(9) Mileta Rajovic

Delicious! Maybe, they'd still need it spoon fed.

 

As I said before, it doesn't stop Rajovic from pressing from the front. He has ZERO work ethic.

When the ball does go up to him it bounces off him. He literally couldn't trap a bag of cement.

 

For the way we play Rajovic and Bayo don't suit. I agree with you that Dennis through the middle is likely to be the best option, but that doesn't solve the issue of not creating much. Dennis is much more likely to create something for himself, but Kone, Giorgi, Martins and Asprilla need to be effecting games a lot more than they currently are.

 

Agreed, but it's a bit of a moot point really. Every time the ball does go to Rajovic he loses it. He wouldn't fill me with much confidence to pass to him either.

 

I would like to think that Kone, Giorgi or Asprilla would do better with somebody like Dennis up front making runs rather than looking up to find Raj has barely moved

 

That's the crux of it I think. Maybe less so recently but in the first few months you'd see him making token runs or showing for the ball and his team mates would visibly turn the other way or choose a far harder pass because they'd seen what happens when you do pass directly to him (or put it ahead of him to chase in behind).

 

Dennis would undoubtedly be my choice to play through the middle.

 

Top scorer. Best striker we've got. End of story.

 

Yes, this is the forum logic in a nutshell. Well summarised.

 

They don’t play in a mediocre Swedish side and then sign for us.

 

Raj is one of those players who are 6’4” tall and can soar to the dizzy height of 5’11” when challenging for a header.

 

Reminds me of Ian Ormondroyd who always seemed like that as well

 

I'm trying my best to stick up for him but that was awful today. Faes was clearly too good for him, no shame in that but Rajovic showed absolutely nothing. It's like playing with a traffic cone up there.

I still maintain with some more coaching and a pre-season he'll look half decent. However it's seriously concerning that we've spent £1m on a guy who seemingly needs to be taught the basics.

 

Considering the general team praise is about ‘trying hard’, I’m surprised he gets as much abuse as he does. He’s just crap, which is fine for the overall team but not for him.

 

There has been a lot of criticism of Mileta Rajovic on this forum and elsewhere, although there are also some people who have urged supporters to have more patience. He has scored 10 goals this season whereas no other Watford player has scored more than 6 goals. People suggest that many of these goals were easy to score because they were tap-ins, but - if that is the case – why have the other Watford players not also been scoring lots of tap-ins. Supporters have correctly pointed out that other aspects of his play have been poor, although there have been a few signs of improvement in some recent games.

There tends to be a rush to instant judgement about players on social media, but it is worth pausing to remember his background. He was playing in the Danish third tier for Roskilde (2020-21) and Naestved (2021-22), Clubs in the Danish 2nd Division (third tier) are semi-professional so he was probably a part-time player and I have read that he was forced to live at home in order to save money. Naestved was promoted to the Danish 1st Division (second tier) during 2022 so he played only 6 months at that level before then moving to Kalmar in the Allsvenskan (Swedish top league).

The level of coaching and fitness and the standard of the competition in all these leagues is likely to have been a great deal lower than in the Championship. He moved to Kalmar in December 2022 and started playing for the team (after their winter break at the end of the 2022 season) in the Swedish cup competition in February and March 2023. The Allsvenskan season began at the beginning of April and Rajovic played right through the season until he signed for Watford after only 9 months at Kalmar. He had no summer break and did not have the benefit of pre-season training with Watford. I am not suggesting that the two players can be compared in any way in terms of ability, but supporters may remember that Richarlison joined Watford in 2017 without a summer break or pre-season training and faded badly in the second part of the season after a great start in the Premier League.

There is no guarantee that Rajovic will improve, but I think that people should be a little more patient before rushing to judgement and see whether there is any improvement after a summer break and a full pre-season. I am old enough that I can remember how poor Ross Jenkins was in his first two seasons at Watford, but that later he became a Watford legend. Supporters ridiculed Jenkins (who was signed from Crystal Palace for a record fee for Watford – at that time - of £30,000 (plus an additional £5,000 later) and it was suggested that Watford had been sold a ‘pup’. Spectators chanted “Toss, Toss, Toss Jenkins” at some games. Even Oliver Phillips was initially critical of Ross. It was a good thing that social media did not exist at that time because he would probably have been criticized even more than Rajovic. Jenkins later described his career at Watford as being the overnight success that took five years to happen. He played for Watford in all four divisions over a period of eleven years (scoring 142 goals in 398 appearances) and twice won player of the season. Read the opening paragraphs of this article by Oliver Phillips about Jenkin's poor start.

https://www.watfordgold.org.uk/hist...e-golden-boys-2001-by-chapter/24-ross-jenkins

I apologize for the length of my post, but I wanted to fully explain why I think that supporters should be prepared to give Rajovic more time. He may still turn out to be cr*p, but please be a little more patient and refrain from rushing to an instant judgement about the player.

