Watford was held at home as Hull City produced one of the close football scores of the weekend in the Championship. While the Tigers passed Wigan and are now two points ahead of third-bottom West Brom, Slaven Bilic’s team would have moved up to third if they had won but instead fell down to fifth. Hamza Choudhury of Watford and Dimitrios Pelkas of Hull both required medical attention after simultaneously tackling one other early on. In the tenth minute, Pelkas had to be replaced by Greg Docherty while Hamza continued with his right knee strapped. However, it was evident that Choudhury, who was on loan from Leicester, was having trouble, and the midfielder bowed out himself five minutes later, with winger Joseph Hungbo replacing him.
Shots on goal were few and far between. Tyler Smith’s attempt from the right side of the Watford box was blocked by Christian Kabasele, while Jacob Greaves’ header from a corner by Hull went wide. On the half-hour mark, the Hornets made their first attempt. Tigers goalkeeper Matt Ingram dove to stop Joao Pedro’s low shot after Jean Michael Seri’s errant ball deflected off a home player. An unimpressive opening 45 minutes ended with Regan Slater’s poor shot at the home goalkeeper Daniel Bachmann and Cyrus Christie’s booking for pulling Ken Sema’s back.
Within two minutes of the restart, Smith injected some life into the proceedings after Docherty had sent him in on the right of the box, but Bachmann made a fine save with his legs. After Sema was stopped by Alfie Jones in an unsportsmanlike manner, Ingram had to dive to stop Pedro from hitting the corner of the net with a shot on the turn. Docherty, who had to leave the game before the hour, was replaced by Ozan Tufan, who was jeered by the home crowd after a lackluster loan stint with Watford in the previous season. Watford’s Yaser Asprilla nearly put the team in front, but Ingram was able to parry and the forward was wounded trying to convert the rebound.
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