Watford vs QPR predictions: Ismael can kick off reign with win over hapless Hoops
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- Watford have won their last three season-opening fixtures
- Valerien Ismael has won both his previous meetings with Gareth Ainsworth
- Recommended bet: Watford to beat QPR
QPR, many people's idea of a side heading for relegation, face a tricky trip to Watford, hoping that the new-look Hornets carry on from last season.
Watford had been among the favourites for promotion last term but suffered an awful campaign, finishing 11th with Rob Edwards, Slaven Bilic and Chris Wilder between them failing to get the Hertfordshire side into the promotion mix.
Now Valerien Ismael is in charge and he has signed a number of new players, so he will certainly be expecting to make it a winning start against Gareth Ainsworth's Hoops, who finished last term in a lowly 20th place.
Team news
Watford boss Valerien Ismael may stick new signing Jamal Lewis straight into the left side of defence, though Georgia international midfielder Giorgi Chakvetadze will probably park up on the bench.
Gareth Ainsworth has spent the week trying to bring in a new defender with Jimmy Dunne and Jake Clarke-Salter ruled out of the trip to Vicarage Road.
Unless a new face arrives at QPR, new signing Morgan Fox might be pressed into starting.
Midfielder Jack Colback, picked up on a free from Nottingham Forest, won't be involved.
The stats
Valerien Ismael has won both his previous meetings with Gareth Ainsworth, courtesy of Barnsley twice beating Wycombe in the 2020-21 season.
The Hornets have lost their opening game in just one of their last 16 seasons.
Rangers have not lost any of their last seven Championship clashes with Watford, a sequence dating back to 2010.
QPR have failed to win 15 of their last 16 opening-day games when those fixtures have been away from home.
Prediction
Watford just never got going last season and their owners, impatient for success at the best of times, will be expecting Valerien Ismael to get this campaign off to a flier.
And the Hornets' hierarchy may very well get their wish with Ismael set to kick off his reign with a three-point start.
Ismael has inevitably lost a couple of key men in Joao Pedro and Ismaila Sarr, but the calibre of reinforcements look encouraging.
Players like Tom Ince, Jake Livermore and Jamal Lewis come with Premier League pedigree and the onus is on Ismael to build a team around them.
The mix looks positive and the same cannot necessarily be said of QPR, who were in freefall last term before Gareth Ainsworth arrived in February and he could do little to stop the bleeding.
Very little money has been spent in the window, although new faces have been recruited, but Ainsworth already has a defensive problem to solve with neither Jimmy Dunne nor Jake Salter-Clarke available for the curtain-raiser.
And Ainsworth is acutely aware that even his best defence last season was far too porous, the Hoops shipping 71 goals in total. Only Blackpool conceded more and last weekend's 5-0 drubbing at Oxford in a friendly should have set the alarm bells ringing.
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