Head coach Damon Lathrope ended his first season in charge of Watford Women with promotion back to the Championship, the Southern Premier Division Title and the Manager of the Season Award.

Not a bad haul in your debut campaign as the gaffer, especially as he was picking up a squad understandably deflated by relegation due to a goal seven minutes into stoppage time on the final day of the previous season.

His back was slapped and his hand shaken countless times after the final whistle at Stadium MK on Saturday, and he took time to step back and soak everything up as his players celebrated with 2,000 Watford fans.

“It feels class,” he said.

“When you’re part of a group that has worked so hard for 12 months, giving everything you’ve got, to then have this moment. It’s class.

“You don’t always get what you deserve at the end of things, but we have today. And I really knew we would because the belief within the group was absolutely amazing.

“Before the game I told the players to go out and be really brave. There is no harder time to be brave, be courageous, take the ball under pressure and pass the way we want to than in a game like today.

“Going into the game I was fully confident that we could pass Forest off the pitch, and at times we did.

“The way we play ain’t for everyone. Doing what we do won’t suit everyone because when the pressure kicks in during the big games, it’s so easy to take the safe option.

“But none of our team hide away, they stand up to be counted. That’s what they did today.”

He also had plenty of sympathy for Nottingham Forest, who don’t get promoted despite winning the Northern Premier Division.

“Forest are a very good team and I feel gutted for them,” he said.

“I’ve been in a similar situations, and they should be going up with us. They’ve won their league.”

Early on in the game, Watford needed two big saves from keeper Jacqui Goldsmid either side of Poppy Wilson’s match-winning 18th-minute header.

“In games like this, you need things to go your way: you need the rub of the green,” said Lathrope.

“You need to have players who get you out of trouble, and today when she was called upon Jacqui was there for us.

“Her job is to keep the ball out of the net and she’s done it really, really well.

“I was hoping we were going to get a second and really put the game to bed. I didn’t want us to have to sit in and soak up pressure.

“On another day I think we’d go and get that second because we just lacked that clinical touch in the final third.

“But I thought the team managed the last 15 minute so, so well. It’s a fine line between making sure you’re secure, and being so deep you are inviting pressure.

“I thought the players got that balance absolutely on the money in the second half. The collective courage and bravery they showed was outstanding.”

Watford Observer: Lathrope in the technical area at Stadium MK.Lathrope in the technical area at Stadium MK. (Image: Andrew Waller Images)

The Player of the Match award went to midfielder Drè Georgiou.

“You won’t find anyone who cares more than Drè,” Lathrope said.

“She cares so much. Sometimes she’ll let me know in training when she’s not happy about something.

“But everything she does comes from a good place. We know she cares and there would have been nobody inside the stadium today who wanted to win more than her.

“That’s what showed through in her performance today. She was calm when she had the ball, she was tenacious when she didn’t. The amount of ground she covered was phenomenal.

“We needed that performance today in the middle of the pitch. I asked her beforehand to go out and run the game, and she did. Her performance underpinned the team performance.”

As for the only goal, Wilson’s size and stature doesn’t necessarily suggest she’s a threat in the air, but Lathrope said he wasn’t surprised at the way she took the goal.

“Poppy has done that a lot. She’s brilliant in the air, and she scores a lot of headers because she gets into good positions and is brave,” he said.

“When that cross came in, her header didn’t surprise me at all.

“It was a great ball in from Gemma [Davison] too. She is a player made for these big occasions.”

With promotion comes the need for reinforcements and potentially a larger budget – plus having to wait to win the play-off before knowing what division his side will be in means Lathrope is playing catch-up on the other Championship sides.

“We’ve already half started preparing for next season because we’ve had conversations. We just need to give ourselves the best chance,” he said.

“Hopefully, sooner rather than later, we’ll know exactly what we can do next season.

“We will do what we can, put it that way. We will be asking all the questions to put ourselves in the best position possible to be competitive at that level.

“One thing we know is it will not be easy.”