Boos were directed at Paul Warne come full-time, as he cut his usual fan-applauding lap of the pitch short.
Derby rattled the bar multiple times and were consistently overpowered on the counter. They were clearly second best as they fell to a fourth straight league defeat, and Watford ended a winless streak of the same length.
The first chance fell Derby’s way after Hornets’ debutant James Abankwah fouled Nathaniel Mendez-Laing. Ben Osborn delivered the resulting free kick, which was headed across goal, and then into the side netting by Jerry Yates.
Watford were on the attack moments later, Kwado Baah beating Eiran Cashin down the right to deliver a cross. Derby could only clear it as far as Imran Louza, whose right-footed effort beat Jacob Widell Zetterström.
As the half progressed there was a lull in what had been a chaotic, but scrappy game, where the hosts’ best chances were coming through Mendez-Laing.
The skipper first put a great ball across goal which was miskicked by Cashin. Kayden Jackson then looped a header over the bar from a free kick delivered by Derby’s number 11.
Derby hit the bar twice in the 41st minute after Kenzo Goudmijn threaded the ball down the line for Kane Wilson to cross. Mendez-Laing met the cross with a first-time, right-footed effort which crashed off the bar, as did Jackson’s follow-up overhead kick.
Cashin rose highest to meet a 45th minute free kick, but Jonathan Bond was on hand to ensure Watford led at the break.
Derby’s very direct style had fashioned them more than enough chances to be level, but it also meant that the Rams struggled to build momentum in a poor first 45.
This began to change after the break, but Bond started the second half strongly, denying Mendez-Laing with a strong left hand four minutes in.
Just a couple of minutes later, Jackson played a perfect pass from the right to find the arriving Adams, whose first time effort cannoned off the post. In what was a busy five minutes for the Gambian International, he then nodded wide and poorly finished a counter attack with a shot which Bond easily gathered.
Cashin had to be alert to dispossess Vakoun Bayo and concede a corner from which substitute Moussa Sissoko hit the bar from 22 yards.
And Paul Warne’s side threatened from a corner of their own minutes later, Curtis Nelson’s, header cleared off the line.
Another Derby set piece brought Watford’s second goal, as they conceded possession, and the Hornets swarmed forward at lightning speed. The Rams tried to claim offside, as Edo Kayembe was played in down the inside right, but his low-drilled shot across goal rightly stood.
Watford had found a rhythm, but Mattie Pollock, did see the flag go up after he found the net.
Tom Cleverly’s side used the power to break again in the 73rd minute, but Zetterström rushed out of his goal to deny Baah.
After impressing at Brisbane Road in midweek, Corey Blackett-Taylor was lively as a substitute, but ultimately couldn’t drag Derby back into the game.
Analysis: Crowd make their feelings known
After the Rams’ cup elimination in midweek, I wrote that if fans in the crowd were express their thoughts in the same way as those on social media, Warne could have a problem.
And that is exactly what happened come full time.
There were several players who had bad days at the office. They were poorly organised and not sharp enough defensively, which was compounded too by the pace, power and physicality of Watford. With only Ebou Adams in the middle of the park who was able to match up to the Hornets physically, they let Derby have the ball, and then effortlessly punish them on the break.
Glaringly obvious was the lack of a plan B. Derby’s main route to goal was simply to get the ball down the flanks and cross it in. While Lars-Jørgen Salvesen appears to be the right profile of targe forward to help the Rams improve on this front liking to get on the end of crosses, they must find other ways to score goals, with more creative patterns of play and line-breaking passes, while also improving their finishing.
I doubt this will be news to anyone reading, but in short: both tactically and in front of goal, Derby are struggling.
The Rams now sit in 19th, just a point above 22nd-place Portsmouth, who scored a late winner at Middlesbrough and still have a game in hand. Wins for Cardiff and Hull too, mean it is ever tighter at the bottom end of the table.
With the visit of Sunderland on Tuesday night and is a potential relegation six-pointer at Cardiff next weekend another big week is coming up for Paul Warne and his side.
Derby (4-3-3): Zetterström (GK); Wilson (Ward 81’), Nelson, Cashin, Elder (Forsyth 74’);
Goudmijn (Harness 74’), Osborn, Adams; Jackson (Blackett-Taylor 62’), Yates, Mendez-Laing (C) (Brown 74’).
Substitutes not used: Vickers (GK), Barkhuizen, Collins, Thompson.
Watford (4-2-3-1): Bond (GK); Abankwah (Andrews 76’), Sierralta, Pollock (C), Ngakia (Larouci 64’); Louza, Dele-Bashiru (Sissoko 46’); Baah (Ogbonna 78’), Kayembe, Vata; Bayo.
Substitutes not used: Roberts (GK), Porteous, Ince, Nabizada, Doumbia.
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