Burn down the mission: Inside the Watford ‘circus’ as Elton John leads irate fans in revolt – ‘crazy’ meddling from on high, players turning on executives, staff leaving ‘unrecognisable’ club and why Gino Pozzo is struggling to sell

‘Burn down the mission. Burn it down to stay alive. It’s our only chance of living’ -Elton John, Burn Down The Mission.

The pitchforks are out at Watford. The torches are lit. There’s no turning back now as they march to Vicarage Road. The mission is in their sights and they are, figuratively speaking, ready to burn it to the ground. For them, now, it’s their only chance to survive.

Over the past few days, Watford have come to discover that when it comes to his beloved football club, if Sir Elton John speaks out, soon does everyone else. They rise up and make their voices heard.

After the Hornets’ 4-0 defeat by Burnley at Vicarage Road, a team previously 241 days without a win, the legendary singer and former Watford chairman made his feelings known.

‘As a lifetime supporter of Watford FC, I am very upset and disappointed at the decline over the past few weeks,’ wrote Elton in a now-deleted comment to a club post on Instagram. ‘I really feel for the other supporters who have to watch this.’

In doing so, he lit the fire. Elton made no reference to the club’s ownership in his comment – and Daily Mail Sport understands he has been in contact with chairman Scott Duxbury since making it – but, suddenly, a fanbase that had long been simmering with malaise and discontent towards Gino Pozzo and the Watford board heard the rallying call they needed.

Out they came. Former captain Troy Deeney said the ‘writing was on the wall’. The Watford Supporters Board called for owners to give ‘urgent attention’ to the ‘deep concern’ fans had about their leadership. The club’s Supporters Trust backed their statement. Even the mayor got involved. The 1881 Movement, the supporters’ group behind the singing section in the Rookery Stand, issued an open letter of no confidence in Pozzo.

‘For too long now, Watford has been treated as a revolving door of managers, a testing ground for short-term decisions, and a vehicle for constant upheaval,’ it read. ‘The endless cycle of appointments and dismissals has reduced a once-proud club to a source of ridicule.’

Pozzo is due to meet Roy Moore from the 1881 Movement at the training ground today after the Watford owner became aware of the open letter and reached out via the club. Moore agreed on the proviso he could report back to supporters what was said. ‘Full transparency was the price of acceptance,’ he said.

Only three days earlier, Watford lost 5-1 to Cardiff, a fourth straight defeat that dropped them into the Championship relegation zone. By then, the supporters were already in full revolt.

In response to every club post on X, hundreds of fans replied with bright yellow squares with the words ‘Pozzo Out’ emblazoned across them. Streams and streams of them, forming their own yellow brick road. 

Supporters in the ground sung anti-Pozzo chants. They will do so again at Vicarage Road on Saturday against Charlton, turning their backs and raising their scarves in the 14th minute in protest against 14 years of Pozzo ownership. They feel it is the only way to save the club, in the words of the final track of Elton’s 1970 album Tumbleweed Connection, about a settler starting a revolt against the wealthy establishment, is to Burn Down The Mission.

The defeat in South Wales looked as if it might prompt that managerial door to revolve once more. Reports emerged mid-match that Alessio Dionisi, who only arrived in the summer, was for the chop and the Hornets would be looking for a 24th manager since Pozzo bought the club in June 2012 and their 14th since 2021. Their former manager Tom Cleverley, by the way, is currently top of League One with Plymouth.

As it happens, the club are sticking by Dionisi for now and he will take charge against Charlton on Saturday. The owners are said to recognise they have been too hasty with hirings and firings in the past and so will give the Italian more time.

That’s always the thing with Watford, though, you never know quite how much time that will be. It’s believed Pozzo was scouting out potential replacements over the weekend.

Daily Mail Sport understands players and staff held a big meeting on the Sunday after the Burnley defeat at the club’s training ground to air their frustrations. While club sources were keen to play down the idea of ‘showdown’ talks, it’s understood senior players led by captain Mattie Pollock spoke up about the current form and launched a staunch defence of their manager. Dionisi is well-liked around the dressing room.

There were believed to be pointed comments made, too, towards Duxbury about his glowing remarks on Watford’s official podcast about young midfielder Jack Grieves – despite the 21-year-old only making a single matchday squad all season.

Grieves’ brother Ben even called into a phone-in on Watford fan podcast Do Not Scratch Your Eyes after the Cardiff defeat to complain about his lack of match action and to add his voice to calls for change.

