Watford head coach Vladimir Ivic is looking forward to focusing on the Championship after his side crashed out of the Carabao Cup away at Newport County.

The Serbian was forced to field a team comprising mainly of youngsters as a busy fixture list threatened to increase the number of first-team names already on his injury list and ended up on the end of a 3-1 defeat. 

Speaking after the match, Ivic said that his squad is still unprepared for such an arduous run of games and that he is now hoping to just concentrate on his main goal of getting promoted back to the Premier League.

"It's disappointing for sure, we're disappointed because we came here to play the game, to win the game and it this was the total opposite," he said. "We can just be disappointed after this game.

"We now don't have a game next Tuesday. We need to think about the Championship now and this is our main goal this year. We respect the Carabao Cup and we wanted to win this game, we came here to play for the win, to go to the next round, but the opposite happened and we need to think now just about the Championship."

One player who will be unavailable for a big derby game with Luton at Vicarage Road this Saturday will be striker Stipe Perica, who was given a straight red card for an elbow after coming on as a substitute.

Ivic said he was disappointed to have lost his forward with his squad already spread thin.

"It was one situation - I'm sure he doesn't want to hit the player," said Ivic. "A lot of times when you jump you put your hand up and you can touch the opponent by accident. It happened a bit like that. The ref has given the red card, but it's not good for us because we can't have him for the next game. He'll be out.

"He's important - every player who can play is important for us in this moment because we know that we don't have a lot of players who can play and who is available to play 90 minutes. He's important for us and now we will stay without him, we need to find some other players who will come in his position."