Watford not quite over the line as Championship weekend ends

Martin Paterson was left out by Huddersfield

Just before reviewing the previous week's fixtures the news came through that Tony Mowbray had lost his job at Middlesbrough. It's so often the case that the next game is televised and that there is suddenly a much better result.

That was the case on Friday as two Albert Adomah goals, and he'd got two the week before in the defeat at Barnsley, set them up for an easy 4-0 win. Mark Venus is currently in caretaker charge.

He remains second favourite for the job but leading the way with the bookies right now is former Real Madrid player Aitor Karanka who was also Jose Mourinho's (that's not the ginger one) assistant at the Bernabeu, a ground potentially set to be renamed the Microsoft Bernabeu.

A great start to the post-Mowbray era at the Riverside and the weekend of fixtures ended last night at the other end of the country as Brighton and Watford fought out a 1-1 draw at the Amex.

In truth it was a game Watford should have won but a second goal at the beginning of the second half was not given despite the ball clearly going over the line.

It wasn't quite Pedro Mendes at Old Trafford but it was still definitely over the line. Brighton got away with it, went on to equalise and get a point while referee Keith Hill and his assistant were left red faced.

That left Watford in seventh place with 22 points. They are ten points behind the league leaders right now.

It is usually at this point where the top of the table is referred to, and the teams up there.

Usually that means discussing other clubs so right now I can confirm that Leicester are second (three points behind Burnley), QPR are third (five points behind Burnley), Blackpool are fourth (eight points behind Burnley) with Reading and Nottingham Forest taking fifth and sixth places (nine points behind Burnley).

Yes, Leicester second. They beat Bournemouth 2-1 at the King Power and Nigel Pearson was really pleased with the win, claiming that Bournemouth are a really disciplined team who can also score goals.

I think we all know they can score goals. They are the only team in the Championship to have scored in every game, but they are also a team with the capacity for conceding goals and remain the only team in the top 15 with a negative goal difference.

Looking down at the other end of the table it shows Sheffield Wednesday have now hit that bottom place. It's no surprise to be honest. When you haven't won any of your opening 12 games you can't expect to be much higher.

Like a lot of clubs they are short of money. They've had former Wolves and Hull midfielder Seyi Olofinjana training with them since the summer but were only last week able to offer him a deal. He went straight into the team at Barnsley in a game that ended 1-1.

The pair of them now occupy the bottom two places and that's due to the surprise result of the weekend; Yeovil's 3-1 home win against Nottingham Forest. Well done to the league's smallest club; this was their first ever home win at this level.

It was hardly the clash of the giants. Television pictures showed the two managers, Gary Johnson and Billy Davies, talking ahead of kick off.

Finally a mention of Huddersfield and their win against local rivals Leeds. It came despite manager Mark Robins leaving out three players for, as he put it, the good of the club. One of them was Martin Paterson who can still claim his goal for Burnley against Ipswich last season is his last league goal.

Far be it from me to comment on speculation but there does appear to have been something of a problem at the training ground involving Paterson and former Leeds midfielder Adam Clayton. Suggestions are, from various sources, that both have been told to find new clubs.

The third player left out was Anthony Gerrard. He's a bit upset about the rumours. On Saturday he tweeted: "People spread rumours and lies over why I wasn't included in the squad!" He followed that up with: "No fighting from here pal Silly rumours are spread by fools and believed by idiots, haha."

The results and stats are below along with the leading goalscorers, each club's disciplinary record, the highest and lowest attendances and the next fixtures which start tomorrow with QPR's trip to Wigan where the home side will go toe-to-toe with them. That augurs well.