Watford v Oxford: Hornets hot-shot appeals at 12/5 | OneFootball

Watford boast a strong Vicarage Road record

High-flying Watford welcome newly-promoted Oxford to Vicarage Road on Friday night. Betfair writer Mark O'Haire is backing Edo Kayembe to make his mark...

Watford v OxfordFriday November 8, 20:00Live on Sky Sports

Watford toothless in midweek defeat

Watford boss Tom Cleverley said he shouldered the blame for much of what went wrong in the 1-0 defeat away at Swansea in midweek. Just a few days after scoring six at Sheffield Wednesday, the Hornets failed to land a shot on-target and struggled to get hold of the ball during a particularly poor first half, attempting a solitary effort at goal before the break.

Cleverley said, "It's two steps forward and one step back - that's the story of our season. If you do that your trajectory will be in an upwards way, and it is, but we could be so much better. We paid Swansea too much respect in possession. We had no identity for the first hour. It's a disappointing goal to concede but I can't have any complaints about the result."

Kwadwo Baah is expected to return to the starting XI having started on the bench on Tuesday night as Festy Obesele and Ken Sema came into the side as Cleverley continued with a back-four after working so well at Hillsborough. Ryan Porteous should feature after serving a suspension but Angelo Ogbonna, Jeremy Ngakia and Tom Dele-Bashiru are out.

Oxford end wait for a win

Oxford chief Des Buckingham was pleased to see his tactical tweak pay off as the U's ended their eight-game winless streak by overcoming Hull 1-0 on home soil in midweek. Having deployed a 4-3-3 system all season, Buckingham set his side up in a 3-4-2-1 shape with summer signing Hidde ter Avest bagging the only goal of the game from right wing-back.

Buckingham said, "It was a different type of performance with a very different set-up to what we're used to. We knew Hull would want to play and we did a bit of work on that last week and the players took it on board extremely well. We know we are one of the smallest clubs in the league and so have to be extremely smart in the way we set up."

Buckingham made five changes to the side that lost to Swansea, with Peter Kioso, Ruben Rodrigues, Louie Sibley, Owen Dale and Mark Harris all dropping out. Ter Avest, Greg Leigh, Will Vaulks, Idris El Mizouni and Dane Scarlett were brought in with Leigh and ter Avest operating on the flanks while Tyler Goodrham and El Mizouni tucked in behind Scarlett.

Hornets well-fancied at home

Watford and Oxford are facing-off in league action for the first time in over 25 years with Hornets holding a W5-D4-L1 head-to-head advantage over the U's going back to 1990. The Hertfordshire hosts have W3-D1-L0 in their past four home fixtures against Oxford, and have conceded just once in five league and cup encounters against the visitors.

Since opening the campaign with three successive victories, Watford 1.69 have posted W4-D1-L6 in Championship action. However, the Hornets have been at their best at Vicarage Road with Tom Cleverley's team taking 15 points from a possible 18 in front of their own supporters, though performance data suggests they've overachieved.

The midweek win was Oxford's 4.10 first since mid-September, as the U's have now earned 15 of their 17-point haul at the Kassam Stadium. Des Buckingham's boys are W0-D2-L4 on their travels since promotion, conceding multiple goals on five occasions - yet the visitors have won the Expected Goals (xG) in three of their six previous away days.

Kayembe backed to score at 12/5

In a tricky game to call, it's worth looking beyond the major markets with an Anytime Goalscorer angle standing-out. Watford's left-sided forward Edo Kayembe has five goals for the hosts already this season, four of which have arrived at Vicarage Road. The DR Congo international is averaging an impressive 0.46 shots on-target per-90 this term.

Kayembe has hit the target four times in his last three home outings is looks overpriced as a [12/5] shot to score on Friday night, a price that implies less than a 30% chance of getting on the scoresheet against Oxford. The U's are giving up 1.72 Expected Goals (xG) in away days thus far, with four of their six hosts firing in a minimum of 18 shots against the visitors.

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