The ramifications of UEFA expanding both the Champions League and Europa League once again caused waves for Watford this week.

The agreed dates and kick-off times for the Carabao Cup third round ties were announced on Tuesday, all except for one – the Hornets trip to face Manchester City.

City were one of the six clubs who, when the draw was made, were kept apart from each other because the additional rounds of European fixtures clashed with dates for the third round of the domestic competition.

The decision was taken that the Carabao Cup had to be extended over two weeks to avoid clashes with matches in the Champions League (w/c September 16) and Europa League (w/c September 23), both of which will see competing clubs play two more matches than in previous season.

And, consequently, the necessary steps were taken to 'seed' the six English clubs in those two European competitions in order to keep them apart, to avoid the potential situation of them being drawn together but with no free date in which to fulfil the fixture.

A random pre-draw saw four of the six ‘seeded’ clubs given home times, and as a result Watford will now travel to face Manchester City on Tuesday September 24 (7.45pm).

However, getting to that date was far from straightforward…

On Sunday September 22, two days before Watford visit the Etihad, City host Arsenal in the Premier League at 4pm.

That meant they would only have one clear day between the end of that game, and matchday against the Hornets.

The natural option would have been to move the Carabao Cup tie to Wednesday September 25, thus giving City an extra day to prepare.

However, on that night Manchester United host FC Twente in the Europa League at Old Trafford, and obviously for many reasons including policing two major games cannot be played in the same city on the same night.

Moving the game to Thursday September 26 was never a workable option for either side as the Hornets are at home to Sunderland in the Championship two days later (Saturday September 28), while City play away at Newcastle that day at 12.30pm in the Premier League.

Therefore, everything pointed towards the original date on Tuesday September 24 – but the conversations between the EFL, the two clubs, UEFA and other organisations meant the date of the tie was not confirmed until mid-morning on Wednesday.

City will still have to manage playing two games in three days, but then they do have considerable size and depth to their squad.