Valerien Ismaël: Asprilla has to learn how be decisive with goals and assists

By Alessandro Schiavone at Vicarage Road

Capital Football spoke to Watford head coach Valerien Ismaël ahead of the Hornets’ trip to Leeds United today. This is what he said:

On whether as a former top-level defender he preferred the goal galore in the first half-hour in the last match against WBA or the following two-thirds of the game with no goals but also no mistakes: “The whole game was great. The mentality, the players’ attitude, the desire…we wanted to get off to a great start which we did, scoring the first goal. Afterwards, it was a recurring theme as we made individual mistakes giving the opposition the chance to find a way back into the game. There’s a lot of quality in the Championship and teams take their chances. When you concede goals like you have to find a way to get back into the game, which we did but with hindsight I feel we should have killed the game off in the first half. Isma Kone had a great chance. In the second half things got harder as we made mistakes in our build-up play which allowed West Bromwich to find a routeback into contest, they even fancied their chances to score goals.”

On Yaser Asprilla’s impact after his introduction on 57 minutes: “Asprilla is a player who has the quality to make a difference but he needs to learn how to be decisive, whether that’s with a decisive pass or a goal. It’s down to us now to work with him so he can get to the next level…”

On facing his former squad West Bromwich Albion: “No [I didn’t feel I had a point to prove]. For us it was just the next league game. We were focused on that, I didn’t have any particular emotions going into that game. I just wanted to win it, like any game..”