With Sam Johnstone joining West Bromwich Albion, it is likely that the Baggies will part ways with their veteran goalkeeper Ben Foster. The 35-year-old is likely to move to Watford who are set to sign him for £2.5m. Foster has had loan stints with Watford in 2005 and he will be a welcome addition to the Hornets squad.
Watford had a good start to the season in the last campaign under Marco Silva, however, their wheels came off as the season progressed and they ended up finishing 14th. Javi Gracia will have a huge task in his hands in the upcoming season as he tries to establish Watford as a top half team.
The team struggled with goalkeeping options as Heurelho Gomes was below par in his performances. A lot would have been expected out of the experienced Brazilian but he made some costly errors which hurt his team badly. The manager went on to use Orestis Karnezis in the latter half of the season and the Greek custodian was only slightly better than his Brazilian counterpart.
Signing an experienced goalkeeper like Foster will certainly solve a lot of headaches in goal for the manager and now, he has a much more established and proven shot-stopper behind his defence.
Foster is known as a thorough professional but recently he didn’t turn up for training with the Baggies in the last two weeks. Hence, the 35-year-old is set to be penalised by the club. However, he won’t mind that anymore as he will be happy with moving back to the Premier League once again.
It’s a big U-turn which the English goalkeeper has taken as in April he had commented,” I’ll be here(On staying at Hawthorns if they go down to Championship). I’ve got no interest in trying to move clubs. I’m very settled and I’m sure there are quite a few others who would love to stay and help us get back to the Premier League.”
Maybe when the actual offer arrived from Watford his head turned as he got another opportunity to continue his career in the English topflight.
