Watford Football Club haven’t always been the most appealing team to go and watch. Since the FA cup final squad of 1984, there hasn't been many reasons why a young lad would choose to support Watford. However, that’s all changed now and here’s some reasons why:

Their style of play:

After the Pozzo family - who also own Italian Giants Udinese and Spanish club Granada - took over the club in June 2012, Watford have opted to adopt a more possession based way of playing. They have seen a significant change in their identity due to the high quality signings and big name loanees, most notably from Udinese, coming into the football club.

Players like Gabriele Angella, experienced Swiss midfielder Almen Abdi and Italian youngster Fernando Forestieri have helped transform Watford into a free flowing attacking side. This is clearly shown by the fact that the club finished top scorers in the second tier of English football last season with a total of 88 goals, 12 goals clear of second placed Crystal Palace (76). This attacking style of play is very much the way football is heading and in this case, Watford are going the right way about it. 

The younger generation do not want to see teams using the outdated long ball system. This was clearly emphasised by the sacking of Tony Pulis from Stoke earlier this year. They want to see their clubs play with the passing style of Barcelona and the clinical ways of Real Madrid. This is obviously very hard to produce when you’re stuck in the Championship,. but Watford were the closest to doing that last season.

Their location:

For those who know their way around England, the town of Watford is located in the southern county of Hertfordshire and for those who know their football, there aren’t many great teams in that county. Stevenage are the second highest placed team from Herts, which doesnt provide much competition locally. Stevenage currently play their football in league 1. 

This is a supreme advantage for the Hornets as they find it easier than the other Hertfordshire based clubs to attract the new generation of local fans. The fact that they are the highest ranked team in the county and play beautiful football makes Watford the favourable choice for a young lad from Herts, unless of course he goes for the bigger club sides situated in the nearby city of London.

They’re going places:

As unfortunate as it may seem, children are more likely to dedicate themselves to a club that’s consistently winning football matches and Watford could definitely do themselves justice by winning a high percentage of their games this season. Watford boasted the best away record in the 2012-13 Championship season with big wins against Leeds, Birmingham and Leicester the pick of the bunch. 

Watford are in a very promising position this season with the club’s star loanees of the previous season recently signing permanent contracts. Therefore, there is an increased chance of the team improving as the players know each other so much better than they did at the start of the 2012-13 season. So surely it’s only a matter of time before their form at Vicarage Road improves and they land themselves the richest prize of all time, promotion to the Barclays Premier League. Watford were actually one of the favourites to win the league at the start of the season with SkyBet pricing the Hornets at a very reasonable 11/1.

Ticket Prices:

At a time where money seems to dominate the world of football, ticket prices are appallingly high with research from British newspaper ‘The Guardian’ showing that the Premier League charge an average of almost £30 for their cheapest matchday ticket and an average of £467.95 for the lowest costing adult season ticket. Watford achieved something quite brilliant last year by introducing ‘Promotion proof’ season ticket prices where they released the prices of the season tickets before the season ended, even though Watford was in a prime position to make the leap to England’s most prestigious league. This offer meant that it was possible for an adult to see 19 premier league games for just £340 (cheapest price), that’s £127.95 below the current average. Last year I went to six home games with individual matchday tickets, these were priced at just £10 each for a child under the age of 16 and season ticket prices for 8-15 year olds will be just £30 next year (cheapest price and they have to be accompanied by a full paying adult). There is a real state of intent to bring in the new breed of fans to Vicarage Road by offering top quality football to children at pocket money prices.