Watford Under-23s beat Wigan Athletic 2-0 in an appearance at Vicarage Road on Wednesday afternoon.

A quickfire double from Shaq Forde and Jack Grieves gave the Hornets the lead ten minutes into the second half, with both goals set up by striker Tiago Cukur.

Despite the likes of Dan Gosling and Nicolas Nkoulou featuring in recent weeks, no first team players were made available for the match, with Roy Hodgson no doubt wanting to keep the available players he has as fresh possible for Saturday’s trip to Liverpool.

Wigan almost took the lead in the third minute, when Harry McHugh’s curling free kick crashed against the crossbar.

The Hornets then squandered an opportunity of their own moments later when a flowing move saw Forde thread a neat ball out to right back Ryan Andrews, who was advancing down the wing. His delivery ended up at the feet of Jack Burchell on the edge of the box after a scuffed clearance, but his shot soared over the bar.

Adrian Blake’s shot suffered the same fate in the ninth minute after he had intercepted McHugh’s loose pass, intended for Kai Payne, on the edge of his own area. His awareness was not matched by his quality on the ball.

The shots continued to fly over the top, with the Latics’ Dean Pinnington the next to contribute, lashing over on the angle after some neat build up play involving Chris Sze.

It took until the 22nd minute for the first shot on target to arrive, with Cukur firing straight at Sam Tickle after dispossessing Charlie Hughes out on the right, when perhaps Forde, making a run to his left, was a more astute option.

There was a more familiar conclusion to the Hornets’ next attack as Andrews found space to cross from the right. He picked out Blake at the far post, but the shot once again cleared the bar, although this time it at least had Tickle worried enough to dive full stretch to his left.

Forde missed a great chance to open the scoring on the half hour mark, with the Wigan defenders forgetting to mark him from a James Morris corner. But he misjudged the flight of the ball and ended up craning his neck to make contact, and diverted wide.

Burchell had a shot saved by Tickle on the end of a weaving Blake run, while Vincent Angelini had to produce an acrobatic stop to his left to deny Youseff Chentouf’s goalbound effort to keep the sides level at half time.

The opening goal of the match came ten minutes after the break, with Morris’ cross from the left held up well in the centre by Cukur. The Turkish youth international laid off to Forde on the edge of the area and his arrowed shot left Tickle flat-footed as it flew into the top corner.

The lead was doubled just a minute later with Cukur again playing provider. His neat flick into the box picked out Grieves, whose first shot was saved by the Wigan keeper, only for the rebound to cannon back off the midfielder’s shins and into the net.

Cukur looked to add a goal of his own as Watford continued to attack just moments later, but he fired over from the edge of the box on the end of Forde’s cutback from the goal line.

Angelini produced further heriocs in the 80th minute when he reacted well to prevent a diverted cross from beating him and he was required again shortly after with McHugh's strike from distance threatening to creep inside his near post.

Tom Costello tested the former Celtic man further with six minutes remaining, but once again, he was up to the task, denying with his feet, as the Hornets saw the game out, with Andrews almost adding a third in stoppage time, only for Tickle to thwart his effort.