Kyprianou insists Watford hotel stay 'was enjoyable'

Hector Kyprianou has dismissed reports that Watford's players were unhappy about the squad staying in a hotel this week.

The Sun reported, external that players were "livid" after being "forced" to spend two nights at a facility near the Championship club's training ground.

Watford owner Gino Pozzo was reported to have "ordered" the "last-minute boot camp" as a team-bonding exercise after a run of five defeats from their past six matches.

Kyprianou, who has made 14 appearances for the Hornets this season, told BBC Three Counties Radio: "I've been told it was [reported to be] like a prison. But I can assure you it wasn't like that. It was possibly the complete opposite.

"We went to a nice hotel. After training, we were allowed to go home, see our families and stuff, and then we reported for dinner, where we were together with the team, having good food, bonding.

"We have a lot of new players still to integrate into the team, so we were doing things like that.

"It was enjoyable, and it was good to be with the lads. I really enjoyed it.

"I think I had a good experience with the lads – got to spend more time with them, get to know them in a better way – and hopefully it will help us perform better on the pitch together."

Watford are fourth from bottom of the table, and head coach Alessio Dionisi, who was appointed during the summer, appears to be under serious pressure already.

Recent heavy back-to-back defeats - 4-0 at home to Burnley and 5-1 at Cardiff - were low points in what has already been a difficult season.

Since then, however, there has been an improvement, with Dionisi's side beating Charlton 2-0 before losing 1-0 at Wolves last time out.

"We know the form hasn't been good enough, and especially after the international break, when we played Burnley and Cardiff," said Kyprianou.

"We knew it was totally unacceptable – the performance, the way we went about it, and the results.

"We've played two more games since then – obviously the win against Charlton, then the loss against Wolves. The win was very important, and then the game against Wolves was going to be tough.

"Since those two bad results, we've played 180 minutes, conceded one goal in the two, compared to the nine in the two previous games.

"So we're slowly trying to have a fresh canvas and have small building blocks for the long season ahead."

Watford are away to Norwich - the team immediately above them in the table - on Saturday (12:30 GMT).