ANTHONY McNamee is fast going to become Watford's "worst-kept secret" in the opinion of Ray Lewington.

Luton Town took preventative action to suppress the threat of the pint-sized winger on Tuesday night, and their manager, Joe Kinnear, questioned the player's productivity.

The Luton boss pointed out that none of the crosses cleared the near post.

"I would agree with that and they did quite well," said Lewington. "He is going to be the worst-kept secret. They showed him inside, which I would do if I was playing against him and that makes the crosses a little bit flatter.

"We have to work with him so that if he does come inside, he knows what to do then. That is part of his education."

General manager Terry Byrne has had emails and post criticising the club for not playing the winger from the start.

"He really is a baby and we have to do everything right to protect him," he said. "He is still growing and the fact he suffers with asthma has hindered him playing 90 minutes. It is still too soon to expect him to start and finish games at that level."

After Saturday's display in which the winger, who was 18 in July, turned the game on its head, Lewington said: "Macker is capable of doing that. He has the quickest feet ever and I thought the cross was magnificent because Smithy was the only prominent player in the box, and he picked him out superbly. I thought Tom finished it really well and showed good technique.

"But if you came and watched our reserve games, he finds the 90-minute physical side of the game a little too much. He is only a titch and he has asthma and has little problems with that. Strength-wise you lose him in games.

"I think he is best used as a substitute at the moment, while he is young, and he is hopefully growing bigger and stronger. He is better when the game is slowing down and we need someone to turn the game. He did it last year for Luca (Vialli), and today he has done it for us.

"He is a terrific little player and while his asthma will always be there, plenty of players have asthma. It is just that he is growing up that it is more of a problem than it would otherwise would be.

"It is the stamina side of the game that he has a problem with. You can use him by saying we need a goal, stay up there and don't worry about their full-back pushing on. We will take a gamble. He is a goal-hanger type.

"Once their full-back had seen how quick he is, they quickly pulled the full-back back in. It was a double purpose thing. They changed their system to a back four, which suited us because they were threatening to run over us."

September 13, 2002 12:00