Livermore knew Ismael could bring the changes Watford needed

Jake Livermore was very aware of the sentiment from the stands when he reunited with his former manager Valerien Ismael by joining Watford in the summer.

The midfielder readily accepts that during a period of massive change and transition, as well as high player turnover, his arrival at Vicarage Road was never likely to be greeted with a ticker-tape parade.

“I understand that, I can see both sides of the story. It wasn’t the exciting signing that you look at and think ‘wow’,” he admitted.

“Watford were signing a 34-year-old who hadn’t played for six months. I was aware of the feeling among the fans, I’ve been around a long time.”

In fact, had things been different then Livermore might have arrived at Vicarage Road six months sooner as former head coach Slaven Bilic tried unsuccessfully to bring him in during the January transfer window.

“It’s a shame it never came off really, and the reason it didn’t is no longer here,” Livermore said.

“I was really up for it. I’d have loved the opportunity to work with Slav again. Me and him were really tight.

“I was his captain throughout his whole time at West Brom, and with the Covid scenario we were having to talk on the phone a couple of times a day to discuss players, training, what we thought about games. It was almost like a father and son relationship.

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“It was the same with Val though. When as a player or manager you have a player or manager you really get on with, and you go through ups and downs and tough periods with them, you know you’ve got someone you can trust in the trenches.

“It’s so good to have someone you can rely on when things aren’t so great, someone who sticks to a game-plan, just someone that ultimately you can trust.

“I loved working with Val and I think he was unfairly dismissed at West Brom.

“What he understood he was getting and what he ended up being given . . . well the goalposts moved. I think he was promised a project and it then became a panic situation from the club and the board.

“When you’re given an opportunity to build something and work on a project, you approach it differently to if you need success yesterday.

“He did a great job at West Brom with nothing to spend. We got rid of our two best assets at the time, Sam Johnstone and Matheus Pereira, and we started building something. I think we went 11 or 12 games unbeaten.

“Val is a great guy, and so when this opportunity to work with him again came up, it was great for me. It felt like everything had fallen into place.

“One of the biggest compliments you can get as a player is when a manager you’ve worked with before wants to bring you to another club, and I had that with Slav and Val.”

Livermore in action for West Brom. (Image: PA)

Livermore knew the Baggies were going to release him, and he was at a crossroads.

“To be honest, I was quite happy to have called it a day if that was where it had ended,” he admitted.

“I wouldn’t have forced a move that didn’t make sense for my family, uprooting them out of school. I certainly don’t want to be spending time away from them.

“So it was fortunate this move did arise because I didn’t have that many options. I didn’t want to have to move my family halfway across the country, or not see them for three or four days a week.

“It was amazing when this move came up, and I like to think it has worked out well for both parties.”

Livermore arrived as Watford were trying to shake off bad habits from the past, both on and off the pitch, and he was convinced Ismael would be the right man to do just that.

“After working with Val before, I knew what he would bring and I knew the structure he would use,” he said.

In training. (Image: Alan Cozzi/Watford FC)

“I knew that being late for anything is not an option for instance.

“Apparently the last few years here have been a bit lax, and things have been a bit player-run.

“I knew the manager wouldn’t have that because in his eyes the team always comes first. He’ll put the team and the club before himself and take responsibility if things haven’t gone to plan.

“I think that is very honourable in a man, especially in an industry where the stakes are so high.

“That was why I wanted to come back and work with him. I work well with people, and I think he’s the same.

“The way Val works is, I think, what this club needed. Everyone buys into it, and the manager has had to make some big calls.

“To be fair to the boys, they have all respected his decisions. That includes me, when I wasn’t playing at the start of the season. I knew I had to bide my time and wait, and then when the opportunity came it was down to me to take it.

“It’s been the same for a few of the other players. Ben Hamer has come in and been excellent, Wes Hoedt has taken over the captaincy and has risen to the challenge.

“You look at the two boys in midfield, Ismael Kone and Edo Kayembe – incredible.

“There are some great boys in our dressing room. There is nothing more I’d like to see than them to do well and get promoted so they can express themselves in the Premier League.”

