Watford missed Livermore and three PL youngsters in January

Livermore was ready to travel to London Colney for a medical, right up until transfer deadline day in January but, despite the urgings of the then head coach Slaven Bilic, the move was not sanctioned and it was only when Valerien Ismael arrived in the summer that the deal was considered again and subsequently completed.

It was one of a litany of missed opportunities and potential transfers that were replaced by others which meant the last January transfer window was all a bit of a mess – quite possibly what the likes of Bilic, sporting director Cristiano Giaretta and current head coach Valerien Ismael have been referring to when they talk of the training ground being ‘crowded’ with ‘too many voices’ involved in key decisions.

To understand the January window better, you first have to go back to before the break for the World Cup in mid-November last year.

By then, Bilic had been in charge for 11 games, presiding over six wins, a draw and four defeats.

While the losses at Blackpool and Millwall were pitifully bad, it’s also fair to say that the wins over Luton and Norwich were particularly enjoyable.

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The head coach had, by the time Watford drew 0-0 at Bristol City on Saturday November 12, advised Giaretta and chairman Scott Duxbury of the three key positions he believed had to be worked on ahead of the upcoming transfer window: a commanding midfield leader, a winger, and a striker.

Sadly, the injury that day to Dan Gosling meant a fourth area needed attention and so Giaretta was also tasked to look at options for a right-sided defender, who was as happy going forward as he was defending.

Bilic already had a player in mind for the midfield role because, as the Watford Observer reported in February, he was eager to bring back former captain Moussa Sissoko, who was equally keen to return to England as his family were struggling to settle in France after his move to Nantes.

The French club, while not overjoyed to lose a player they had only signed a few months earlier, were willing to play ball but wanted a portion of the £1.8m fee they had paid Watford for the former Tottenham and Newcastle player’s services.

That figure was believed to be around £500,000, with Sissoko also happy to take a wage cut in order to facilitate the move.

However, what appeared to be a done deal by the time the season restarted in mid-December was suddenly off the table a couple of weeks later.

Newly-appointed technical director Ben Manga had arrived with the full backing of owner Gino Pozzo, who may well have sold the former Eintracht Frankfurt director of football a job description, remit and scope of budget that turned out to be rather different in actuality.

Manga is understood to have advised Pozzo that spending half a million on Sissoko was a bad move, and undoubtedly there would be a body of Watford fans who watched the midfielder during his time at Vicarage Road and would have agreed with that sentiment.

Nonetheless, it left Bilic and Giaretta with a gap they thought they had filled, although Manga was also now aware the head coach wanted a midfielder.

The work on a right-sided defender had brought forward two contenders: Djed Spence of Tottenham and Cody Drameh of Leeds.

The preference was for Spence, who had joined Spurs from Nottingham Forest for £20m in the summer but had not nailed down a first-team place.

Djed Spence (Image: Action Images)

The London club were happy to let the England Under-21 international go out on loan for the remainder of the season and, better still, the wage contribution they were looking for was minimal. A solid signing that was effectively taking away little of the budget available.

As far as Bilic and Giaretta were concerned, that one was in the bag.

Two days before the January window was to open, Watford put in one of their most abominable performances of the season as they were thumped 4-0 at Swansea.

After the game, Bilic had a face like thunder – understandably so, given his team had just offered up  such a lame showing on a night when many fans made the long journey to Wales and back during the festive period.

However, what none of the fans or media knew was there was another reason he was fuming: he’d just found out the loan signing of Spence had been vetoed.

What’s more, just outside the dressing room door at Swansea, Manga and his head of scouting, Helena Costa, informed him they had agreed to sign him a right-sided defender and spent pretty much all of the club’s January budget in doing so.

The club were spending £2m to sign 21-year-old Joao Ferreira from Benfica.

Bilic was later to admit privately he didn’t know anything about Ferreira, and had to look him up online on the bus journey back from Swansea.

He also made a comment that Ferreira was ‘not required’, which was interpreted as a right-sided defender wasn’t necessary – what Bilic was actually saying was that an option he felt better suited Watford’s needs had been overlooked.

Deals to sign midfielder Ismael Kone and the addition on loan of Matheus Martins had been agreed well before January, and both came to the club via the Pozzo scouting network.

However, with Martins moving so far from home, Bilic was still keen to get a winger in who was already more settled in England and had played here before.

At the time, rumours abounded that the Hornets were looking to sign Uruguayan winger Facundo Pellistri – however, it was another youngster at Manchester United that was being eyed: Argentinian international Alejandro Garnacho.

Alejandro Garnacho (Image: Action Images)

The Spanish-born teenager had joined United in 2020 and had already made a handful of Premier League appearances.

Work on the deal started during December, and Watford had the player watched in a couple of games at Old Trafford either side of Christmas – Pellestri was also involved in at least one of those matches which is where the rumours around him may have come from.

Bilic spoke to the player’s agent and all seemed set for Garnacho to join on loan for the remainder of the season. Except the deal didn’t get done – and eventually Erik Ten Hag pulled the plug totally, possibly due to Jadon Sancho’s combination of injury and health issues, although the feeling at Watford was the United boss had simply run out of patience.

