
Football
Exclusive: Ex-Watford Forward Calls for Patience with Tom Cleverley
Former Watford player Gifton Noel-Williams is optimistic about their Premier League promotion hopes. He calls for patience with under-fire manager Tom Cleverley and highlights the importance of recruitment. As a black manager, he aims to break stereotypes and land a top coaching job.

Getty Images / Andrew Kearns
Former Watford man Gifton Noel-Williams has expressed optimism about Watford's chances of earning promotion to the Premier League next season.
With over 164 appearances under his belt for the Vicarage Road outfit, Noel-Williams played a crucial role in the Hornets promotion to the top flight in the 98/99 season, as they won promotion to the Premiership.
With Watford nursing Premier League ambitions yet since dropping out of it in the 21/22 season, Gifton believes they are onto something good, even though the results have been poor lately.
"I think that they aren’t too far away now", Gifton told SportsBoom.com.
"If there's someone who can score 20+ goals, and a creative midfielder who's good enough to play in the Premier League, that's an added advantage."
"That probably increases their chances at the other end, when they go forward."
"And then a centre-back that loves to defend will be great too."
GIFTON CALLS FOR PATIENCE WITH UNDER-FIRE CLEVERLEY
Watford's results lately have been a huge cause for concern.
A draw at Cardiff and a win at Derby looked to have turned the tide but another pair of back-to-back defeats to Preston North End and Coventry dealt their promotion hopes further blows to leave them on eighth place in the Championship and a point off the last playoff spots.
Thus, news continue to build in recent weeks that the club's management could hand Tom Cleverley the sack but Gifton feels the 2013 Premier League winner should be given more time.
"There is still a lot of time to get things right, so I don't know why the rush to replace him."
"But we all know the history of how [the Pozzo family] the coach/management relationship has been. Maybe they already have a new manager waiting to take over, I don't know."
"But one thing, even if he ends up getting the sack, you have to believe in your coaching staff," Gifton stated.
When quizzed on what Cleverley and his side need do to put the needed points on board and achieve their top flight ambitions, he said: "Clevs knows what he's doing and I’m sure he has his philosophy. For a young manager, he's doing a great job."
"The way he wants the team to play, they are in and around there but sometimes a bit of luck is needed to get into those top six spots."
However, Watford recently put out on X that news surrounding Cleverley's future at the club are 'pure speculations'.
RECRUITMENT WILL BE IMPORTANT AS WELL
"They have a few quality players but just like I said they will have to bring in some more to get there, to get to where they want to."
"Do they have a 15, 20-goal player in there? Maybe not yet but i believe they will get that. Sometimes in the Championship, you could play bad but the goals you put away keeps you afloat, so you see why you need it."
LIFE AS A BLACK MANAGER
Now trying to get to grips with football management, the vocal Gifton has often opined how hard it's being for black coaches to land top jobs in football, but that could change if people get to see what he's much more about.
Once told he would have to cut his flowing manes and get rid of his gold tooth if he was ever to grace the Premier League in a managerial role, Gifton is optimistic the giant strides he's made is changing the narrative and negative stereotypes.
"I want to manage in the very top jobs, the Premier League, the La Liga, the Champions League, but it's not all that easy to get along with", the 45-year-old who recently ended his technical director role with Grenada said.
"At the moment, I'm currently looking for a head coach position in football. People could look at you and say, can he do it?"
"But I’ve done many jobs in football so I can learn and now it’s time for me to live out my journey as a head coach."
"There's no far place to travel to, provided it's a highly competitive and professional league, and a good project is on ground", he enthused, talking about what would be a dream job at the moment."

Since he broke loose from the shackles of long hours huddled up in a hot classroom learning Mandarin Chinese and Pinyin at the famous Confucius Institute, UNIZIK, Emmanuel Chinaza has embraced sports and football in particular, and it helped that he grew up in the football-crazy city of Anambra.