Watford looked like a team that was happy just to be mid-table in the Championship.

That was the damning assessment of head coach Tom Cleverley after his side offered minimal resistance as Preston beat them 3-0 at Deepdale on Wednesday night.

A victory would have hoisted the Hornets into the top six but instead North End lifted themselves out of the bottom three with only their second league win of the season.

They had only scored one Championship goal at Deepdale this season before Watford arrived.

“We looked like a team that was happy to be a mid-table side, winning games at home and being so-so away from home,” said Cleverley.

“That’s the disappointment for me. We’ve come here with a mid-table mindset and that’s not what any of us are about.

“I felt we were playing within ourselves in the first half and we were in the game, but we didn’t look like a team that are desperate to challenge at the business end of the table.

“We work far too hard to be like that.”

It was a difficult task to highlight more than a small handful of players that performed anywhere near what they have shown in games earlier this season.

“There were too many poor individual performances,” Cleverley agreed.

“I don’t think I can accuse everyone of not demanding the ball and not playing with as much confidence as they usually do, but we had too many off nights tonight.

“And that was with the ball – too many also fell short in terms of competing.”

It all combined to deliver a pretty grim evening’s viewing for the loyal bunch of Watford fans behind the goal in which Preston scored all three goals – and who then had to undertake the second half of an eight-hour round trip.

“I’m hugely disappointed for them,” Cleverley admitted.

“We appreciate how far they travel, how expensive it is and how much they do for us.

“We were in Manchester last week, we’re in Preston midweek this week, and we are always a really well supported team.

“I am mightily disappointed for everyone associated with the football club because I really felt like tonight was to be our statement evening, and it was far from that.”