"A time to reflect - and also look forward"

Last updated : 05 May 2006 By Gary Calder

As the ‘regular' season has come to an end, I thought that now is a good time to reflect on how far we've come – whilst not losing sight of the job still in front of us.

We finished in third place, a position which we've held for most of the season and won 81 points, scoring 77 goals in the process. Only Reading scored more than us this season.

This means that we've ended up as the third best team in the league but now we've got to prove that again by beating Crystal Palace and getting through to the final. It's going to be tough because they've beaten us twice already this season, they have a bigger squad and they've been through all this before so they are the favourites but that's how we like it.

We're going there to win, not just to make up the numbers.

During the course of the season, a number of young players have played their first game for the club or made their first big impression at first-team level – lads like Al Bangura, deservedly voted as the club's Young Player of the Year this week, Adrian Mariappa, Theo Robinson, Toumani Diagourage, Junior Osborne and Joel Grant.

That's been great to see but the more senior members of the squad haven't let us down either – both Marlon King and Ashley Young were elected into the PFA Team of the Season by their peers and Marlon finished as the league's top scorer into the bargain – fantastic achievements all round.

From a team point of view, we've managed to do the double over six teams (Cardiff, Norwich, Stoke, Ipswich, QPR and Southampton) as well as having three players in double figures for goals and Matthew Spring not far behind on eight.

But let's not dwell on looking back because there's so much ahead, starting on Saturday in the play-offs.

We had the player of the year party at The Grove on Sunday evening. It was a bit strange because we were there to celebrate what we've achieved this season but, as soon as the evening was over, it was back to work on Monday to prepare for Palace. That gave the whole evening a bit of an odd feel.

See you on Saturday.


Come On!

Reproduced with thanks to the official site, WatfordFC.