‘Some players care, some players don’t,’ he said. ‘There is something seriously, seriously wrong with our football club at the minute and there has got to be something that changes.’

For the fans, it is clear what should change – the owner. Pozzo, who took over the club with his father in 2012 before having sole ownership two years later, has enjoyed great success in his time with six seasons in the Premier League and four trips to Wembley, including an FA Cup final. It was the club’s best run of success since the days of Graham Taylor, under Elton’s stewardship, in the 1980s.

And yet, since that historic day against Manchester City in 2019, the cracks have begun to appear and widen. The player trading model on which Watford is based, and previously led to huge profits on players like Richarlison and Joao Pedro, has gone stale. Recent signings from Udinese, Pozzo’s other club, haven’t fired as they once did. 

The constant churn of players and managers leaves a place that describes itself as ‘the original family club’ feeling more like a hotel lobby which bodies merely pass through. Members of staff have left, with a heavy heart, a club they no longer recognise.

Watford’s summer business, described by recently departed midfielder Tom Ince as ‘soulless’ in another incendiary interview by a former player, saw players arrive late in the window, miss chunks of pre-season, and soon pick up injuries.

The club barely spent a penny on their 12 summer transfers as they look to tighten the purse strings even more now that the parachute payments have dried up. The most recent accounts for 2024-25 showed Watford to be spending more on wages (£28m) than revenue (£26m), though the club are now understood to have one of the lowest wage bills in the Championship at around £14m.

Watford were in talks with former West Ham striker Michail Antonio throughout the summer but felt they couldn’t do a deal due to wage demands, only to bring him in on September 11. Antonio is yet to play a single minute.

The signing of former Monaco defender Krepin Diatta was seen as a huge coup for the club – ‘our point of difference, which other clubs don’t have, is our scouting network,’ said Duxbury on the club’s official podcast – only for the player’s agent to suggest he’d had to settle for the Hornets after being rejected by clubs all summer for asking for excessive wages.

Ince’s comments poured yet more fuel on an already raging furnace. ‘From the outside you see Watford is a circus, but when you’re in it you kind of feel it too,’ he said on the BBC’s 72+ podcast. ‘Circus’ was the word used by another former player to Daily Mail Sport this week.

‘Players knew the manager wasn’t important,’ added Ince. ‘They would almost bypass the manager (and speak directly to the owner) as we knew he had no control.

‘Watford is built to be a Premier League team but they need to think, “Are we more bothered about profit or building a successful football team?” and not hire yes men who are told who to play, what systems to play, how training goes.’

There’s always been stories like that around Watford, of envelopes slipped under hotel room doors with team changes sent from on high. One source close to a former manager recalled players being signed without their knowledge. Daily Mail Sport heard a perhaps far-fetched tale this week of senior players receiving WhatsApp messages in the dressing room at half-time with substitute recommendations to pass on to the coach.

‘It’s crazy at that place,’ another former player told Daily Mail Sport this week. ‘I only expect it to get worse, sadly.’

As always with clubs in a downward spiral, it’s issues off the pitch that trickle on to the grass.

The club’s ownership are understood to be open to offers. They have sold the women’s team to a US investment firm. The academy has been downgraded to Category 3 and its director, club legend Richard Johnson, has just left. 

One agent told Daily Mail Sport they had been approached multiple times by interested parties asking for the best way in. However, the £175m valuation placed on the club, when it sought out £17.5m for a 10 per cent share a few years ago, seemed far too high. As the club is in a worse position now than it was then, such a figure is surely unrealistic now.

According to football finance analyst Swiss Ramble, Watford have repaid a Championship-high net £34m to their owners in the six years to 2024-25. The £53m still owed to them carries interest of up to 8.75 per cent, with £7.7m built up so far. The club’s available cash appears to come almost entirely from player sales. Watford were forced to pay out to a stewarding company in the summer, who had hit them with a winding-up petition.

There’s still the uncomfortable relationship Watford has with agent Mogi Bayat, who they continue to do business with despite him awaiting trial in Belgium over charges including money laundering and fraud. Bayat denies all wrongdoing. 

And then there’s Pozzo’s own court case in Spain next month, where he stands accused of evading more than £7.5m in tax on transfers while at Granada. A guilty verdict would see him fall foul of the Football League’s owners regulations. Pozzo’s lawyers have said he ‘refutes in the strongest possible terms that he has breached Spanish tax laws in any way’.

The message from the club is that patience is required and there’s no need to panic. Results will come and they always change the mood. For supporters, it’s too late for that. For them, they only have one way left to stay alive. Their only chance of living.