Hayden Mullins has called on his Watford players and staff members to remain professional in the final two games of the season, following the sacking of Nigel Pearson.

The interim coach will be in charge for the matches with Manchester City and Arsenal as the Hornets look to retain their Premier League status, something which looked unlikely back in December when the club were nine points adrift at the foot of the table.

Mullins recognised Pearson's input in helping the club climb to a more secure place in the table, but with just three points separating them from the drop zone knows there is still work to be done.

The former Under-23 boss said he didn't know why the club came to its decision to terminate Pearson's contract, but that he was now just focused on the task at hand.

"When you work in football, one thing you have to take on board is that a lot of things happen and one of the things that we've had to deal with in the last couple of days is the manager leaving," he said.

"However that's come about, we can't let it dissuade us from our focus for the last two games.

"We know that the manager was a big part of [getting Watford out of the relegation zone], but the club have made a decision and us, players, staff have got to be professional enough to now focus on the next two games.

"The players have trained really well the last two days. They were informed as I was yesterday. We had a meeting with the owner and the chairman and they were informed as I was. We went out we trained yesterday, we had a really good session, they came in today very focused and again we had another really good session today preparing for tomorrow.

"I wasn't part of the decision [to sack Pearson]. The club make their decisions and the club has their reasons for the decision, that's a question to ask the club. For me, I work for the football club, I've been asked to step in and be caretaker these next two games and that's what I'll try and do."

Mullins will take over in an interim capacity for the second time this season, prompting questions about whether he could be a serious candidate to take on the role permanently.

However, he insists he is not thinking about that for the time being and instead is just looking to make sure his side is as organised as it can be to try and get something positive out of two tricky matches.

"I said in December when I had the caretaker role, I work for the club and at the moment I recognise where we are and what the situation is and what we need and how we need to focus," he said. "That's my focus at the moment, on the game on Tuesday, the focus today was definitely on preparing the team. Anything more long term I haven't thought about.

"I want to organise us as much as we can, I want us to be competitive, I want us to all know our jobs on the pitch and hopefully the players can go out and carry that out. I think it's a very good team we're playing tomorrow, we can't get away from that, they're a fantastic side, a fantastic manager and we just have to be as disciplined and as compact as we can."

In order for the Hornets to get anything against City and Arsenal, Mullins has demanded that they all show leadership qualities and pull together in the same direction.

"We've got a lot of leaders in the group and we need every single one of them," he said. "It's not just one or two, it's a 19, 20 man squad. That's what we need, everyone pulling in the same direction, 11 leaders out on the pitch and one common goal and that's to get positive results."