There was torrential rain upon arrival at Kenilworth Road.

Groundstaff spent most of the two hours before kick-off sweeping water off the pitch, and the game went ahead and was largely played in sunshine.

But for Watford fans, inside the stadium and watching on at home, the dark clouds didn’t clear – because there was one total shower still on the pitch.

Four paragraphs in and the scoreline really does have to be mentioned: Luton 3 Watford 0.

Quite simply, this was a pathetic surrender. Embarrassing. A gutless excuse for a performance where the Hornets were outfought, outrun, outmuscled, outplayed and deserved every boo and gesture inside the ground, and each furious post across every social media channel.

Losing is one thing. Playing badly and losing is another. But delivering 90 minutes where the players looked scared, disinterested and shameless, in a derby, on TV – that’s pretty much as bad as it gets.

And it’s not as if Watford don’t have previous for this offence. Remember April 2023?

Two consecutive trips to Bedfordshire where the home fans have laughed the Hornets off the pitch with total justification.

Rob Edwards was the architect of both, a man who was managing Watford a little more than two years ago and Tom Cleverley is the fourth to have taken charge since.

Calls for a change of head coach are emotional knee-jerk reactions to a grim defeat, but the very fact some fans think Cleverley could even be in danger are indicative of the culture that has pervaded at the club for several seasons now.

The Hornets are eighth in the table, yet people are discussing if the head coach is at risk.

That's because we’ve been taught that a few bad results generally mean the manager pays the price, and if fans have that idea in mind then there has to be every chance players think the same way.

Chuck in a few bad performances, talk the talk but not walk the walk, sack it off in a derby – no repercussions for us because every time it’s happened before the head coach has been sacked.

Big it up during the week, bottle it on the day. Too many uses of the phrase ‘we go again’ and not enough inward reflection on why they didn’t go a lot more in the first place.

Cleverley is not free from blame, though. Not at all.

His decision to recall Dan Bachmann, who was clearly hampered by an injury which meant he couldn’t kick properly, was mystifying.

Jonathan Bond had done little wrong while he was deputising, and leaving a fit keeper who has been playing well on the bench to field someone who has been out of action and so obviously hampered is surely a decision that will haunt him every time he looks back on this defeat.

It also felt like there needed to be changes at half-time, and yet the same 11 players that had been so placid and purposeless for 45 minutes trotted back out for the second half and promptly conceded another goal.

Then the changes came, but Luton were disappearing over the horizon and coasted through what was really no more than some token resistance for the remainder of the match.

The Watford head coach has got far more right than wrong so far this season, but he picked the worst day to drop a couple of clangers.

Having said that, once the players cross the white line and the whistle blows, no head coach can be in the ear of every player – you can’t have 11 staff members trotting around with each of them, reminding them of the need to put some effort in and urging them to be brave little soldiers.

What the players dished up let the head coach down and, just as importantly, let the fans down.

Being reminded they’ve got to wait for a bus home after another turgid derby defeat by the home supporters is unpleasant enough without the realisation that there is absolutely nothing you can shout back because the team have simply rolled over before their eyes.

This is a squad of players that has Premier League experience. Many of them are either full internationals or have been capped by their countries at younger age groups.

Through the week we’ve heard many of them talking about being ready, knowing what to expect, blah blah blah etc

Yet none of them – not one of them – emerged with a scrap of credit.

At this juncture, let’s grudgingly give a nod to Luton. They did exactly what their manager asked of them, they did it with grit and determination, they fought and battled, they played with pride and heart which spread to their supporters.

Watching them throw themselves into tackles, muscling Watford players off the ball, chasing back, running hard for each – all the qualities they displayed in bucketloads were the same ones so painfully lacking among the visitors.

And this is a Luton squad that is beset by injuries and sustained more during the game.

They fully deserved their victory, and there are simply no excuses that can be offered.

It’s that latter point which is worrying. There were no mitigating factors for this humbling, nothing you could desperately cling onto.

