Having spent the past three seasons trying and often failing to find positives in Watford performances, driving home following the 5-0 win over MK Dons just a couple of days after the victory at Millwall I had a feeling of excitement and optimism.

And football felt fun and enjoyable again, something that can be looked forward to rather than a chore which is undertaken out of a sense of duty.

Of course, beating a League Two side at home in the cup is not, in isolation, cause to be predicting great things for the season.

But two years ago MK Dons humbled the Hornets at home in exactly the same round of the Carabao Cup, and last year Stevenage did for them on penalties.

If there has been a banana skin somewhere in the early rounds of the competition, Watford have generally managed to find it, tread on it and skid out of the competition.

This was different: not only did they never look like being embarrassed but they swept aside the visitors with a ruthless, effective, entertaining display which was not at all flattered by the margin of victory.

At this point it has to be mentioned that Dons keeper Nathan Harness, making only his third appearance for the club, had what could be referred to as a ‘Weston’ (that’s a super mare…).

The 24-year-old has only made 30 senior outings in his life and 18 of those have come in non-league football.

At Vicarage Road he had the sort of night goalkeepers must dread, when even the ones you think you’ve saved either creep in or land at the feet of an opposition player.

He could have done better with Mattie Pollock’s header for the opener, he certainly should have done better when Kwadwo Baah scored his first for the club and he probably couldn’t have done much worse as he fumbled Tom Ince’s second goal over the line.

When he palmed Tom Dele-Bashiru’s shot to Ince to complete his hat-trick, Harness had literally had a hand in so many goals it felt like Ince ought to lend him his matchball for a few weeks such was the keeper’s personal contribution to the Hornets stonking victory.

To be fair, Harness also made three or four very good saves, and at times he must have felt like he had a target painted on his shirt as the Hornets sent 24 goal attempts at him, 12 of which were on target.

A team from a lower league with a goalkeeper having a howler still has to be beaten, and Watford didn’t just do that, they tore them to bits.

Given the captain’s armband and in the midst of another strong, brave and calm display, Pollock netted his first goal for the club with the sort of header that his power in the air suggested he had in his locker.

His reliability either side of the summer had earned him his place, and he looks incrementally better with each game.

Against the Dons he was clipping aerial passes beyond the last defender, at Millwall he won 14 headers – Pollock has gone from almost leaving to exorcising the ghosts from his previous trip to The Den and looking like a name that quickly goes on the teamsheet.

It appeared Watford may only lead by a single goal at the break before Ince netted his first, and even then 2-0 didn’t reflect the Hornets’ dominance.

That second goal was a thing of beauty, with Ince left merely to tap home after Ryan Andrews had shown outstanding skill, both to control the ball on his chest while sprinting and then to see and pick out the goalscorer.

However, it came from a delicious pass from Imran Louza. He couldn’t have measured it any better had he been able to pause the game, walk forward and place the ball.

The Moroccan has had such a mixed time at Vicarage Road, and I wasn’t sure he’d still be at the club when the season started.

He’s still behind Dele-Bashiru and Moussa Sissoko in the pecking order, but against MK he showed a willingness to do the inglorious shift – battling for possession, picking up the knock-downs, tidying up and using his body to shield the ball in tight spots.

The visitors made three changes at half-time and for 15 minutes had a spell where they threatened to get back into it, although Jonathan Bond was only called upon to make one save.

As Tom Cleverley highlighted after the game, Louza’s graft in the middle of the park was a key reason the visitors failed in their attempts to gain a foothold. Should he still be here come September 1, Louza has shown he can make a difference.

The same can be said for Mileta Rajovic, who led the line arguably as well as he has since he joined.

There was a real grit and determination in the way he was willing to be pulled, dragged and have his shirt tugged by the Dons defence as he attempted to hold the ball up.

He looked far more mobile than last season, and his runs across the front were perhaps the first sign of coaching helping him understand the way Cleverley wants his No.9 to operate.

Just behind him, Rocco Vata was a thrilling bag of tricks who seems to do everything quickly.

On and off the ball, the young Irish international looked like someone had pressed the button on the remote so that everything he did was slightly sped up.

He is a real prospect, and as with every teenager on the way up, he has much to learn. But he’s a player who wants the ball, wants to make things happen and will excite.

On a night of debuts, there was a first goal for Kwadwo Baah, and on his first appearance more than three years after signing for Watford.

Switching from a winger to a more central forward over the summer has shown him in a good light, and while he has a hot-headed streak that needs attention, his direct style and pace will hurt teams.

Of course, the man of the night was Ince.

I had to double check because, even though he didn’t play much last season, I was still surprised the MK Dons game was the first in which the 32-year-old had played the full 90 minutes for Watford.

Ince is one of those players – we all know them – who seemed to invariably do well whenever he came up against Watford before he switched from Reading to Vicarage Road last summer.

Once he made that move, though, things unravelled a bit for him and he became more and more of a fringe player to the extent that many thought he would leave.

To his credit, Ince spoke after the game about just wanting to be given a chance, and how he saw being in the side as his opportunity to help himself and the team.

His performances in pre-season, and again last night, perhaps show how a change of head coach and position can benefit a player.

For whatever reason, Valerien Ismael only saw fit to start Ince eight times in seven months and only four times last season did he get more than an hour.

He only played 21 minutes for Cleverley during the final nine games of the campaign, but the head coach has spoken several times since of the benefit of Ince’s footballing intelligence, experience and ability in the No.10 role.

Like Louza and Rajovic, Ince may not be a first choice at the moment but he’s gone a long way to showing he could be a very important part of the wider ensemble.

I spoke to Ince after the match at some length, and it was very interesting to hear him talk about last season, the game in general and also the club’s younger players.

He can clearly offer more than just what he does with the ball in matches, and a revitalised and high-performing Ince could be an unexpected bonus.

Overall, having 20-odd attempts at goal on the way to sticking five past a team two divisions below with a goalkeeper having a bad night is about as much as you can hope for from a cup tie like this.

However, it made for a happy, fun evening where we saw lots of young prospects get on the pitch to showcase their talents.

Cleverley was measured in his reaction, reminding us all that scoring five doesn’t mean we are a polished attacking force while pointing out that the feeling of such a win has to be earned, week after week after week.

He also stressed that one good home success doesn’t right all the wrongs of what was dished up at Vicarage Road last season – six league victories is, after all, relegation fodder.

The work rate, performance and energy levels have to be carried on into the next game against Stoke at Vicarage Road on Saturday, he said, adding that it’s been a while since Watford won three in a row.

It’ll be exactly 655 days on Saturday since the Hornets won 2-1 at Cardiff on November 2, 2022, to complete their last winning treble.

If they can repeat the feat against the Potters and take three more league points then that belief gauge, which has understandably been hovering in the negative zone for so many Watford fans in the last few years, will take another few ticks toward the realms of positivity.