Frustration test for the geniality of Gianluca

Any doubts that Gianluca Vialli remains a class act would have been swiftly dispelled by a TV clip of him training the other day with Watford, the club he now manages. The 37-year-old Italian was streets ahead of his players in a spot of light-hearted, keepie-uppie one-touch ball control. But it is as a potential saviour in the harsh surroundings of a lower division that Vialli now finds himself judged, and he will need all his dexterity to live up to the towering expectations associated with his name.

One such assumption among the club's followers was that Vialli, a high-profile, high-publicity replacement for the long-serving and enduringly popular Graham Taylor, would lift them back where they feel they belong, the Premiership. Instead, Watford are adrift in the bottom half of the First Division and in urgent need of a victory from their visit to Gillingham today.

They can be assured of a hot reception by the Gills. Every Watford game is like that nowadays because of who their manager is; the tale of six defeats already away from home reflects this attitude by the opposition. "Everybody wants to beat us now," said the captain, Neil Cox. "People look at Watford, with a famous name as manager and a couple of big signings and say 'Right, let's get stuck into them'." Vialli himself, still in shorts after leading a session at the club's London Colney training ground on Thursday, concurred with his captain. "Our opponents play above themselves," he said. "Everybody is on top of their game when they play us. We have to get used to it and recognise that we need to do even better.

"If you read the newspapers when we lose, it is because I did something wrong. If we win, it is because I did something great. It is a bit unfair towards the players when we win, because they are the ones who go on the pitch and play well, and unfair towards myself when we lose because it is a team effort. The team deserve recognition when we play well. It is not just me. It is the club, the directors, the supporters, it is everybody who is going to pull together to make us successful." Success is proving unexpectedly elusive, especially away from home, and it seems to be affecting even this urbane, unflappable man. During Tuesday's defeat at Burnley, Vialli was prowling the line, disputing decisions and conceding afterwards that he feels frustrated.

Forty-eight hours on from that setback, Vialli was prepared to expand on that feeling. "That was a game we could have won but at the moment things are not happening for us. It will not affect our confidence because we know we are capable of turning things around, and we will.

"I am frustrated and very disappointed with the results but the performances, in my opinion, have been good enough – some great, some OK and a couple of bad ones. But that is understandable. We have a new team and it is still early in the season. After four months I can't expect to be in charge of a fantastic team already.

"I know expectations are really high and unless we win 3-0 and are almost perfect nobody is going to be happy with us. We have played sides who made a lot of mistakes and got away with it, yet we don't get away with mistakes. It's probably because God knows we are much better and wants to teach us a lesson," he smiled. "And the lesson is that we have got to be perfect if we want to get results. In the meantime, our football and my principles remain the same."

Those principles, buttressed by considerable skill, carried Vialli through a glittering playing career with Cremonese, Sampdoria, Juventus and Chelsea before he became arguably the most successful manager in Stamford Bridge history by winning five trophies in less than two full seasons. Harsh dismissal in September last year has not persuaded Vialli to unburden himself subsequently about his treatment, though he does refer sardonically to the club's managing director, Colin Hutchinson, as "Chelsea's Mr Nice Guy" after they clashed when Winston Bogarde was bought without the manager's knowledge or wish.

Rumours of a return to Sampdoria having been dismissed as nonsense, Vialli is seriously embarked on turning Watford round and, in pursuit of instilling his beliefs and demands, he had every member of the squad in his office last Thursday for one-on-one briefings. Already, much has changed from the Graham Taylor days of getting the ball forward quickly, as Cox noted: "This manager is trying to get the ball down and pass it. He has been here four months, so we should have taken everything on board by now. It's about time we all got firing, got some clean sheets and started winning some games."

In an extremely tight division, Watford remain in close enough touch with the leaders for a good run to put them in contention. "No team really stand out," said Vialli. "Therefore it is going to be tight, probably till the end, and that is a good thing for us because we still have time to make up for not starting as well as we hoped." While agreeing a string of wins could put them among the front runners by the turn of the year, Vialli warned: "It is easier to say that than do it, so it is about time we stopped talking and started showing what we are capable of, stopped giving other teams the chance to say to us 'Thanks for being Father Christmas'."

Vialli insists enough money has been made available to cover his plans. "There is enough to enable us to compete with the others. As long as you have targets and the money available is enough to reach those targets, which is the case at Watford, you can be happy. Obviously with this sort of money we couldn't try to win the Premiership. But there is enough for our needs, especially when I look at other clubs that have even less. What matters to me are things like good training facilities, good relationships with directors, the players and the club. I have all of that here, and that's why I am very happy." A win at Gillingham today and Vialli, the keepie-uppie king, would be even happier.