Bantams are spot unlucky

Forget losing the shirt. They must be down to the thermal socks by now, if that.

The Bantams have now conceded an incredible TEN penalties, more than any other team in the First Division - in fact more than any other team in the whole league.

That scary statistic tells you two things.

Firstly, City are doing too much defending and the ball is clearly spending far more time than it should inside their penalty area.

But also it reveals the trigger-happy readiness of the officials to point to the spot whenever a striker tumbles dramatically in a heap.

Watford will feel they should have had a penalty on Saturday. But not for the incident which referee Alan Butler blew for two minutes from the end of a match with 0-0 seemingly stamped over it in 12-foot high letters.

The Hornets had better claims for hand ball against Simon Francis in the first half as he struggled to usher a cross from Jermaine Pennant away from his goalmouth or Mark Bower's aerial clash with Gifton Noel-Williams within minutes of the substitute striker coming on.

But as the old adage goes, if at first you don't succeed ....

So with time running out, the slippery Pennant tore into the box with Lewis Emanuel matching him stride for stride.

The City left back had a nibble at his former England youth team-mate with a brush of the shoulders. Pennant stayed on his feet and kept running.

Emanuel moved in again with another hefty block and this time Pennant launched into the air like the fella off the springboard in the John Smith's ad. Butler was convinced and braced himself for the rush of protests from the flummoxed City players.

As Emanuel stood frozen on the by-line with hands on hips, his team-mates surrounded the official to vent their fury at seeing a hard-earned point ripped from their grasp.

With order restored, home skipper Neil Cox blasted home the penalty and City had lost away from home for the eighth successive match. Cox later admitted he didn't think it should have been given but that's scant consolation to the beaten visitors.

Michael Standing said: "At first we all went over to Lewis to praise him for seeing off their lad. When the referee then gave the penalty I was just in shock.

"They had a shout earlier that possibly was. But that was a disgrace and they knew as well.

"I don't think their boy dived but just got out-strengthed by Lewis and went down."

Pennant had already been fingered for falling too keenly by Mark Bower when the centre-half was booked for a sliding tackle earlier in the second half.

But the Arsenal youngster, on a season-long loan from Highbury, was afterwards maintaining his innocence in a manner with which Arsene Wenger would be proud.

Pennant claimed: "The Bradford lads said I dived but I didn't. I'm not sure if it was a penalty but the referee gave it so I'm not going to complain."

Well at least that's better than the "I didn't see it" mantra you would have got from his Premiership pay-masters.

Not surprisingly City strongly disagreed. It was a hefty block from Emanuel but not the mugging that Pennant's dramatic fall had suggested.

Then again with City's penalty record, we shouldn't have expected them to negotiate a whole afternoon's defensive duties without being brought to book.

Referee Butler's pencil was pretty worn down by the final whistle after taking six City names which guarantees the hard-up club a £5,000 rap from the FA.

But that will feel a minor annoyance compared to the major grumble at seeing their first away point since mid-September wrenched away in such heart-wrenching manner.

It was no vintage display from Nicky Law's side but they once again showed the steely resolve that was evident the last time they were on their travels at Millwall three weeks ago. Sadly it was the same result at the end of it.

Watford will feel they deserved it on the balance of play, and certainly for the first 45 minutes there was only one team in it.

City were on the back foot from the opening seconds when Aidan Davison had to race from his goal to boot into the stand. Although for all their huffing and puffing, the Hornets showed little sting.

Their best chance came after seven minutes when Heidar Helguson seized on a lucky break. Simon Francis slid in to intercept a Watford through ball but succeeded only in diverting the ball into the Icelandic striker's path.

The angle was tight but Watford's leading scorer must have fancied his chances with only Davison to beat. But the keeper, returning to form after a dodgy spell, narrowed his target even further and blocked the shot with both knees.

The rest of the half was spent camped inside City territory. Watford keeper Alec Chamberlain could have nipped off for

some last-minute Christmas shopping and nobody would have noticed until Standing drove over his bar right on the stroke of half-time. It may not have matched the display against Nottingham Forest, although captain Robert Molenaar was in man-mountain mood again, but there was a determination about every City tackle and clearance.

And when Emanuel got to grips with Pennant's pace after the break, Watford were clearly running out of ideas.

Like City, they had won only one of their previous seven games and the frustration was becoming evident as attack after attack was snuffed out.

The visitors even threatened to grab the lead just after the hour as Claus Jorgensen forced a reaction save from Chamberlain with a 25-yard thunderbolt. The Santa Claus headlines were already being conjured when Watford's veteran keeper threw himself to his right to push the ball away.

Watford threw on Gifton Noel-Williams for his first action since serious knee surgery as well as nippy Anthony McNamee, the will-o-the-wisp winger who gave the Bantams a real headache when they last played in March. City were stretched at times but still coped as they closed in on a second successive goalless draw in Hertfordshire.

Andy Tod looked out on his feet in his first game for four months and Law attempted to shut up shop by introducing Paul Evans. The Welsh international immediately made his mark on another - and was booked within half a minute for taking out Watford full back Paul Robinson.

That seemed the last flash-point but Mr Butler had other ideas. City lost their rag as well as the match.

Christmas has never been more crucial.