Heurelho Gomes absolved Troy Deeney of any blame for his part in Manchester United’s winner on Saturday, much as his teammates did after his errors at Leicester City a fortnight ago.

The Hornets keeper had a hand in both goals at the King Power Stadium prior to the international break, allowing a tame N'Golo Kanté shot to slip through his palms before fouling Jamie Vardy for what proved to be a decisive penalty.

However, the Brazilian was back to his best against United and looked to have earned the Golden Boys a point with a late save to force a corner.

But fate was to intervened and, from the resulting set piece, Louis van Gaal’s men forced a last-gasp winner as Deeney, hero after slamming home an 87th minute penalty to equalise, turned home Bastian Schweinsteiger’s low cut-back to make it 2-1.

Speaking afterwards, Gomes said: “He was disappointed with the goal. But I told him he’s a great player for us, he’s doing great things for us and he needs to carry on. I told him it’s not his fault. You cannot do much in a situation like that.

“We win together and we lose together.”

And Gomes felt the Hornets’ second-half display against the Red Devils showed they can do more than just avoid relegation this season.

Deeney went close on more than one occasion before finally dragging Watford level whilst Almen Abdi’s deflected effort forced a stunning save from David De Gea in the United goal.

“We need to stabilise in the Premier League first - that is the most important thing,” said Gomes. “But I believe we are not just in this league to avoid relegation.

“We can do more than that and that is what I’m here for and what the other players are here for. That is why we work so hard to be in this position.

He continued: “We need to keep this level and we can showed today we compete with Man United, one of the best teams in the league.

“They are so good on the ball but we were able to do very good things in the second. In the first half we respected them too much.”

The Hornets have given both Arsenal and Manchester United a scare at Vicarage Road before succumbing to defeat and Gomes insists Quique Sanchez Flores’ side have proved they can more than hold their own against the Premier League’s perceived ‘top four’.

He said: “We believed before the game we could compete at a high level. Maybe the game against Arsenal we just switched off for ten minutes and conceded three goals. But we played well in that game as well.

“Of course we need to try to continue like this to try to get points from big games as well.

“We were so close.”