Million Manhoef's brace helped Stoke return to winning ways with a comfortable victory at home to Watford.

Manhoef opened the scoring in the 28th minute, finishing calmly after Milan Smit teed him up perfectly.

The winger doubled Stoke's lead in the second half, firing a powerful effort past keeper Egil Selvik following a counter-attack.

Nestory Irankunda briefly gave Watford hope with a fierce strike from the right, but Sam Gallagher sealed Stoke's win soon afterwards with a composed late finish.

Watford boss Ed Still called their midweek draw at already relegated Sheffield Wednesday a "really disappointing" result - and his side failed to make amends for Tuesday's performance.

In the opening 10 minutes, Stoke had more than 90% possession, but before Manhoef's first goal, Tom Ince had two big chances to give the visitors the lead, firing straight at Selvik on both occasions.

Manhoef had already created problems for Watford on the flank before his craftmanship was rewarded when he nestled the ball into the top left of the net following a nice touch from fellow forward Smit.

After the break, Watford had a series of corners and Manchester City loanee Stephen Mfuni came closest to scoring, sending a free header wide just before the hour mark.

Manhoef's second arrived at a critical time, in the 77th minute, and was a gut punch for Watford, who had territory high up the pitch in the build-up.

Tomas Rigo found the Dutchman on the right side of the box and Manhoef drove a right-footed finish beyond Selvik, who saved his initial effort.

Irankunda responded on 81 minutes for the Hornets, producing a fine solo dribble and sending a thunderous strike into the top corner to reduce the deficit.

But Gallagher restored Stoke's two-goal cushion just four minutes later, cutting inside his marker before firing into the far corner to seals the Potters' first win in four matches.

Stoke City manager Mark Robins told BBC Radio Stoke:

"Honestly, I think the game was a tough game. It's a transition game, wasn't it? Because that's how they play.

"They're the best in the division by data, and you can see why. You give the ball away, you commit bodies forward, they leave people up.

"If you don't get the quality or the connection or the goal, then they're a threat on the counter-attack. So we found that really difficult to deal with and gave up some chances early on in the game.

"But when we were good and we were good in possession and calm, we created our own opportunities."

Watford head coach Ed Still told BBC Three Counties Radio:

"Gutted because there's a little bit of the same feeling as there was after the Sheffield Wednesday game earlier this week, where we've started the game and had at least three huge opportunities there and come into the zones where we wanted to be, pulled the ball back to the zones we wanted to bring it back to.

"At this level, at any level, you need to be taking those chances to be one or two ahead, and then the dynamic of the game changes completely.

"You put the opposition on the back foot, you're able to set up and manage the game completely differently.

"Then also we've come out early in the second half and had another couple of really, really good chances - not just situations, but actually real chances, which we haven't taken."