Garnacho went on to make 19 Premier League appearances in all, and featured in United’s run to the FA Cup Final.

In attack, the search for suitable competition for Keinan Davis and Vakoun Bayo led to Bilic and Giaretta agreeing that Cameron Archer was the player they wanted.

After a successful loan spell with Preston during the second half of the 2021/22 season, Archer had signed a new five-year contract with Aston Villa but wasn’t getting game time.

Had other things fallen into place in the previous summer, Archer could have already been at Vicarage Road as a loan move was part of a potential deal that would have taken Ismaila Sarr to Villa Park.

Cameron Archer (Image: Action Images)

Had Sarr's move to the Midlands been completed (then manager Steven Gerrard backed out at the last minute) then Archer would have been heading to Vicarage Road, as well as Davis, on a season-long loan.

Again, work was done on securing a loan deal for Archer during January, but then Manga proposed a move for the highly-rated Portuguese Under-21 international Henrique Araujo.

Bilic wasn’t keen, citing the player’s style and size not suiting the way Watford were lining up, but with Manga having the nap hand at that point, the head coach relented – but on the understanding another striker more akin to Davis was brought in also.

By mid-January, Watford were still no nearer bringing in the three players that Bilic had outlined months earlier.

After the 2-0 home win over Blackpool, in which Academy youngster Tobi Adeyemo came off the bench to open the scoring, Bilic was asked in his press conference about the transfer business he wanted to do before the end of the month.

He held one hand aloft with three fingers extended, and as he pointed to each finger he said: “Midfielder . . . striker . . . winger.

“Players will be back from injury but things haven’t changed since I spoke about transfers in November before the World Cup.

“That was what I said then. Midfielder, striker and winger.  It’s not optional. I know it’s January and it can be hard to get players but we have to bring them in.”

Only later did it become apparent that the next transfer would be an exit that Bilic had also not been told about – William Troost-Ekong was loaned to Italian side Salernitana for the remainder of the season.

Although a player that divided fan opinion, the Nigerian international had been a starter for most of Bilic’s time at Vicarage Road and had captained the team five times.

Troost-Ekong was an unused sub during the draw with Rotherham at Vicarage Road on January 21, after which Bilic admitted he had himself only heard the rumours of the move that day.

Within a week Troost-Ekong was in Italy and Watford had signed Ryan Porteous, a move which Bilic described as a “cosmetic change”, a comment he received some criticism for.

Porteous was another player that had long been on the Pozzo scouting radar, with some suggestions he might move to Udinese before he actually arrived at Vicarage Road.

With Mattie Pollock being allowed to leave to join Aberdeen on loan, Francisco Sierralta ruled out for the rest of the season and Christian Kabasele beset by injuries, there was an increasingly thin look to the central defensive options.

Wes Hoedt scored on his Watford debut against Blackburn last season. (Image: PA)

A couple of days before the January window shut, Wes Hoedt arrived – this was another signing made without any input from Manga, and it may come as a surprise to learn that Mogi Bayat was a key player in bringing the Dutchman to the club.

As the end of January neared, suggestions for a new striker were still not forthcoming. The recruitment team felt Araujo was sufficient, the football staff didn’t – and so with two days to go, Britt Assombalonga returned to Vicarage Road.

Still, though, nothing had been forthcoming with regard to the experienced midfield leader that Bilic felt was the most important of all.

Which brings us back to where we started: Livermore.

He had captained West Brom under Bilic throughout the 2019/20 season, starting 43 league games as the Baggies were promoted to the Premier League.

Livermore wore the armband again the following season in the top-flight, with Bilic losing his job in mid-December when the Baggies were sitting 19th in the table.

The Croatian was a big admirer of the former England international, and when it became clear his plan to bring Sissoko back to Vicarage Road had been permanently vetoed, he turned his attentions to Livermore.

The midfielder’s contract at the Hawthorns was coming to an end, and he was keen and ready to move to Watford.

It’s understood Duxbury backed the idea, as did Giaretta. However, the feedback from Manga to the owner was that Livermore was too old and couldn’t cut it at Championship level anymore.

Over the closing days of January, there was practically a game of tennis at London Colney with Livermore’s name being sent back and forth between the recruitment staff and the football staff.

As I was at the training ground on January 31 for a live blog, I distinctly remember Bilic staying on after training, phone regularly pressed to ear as he paced between the canteen and the nearest training pitch.

It merely needed a nod and a phone call, and Livermore was ready to undergo a medical and complete the move.

There was no nod, there was no phone call – and as the clock ticked towards the moment the window closed, Bilic sat and discussed with me how he had tried to bring in Livermore but it looked like it wasn’t happening so best not to mention it.

I didn’t know the detail then, and with the departure of Bilic, the short stay of Chris Wilder and the abject end to the season, Livermore’s name wasn’t mentioned again until news that he had signed in late July.

Bilic never did get any of the ‘midfielder . . . striker . . . winger’ combo that he first set out to sign all the way back in November, and there is no way of knowing if Watford would have fared any better if he had, though it’s fair to say adding Livermore, Archer and Garnacho would have been unlikely to make the second half of the season any worse.