Livermore has said previously that the press Ismael deploys is not only one of the best he’s been part of, but it’s the head coach’s Hawthorns legacy.

Valerien Ismael while in charge of West Brom. (Image: Action Images)

“He has a very black and white mentality – this is our press and we stick with it. He doesn’t panic, and I think that’s why we work well together.

“We had some tough times at West Brom but we stuck with him, and ultimately now if we here can stick to what he wants then we’ll be successful.

“The press he set up at West Brom they still use now. They are using his blueprint and I think they’re on their fourth manager since Val!

“The press used to be about teams just getting one player after the ball. I used to play with Robbie Savage and he’d press by himself, and his hair would be flowing all over the place. He’d get the crowd going by giving the ball away and then going and getting it back again.

“But the game has evolved so much now. It’s credit to Val that even since I last worked with him he has adapted certain things and certain ways of working and playing. He has created more opportunities for more players to feel comfortable.”

Livermore had featured in only three Championship matches when Watford went to Sunderland, and was an unused as the Hornets were beaten and gave a particularly abject, lifeless performance.

That night Ismael kept his players and staff in the dressing room for an hour as they discussed what was going wrong, and how it could be rectified.

“I think it was a turning point that night, yeah. Two defeats in 12 games since then,” said Livermore.

“Sometimes you do need to hit some sort of bottom to really address the issues. We needed to get back to stability and discipline.

“I think we’ve done that off the back of the Sunderland game, and we’ve created a structure which allows the boys to go and express themselves and use their quality.

“You need to be hard to beat in the Championship. You have to be competitive in every game. Things like that should be a given. You shouldn’t even need to bring them up in conversation.

“But there has been a difficult period here with so many managers and a turnover of players, and that means a turnover in mentality.

“In the past, there must have been players thinking ‘well I’ll outlive the manager here anyway, so if I’m late or I don’t play it’s fine because he’ll probably be gone in a few months’.

“In Val’s defence at West Brom, they offered him a position to build something and then, all of a sudden, they started chopping and changing managers and players. You have no stability.

“Now the boys here know there is a bigger picture and we all buy into it. The team comes first. The badge will always be bigger than any name on the back of the shirt.”

Two words that have been heard a lot this season are mentality and attitude.

“They’re massive – the biggest things of all,” said Livermore.

“After that night at Sunderland, our turning point was a shift in mentality and attitude. The ability was there, and arguably the technical quality of the team that played at Sunderland was higher than the team now.

“But if you haven’t got the mentality or the right attitude to go along with that ability, then it’s going to be difficult.

“We’ve changed that round now and there is an attitude and mentality that allows the boys in the team to go and express themselves. The likes of Kone, Matheus Martins, Yaser Asprilla, they can go and express themselves knowing there is a solid platform around them.”

The current good run of performances and results peaked on Saturday afternoon at Preston, particularly in the second half, as Watford ran the home side ragged.

“We play some really, really good stuff. If we can show that ruthless mentality like we did on Saturday then we can stay at that level.

“Goals change games, and when they start going in it relieves so much pressure off the team and puts us on the front foot.

“That second half performance on Saturday, if we can repeat that, will mean we get to be where we deserve to be, and know we can be.”

As Livermore rightly pointed out, goals changes games, and none more so than the one from Martins that put the Hornets 2-1 up seconds after the interval.

It came direct from Preston’s kick-off: their liking for playing the ball back to the keeper who then launches a long pass towards one side of the pitch packed with their taller players was something Ismael and his staff had spotted.

“These are the sort of things the manager instils in us,” Livermore explained.

“With him and his staff, they do so much hard work that we end up knowing patterns of other teams’ play. It means we can get ourselves in the best position to give ourselves the best opportunity.

“So we know if Wes is going to go up and win the ball, we need players on the same side of the pitch, and then we know our out ball is into an area where they have tucked over.

“These are details that the manager has put into us that are now second nature.

“The more we get on the same wavelength and are around each other, and get into the right positions for each other, then it will only help us more.

“The start of the second half at Preston was a very good example.”

• Part two of this interview with Jake Livermore will be online tomorrow (Friday) morning.