal superbly well and led the side admirably.

I was also impressed with the performance of Mario Suarez. I, like many others, was surprised that Suarez was given the nod over Valon Behrami, when Etienne Capoue went off injured. But the Spaniard also had a good game, as he kept hold of possession well and managed his defensive and offensive duties effectively. In recent weeks, he has shown glimpses of his quality and given a full pre-season, I think the former Atletico Madrid and Fiorentina man could become an important player for us next season.

All in all though, Sunday’s game was a disappointment. There’s no getting away from that.

Hopefully now we can finish the season strongly, with three of our final four games coming against teams lower than us in the table. Fifty points is a serious possibility for Watford. We know how important it is for teams to finish strongly. You only have to look at Leicester to see how important it is to build momentum.

It’s a case now of looking to finish this season as strongly as we can and build for next season. Hopefully that will happen, starting with a victory over Aston Villa this weekend.

Bradley Hayden is the founder and sole writer of www.thewatfordblog.com