The last three away games have delivered three defeats, all deserved, with one goal scored and 10 conceded.

There’s a pattern forming here. And the prospect of travelling to a Leeds team that is hitting its stride makes Tuesday night rather worrying.

I put it to Cleverley after the game that Watford are in danger of becoming, to use a cricketing phrase, flat-track bullies.

They are able to deliver the goods when everything is in their favour: at home, fans behind them, pitch delivered to suit, no travelling involved.

But when asked to do it in a less hospitable environment, we see what has been served up at Norwich, Preston and now Luton.

The Watford head coach didn’t disagree, admitting that it was an accusation that could be levelled at his team currently.

During the international break I asked him whether Watford were lacking a snarling, hardened ball-winner in midfield who could do all the hod-carrying and provide an extra layer of foundation.

He didn’t think so, but for me that was something – among many, many others – that was lacking at Kenilworth Road.

Watford couldn’t get hold of the ball, and when they lost it they couldn’t get it back.

Up front, the lack of a physical presence was painfully obvious as first Vakoun Bayo and later Daniel Jebbison were unable to make any headway whatsoever against the home side’s powerful back line.

Out on the flanks there was simply no progress made, which resulted in the ball getting trapped in the centre where Luton’s superior combativeness always gave them the upper hand.

In defence, the Hornets struggled against the Morris/Adebayo combination.

Let’s be honest, of all the things any of us expected from Luton, the type of threat that pair pose is the one easiest to predict, yet Watford spent an hour looking like they had no clue whatsoever about either of them.

There were so many haunting memories of the 2-0 defeat in 2023 that sprang to mind 18 months later, but one which really came into focus was what appeared to be Watford’s only answer to the questions Luton asked of them.

In 2023, it was ‘give the ball to Pedro and hope he can do something’.

In 2024, just replace Pedro for Chakvetadze.

As was the case with the Brazilian, Luton’s homework was on point, and so aside from a couple of typical runs the Georgian was largely shackled and became increasingly frustrated.

And that, folks, was pretty much all Watford had to offer. With the threat of Chakvetadze muted it was a case of the other players looking around haplessly in a vain search for an alternative.

It’s a chronic summary of the Hornets performance that the closest they came to a goal was from an errant back-pass by a Luton defender when it was still 0-0.

After what Luton’s forwards do very well, next on the list of things to expect was surely threat from set pieces.

Not according to what we saw though, as the opening goal came from a corner.

It was far too easy for Tom Holmes to win the first duel and then Jordan Clarke had so much space in which to turn the ball in.

The second goal was even worse.

Morris merely peeled off towards the back post and when the corner was hit deep he had the simple task of heading it in.

Probably a move straight off the training pitch, though the mannequins might have offered a bit more defensive resistance.

At 2-0, Luton could afford to coast and while Watford did offer a little more it always felt like the Hatters knew the job was done.

They had chances to add a third before it finally came in stoppage time, Jacob Brown leaving Ryan Porteous and Angelo Ogbonna trailing in his wake before slotting into the corner.

There’s no doubt, a win by three goals is not in any way flattering to the home side. They were better in every department and every area from the first whistle to the last.

It was a defeat for which there is no defence, and a performance that the players will hopefully be mulling over with a mixture of pain and shame.

Every Watford fan, everywhere, will be hurting massively. Hopefully, at London Colney, there are similar feelings.

Why?

Because in the week, there was much use of the phrase that Watford ‘needed to earn the right to play’. Well they didn’t.

Because this was, we were told, a chance for Watford to show they believe they can be a top-six team. They didn’t.

Because it was an opportunity for Watford to earn the bragging rights. They didn’t.

Now there are just a couple of days to try and heal the wounds, right the wrongs and get to the bottom of how so much went badly awry at the one place, above all others, that you don’t want it to.

Tuesday night at Leeds was going to be a big test before. Now it becomes even more significant.