Watford welcome Norwich to Vicarage Road in a huge relegation six-pointer in Friday Night Football.
Victory would see Watford move four points clear of the relegation zone, whereas Norwich will climb out of the elimination zone with a win at the Hornets’ expense.
Team News
Watford have no fresh injury concerns to report from last weekend’s draw at Newcastle as Peter Etebo (quad), Kwadwo Baah (ankle), Nicolas N’Koulou (hamstring) and Ismaila Sarr (knee) remain absent.
Imran Louza, Adam Masina and William Troost-Ekong are away on international duty at Africa Cup of Nations.
Norwich will welcome Kenny McLean after he recovered from a positive test of Coronavirus.
Max Aarons (leg) and Brandon Williams (cramp) could also be in contention if match fit.
Tim Krul (shoulder) joins Andrew Omobamidele (back), Christoph Zimmerman, Billy Gilmour (both ankle), Lukas Rupp (hamstring) and Mathias Normann (pelvis) on the sidelines.
Stat Attack
- Watford have lost just one of their five previous Premier League meetings against Norwich (W4, L1).
- Norwich have conceded twice in each of their two previous Premier League visits to Watford (L2).
- Watford won their only previous Friday Night Football encounter against Norwich in the Premier League, prevailing 2-0 at Carrow Road in November 2019.
- No Watford player has made more interceptions in the Premier League this season than Craig Cathcart, who made 19 interceptions in 17 appearances.
- Five of Norwich’s ten league goals this season have been scored by Teemu Pukki, with two of his five goals scored from the penalty spot.
Prediction
With their injury crisis beginning to ease, Watford can afford to relax a little coming into this crunch match but they can’t repeat their wasted chances from their draw at Newcastle, especially if they’re to put space between themselves and the relegation zone.
Norwich meanwhile were excellent in their win against Everton because they showed excellent energy in their movement and runs to punish mistakes throughout the game, whilst also defending well throughout which is a rarity this season for the Canaries.
Both teams though must continue their progress into this match because if either team revert back to normal form, the opposition should have enough in them to punish any errors so this is either going to be a cracker or a tight cagey battle to the final whistle.
Prediction: Watford 1-1 Norwich
Result: Watford 0-3 Norwich
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