Head coach Valerien Ismael gathered his staff and players yesterday for a meeting to look back at the good, the bad and the ugly of the season so far in an attempt to eradicate the latter two.

In recent games Watford have shown they are capable of turning chances into goals, but they are just as adept at gifting opportunities to the opposition.

Both of West Brom’s goals on Wednesday night contained a litany of mistakes and sloppy play, and that has been the pattern in nearly all the goals the Hornets have conceded this season.

In turn, that takes the spotlight off the impressive attacking play that has been on show at the other end of the pitch.

Ismael got everyone together to turn a spotlight on how they are shooting themselves in the foot, but wanted his players to go away knowing they are also doing many good things.

“We had a post-match meeting yesterday, and we analysed two situations: the first was all the mistakes we’ve made so far, and the second was all the positives so far,” he said.

“And I can assure that after the meeting the players had a smile on their faces.

“They saw the positive side. I said to the players that now we need to show that on the pitch, in our results and in the league table.

“You have scored goals, you have dominated opponents – but the opponents are still alive so the job is not finished. That is a lot due to our mistakes.”

Ismael has talked before how conceding goals through your own faults – while frustrating – means you have more ability to affect things, than if a team is shipping goals because they are constantly being outplayed.

That was the case again in the game with Albion.

“On one hand that’s a good feeling, but on the other hand we know we need to change that quickly,” he said.

“That’s why we took that meeting and did it very positively, because we want to see that we can take our chances but do it better without the mistakes.

“I said to the players that this is part of the process. We’ve changed the mindset of the squad, we’ve changed the way they play, so we know that we will make mistakes.

“That was the same at my previous club when we tried to implement something new.”

The Watford boss said the errors his players have made are not as a result of the style of football they are playing.

“The mistakes are about a bad touch, losing duels, things we can avoid. It’s not to do with the way we play,” he said.

“I know that to the outside world it’s all about the results, and as a manager and as a team, we know that.

“But inside, within the club, we are aligned. We know exactly how we want to work, what we want to see on the pitch, and when we win a game we know exactly why we won it.

“This is what we want to create. Everyone knows it takes time but I think that even with all the changes we have we made we are moving quickly forwards.

“Now it’s about getting the right balance on the pitch.”

Other than Ken Sema, who missed the game in midweek and will be out for the trip to Leeds tomorrow, the main injury concern is defender Ryan Porteous who limped off on Wednesday night.

“We will assess him in today’s training session,” Ismael said.

“He didn’t train yesterday, he had just a recovery session. It was a little bit better when he woke up this morning.

“I can’t tell you anything at the minute, it’s 50/50.

“We have options, and if he cannot play then another player will get the chance.

“It’s a long season and we will need all the players. I always stay focussed on the players that are available to give confidence to players who step up when others are not available.

“We are a team and we can compete even when we are missing players

“Sierralta is a centre-back, Jake Livermore can play that position, and then we have Pollock who came on the other night.

“When we picked the squad at the beginning of the season for sure on paper it is not the biggest squad. We don’t have 30, 35 players.

“But I like to play with a small size of squad and within that squad to have players who are able to play two or three positions. That helps you to keep the size of the squad like that.”

Although 4-3-3 has very much been the chosen formation, Ismael made it clear he has no problem switching style and approach if he feels it’s the right thing to do.

“We played at the end against West Brom with three centre backs, we did it at Coventry and had two strikers,” he pointed out.

“It depends on the situation and what the game plan is, as well as how the opponent plays.

“We know that we are flexible. We are strong in our 4-3-3 but we know that we can change the shape if needed. We can have another striker if we need it.

“Throughout the season we will have to make decisions like that.”