 

Very good post and very good points here in particular.

I wonder if certain other posters are going to throw lots of crap at you for simply pointing them out? Or do they only bother when I say the same things...

 

Why does he not get any free kicks for being fouled? On Saturday there were many times where it looked like he was fouled but he got nothing from the ref.

 

Holdsworth was explaining it in the commentary, basically saying that Rajovic often goes down without the defender doing anything wrong. It's not like he's trying to get a free kick by simulation, his balance and strength is just not up to standard.

 

I didn't see the game but between this and the WO report above it sounds like he just got plain bullied by their centre half on Saturday?

 

That would explain it, thanks.

 

this might be the most sensible post in the history of wfcforums

 

I fully agree that we should support him and I really think he does his best. It's not his fault that he's basically an amateur footballer thrown into a level that is way, way above him. Pointing out the fact that he is far out of his depth is not criticism, I think, it's just stating the obvious. If we had brought in a 24-year-old striker from King's Lynn and made him our new no. 9 we would probably say the same thing. I blame the recruitment, not the player.

Yes, there is a slight chance that he'll improve after a full year and a pre-season, but I really haven't seen anything to suggest that he has the potential. I think the best thing for everyone would be to loan him back to Scandinavia and hope that we can recoup some of the money we invested in him.

It's almost painful to watch Rajovic sometimes. I really hope that he sees this spell here as a fun adventure and doesn't let it affect him too much, because he must feel like a drunken sailor thrown into a heavyweight boxing ring out there at times. I wish that Val would just use him as a 10 minute sub when we're chasing a goal and nothing else. If there's anything he's good at, it's getting in the six yard box and poaching. Now that he's asked to do a lot of other stuff that he doesn't have the ability to do he's not even sniffing around for crosses anymore, so we're just getting the worst out of him.

Again, I don't really think this is criticism, because it's exactly what you would expect from a striker from the third tier in Denmark. The only time I've seen him not look completely lost was against... Chesterfield, which is probably around the level he should be playing.

I also think his goal stats are less relevant than some people think. Those stats are heavily skewed by the fact that he scored 5 of his first 6 shots, which is not sustainable at all, no matter who you are. Remember that goals are the _only_ positive thing that he contributes and even with that crazy start his goal involvement per 90 mins over the season is actually lower than Bayo (!).

 

Pretty much, yeah. Morrison had him in his pocket all game. It wasn't even bullying, as such, it's more a matter of strength, balance, reading the game and reacting to situations, I think. Experience, I guess.

 

I think the comparison with Ross Jenkins (the first) is particular helpful. Jenkins first two and a bit years with the club saw the team relegated from the second tier to the fourth division. He really was quite dreadful. So of course as the clubs record signing he got a lot of stick. Not really his fault. The club was a mess, but no other club came into to pluck this jewel of a forward from the poo. Billy Jenkins, (a 1 goal every 3 matches career average), of course got the mega move after scoring 29 goals in the third division. The following season Ross led the line in a team that got relegated to the fourth division.

The main point about the comparison between Jenkins and Rajovic is that if the latter has to spend seven years in the Third and Fourth Division learning his trade before becoming an effective centre forward in the Championship. I hope he doesn’t do so with Watford.

Maybe a few years in the lower divisions may turn him into the next Ivan Toney. Don’t thinks it’s going to happen though!

I expect the will be in the squad next year, so sure give him another year to see if he can improve. Although I would not be disappointed if he had a loan next season. Subject of course of finding a replacement. Like a Paul Furlong, Danny Graham or Alan Smart. None of whom were mega fee signings, but all effective.

 

I don't think we'll ever see him markedly improve, but the one hope I have for him is that he'll come back refreshed after the summer and will look as threatening in front of goal as he did when he first came here when he was match fit from playing in Sweden

 

He's simply nowhere near good enough. It's that simple. All these essays above are just complete nonsense. Not good enough for this level, and never will be.

It's not his fault, it's the crettins who signed him who deserve our ire.

And the biggest crettin of all? The mug in charge who plays him week in week out and defends the signing to the local press.

It was a catastrophic error. Drop him, sell him in the summer and move on. If we don't, then the message is clear: we don't have the means to accept such an error and the decline of WFC will continue apace.

 

Anyone hoping for him to be loaned out next season will probably be disappointed as it's very unlikely we'll have Dennis after the end of this season, likely leaving us with just Raj and Bayo

 

I'd like to see us give Sierralta a go up front.

 

All I remember about Orm0ndroyd was he got most of his 4 goals per season against us.

 

Good idea and people would no doubt back it with 15 paragraphs explaining how it’s unfair to judge a player after 30 appearances in that position because another player had a slow start to his career 50 years ago.

 

Personally I don't think it's fair to judge him on it until he's had two preseasons and a run of 92 back to back starts in that position.