After guiding Watford out of the Premier League relegation zone for the first time this season with a 3-0 win away at Bournemouth, head coach Nigel Pearson said his players had simply done what they had to in order to win.

The Hornets have won four games from six in the league with the 56-year-old in charge, lifting them from the foot of the table into 17th and, although he thought the game at the Vitality stadium was scrappy, Pearson was delighted with the way his players adapted to find the three points.

"It was scrappy because both sides were very committed and both sides were very resilient and showed a lot of tenacity so there was an awful lot of transitions in the game," he said.

"There was not a great deal of patient possession because both sides wanted to put each other under a lot of pressure but we did what we had to do to win the game and I think that's the important thing from our own perspective, it's finding different solutions in games and it's finding different ways of winning.

"There have been times when we've played some really good football and won games and then today was an example of having to show quite a bit of resilience and game understanding, but also using our quality when we could and I thought our counter attacking situations were really good, we created a lot of chances, we defended set plays with an incredible desire to keep the ball out of the net, and we needed to. It's a great result for us, but we have to keep our focus from here on in."

Despite this being the best position the club have been in so far this season, Pearson is still refusing to let his players get carried away. 

He knows there is a long way left to go and that he needs to keep his squad grounded, but he did say he was pleased with the way his side navigated a busy festive period, despite a number of injury problems, with few complaints.

"There are so many games left, I think it would be foolish to think that just because we've got out of the bottom three, that the job's done," he said.

"It's not at all, there's an awful long way to go, but I think what it does, it quantifies the work that the players have put in over the last few games and the Christmas and New Year period have been very difficult and very busy. If you want to use fixture congestion as an excuse, we've got plenty of injuries, but our players have just got on with it and I've been very pleased with that because they've taken responsibility for their own performances and that's important."