With Gareth Barry, that point would’ve been 3
Hey all, hope you’ve been well. You’re looking great! It’s been a long time since I’ve written on here; between having a young child, a pregnant wife, a foam business to run and no internet for a while, it’s been difficult to find the time to watch Villa, nevermind write about them.
But I’m back online now, so I figured I’d at least do one post, as there doesn’t seem to be much going on around here since i trapped into obscurity, which is a real shame as the site was really starting to grow and do well. If there’s anyone out there who is a fan of the site and(/or) wishes to become a writer, then get in touch. It has adverts now too so there’s earning possibilities I’m sure.
Back to the point
Anyway, back to the point at hand. I’ve dived straight in with a debate-ensuring title, knowing full well that some will not agree with it. I have received criticism in the past for titles and only trying to get newsnow traffic and blah-blah-f?@king blah. But, like it or not (and I really dislike it), you can only get readers from newsnow with controversial titles. If I’d called it ‘Aston Villa 1 – 1 Tottenham’ would you have clicked? Plus this site hasn’t exactly got any loyal following anymore, due to lack of content to loyally follow.
I honestly do believe it though. If not exactly, at least in sentiment. We lack a player in the middle who is inventive and creative going forward. Yeah, Barry had his haters by the bucketload after the Liverpool saga (and then that bucketload multiplied by a Brazilian when he chose to move to Man City) but whether you want to admit it or not, he was an ESSENTIAL part of our team and our success. Had his heart still been with the club, do you really think he would’ve allowed that slide in the second half of last season? he was probably glad of that slide in the back of his mind because he’d agreed to stay if we made the Champions League. (The dillweed then went and joined a non-CL team in the end though, surely knowing he would be accused of money-grabbing.)
But I’m not just talking about Barry. We need SOMEONE of quality. We NEED a playmaker in the middle of the park who dominates the game and gives us someone to look for when going forward, not just whacking it for Young, Milner or Agbon to chase down.
Reo-Coker is not focused (thanks to not getting on with the boss) and Sidwell has never recovered the form and confidence that made him such a star at Reading. I’m sure all the Anti-O’Neill brigade will (and may well have every right to) blame him, but then if either of those had stepped up then everyone would be calling him a hero for seeing they could take on the role.
Didn’t happen though, so we find ourselves playing the ugly ‘whack it and hope’ game that I’m not a fan of.
Passing
Towards the end of the game against Tottenham, ESPN put up a completed passes statistic; Villa had 170 and Spurs had nearly 2½ times that figure! They played the type of football (ironically) that I love to watch. They passed it around. They dinked it about creatively. They beat players and looked for an option and then played that option, often ALONG THE FLOOR (a concept lost on us!). They built their attacks, instead of countering with pace and very little else (short of booting it and running like hell). In all honesty, I can’t believe we held on to a point. And, we came within a whisker of nicking it with another Heskey header, which would’ve been very welcome to me, but totally undeserved.
So what now?
I am all for trying Milner in the middle, I dunno about you lot. If not with Downing on the opposite wing to Young, then why not Albrighton? I’ll tell you why not; it’s too big a risk for our manager to take. But it’s pretty obvious to anyone that we are not ruling the games in the middle. Petrov is doing his role well, but he needs someone with him who he can feed with short, sharp passes and then that man will take us forward to attack. We shouldn’t be having our attacking players receiving the ball from the defenders as the general rule.
Now we have given 5th away as cheaply as we gave away 4th
Gareth Southgate - Was a great player but he's not management material
A draw to Middlesbrough. It’s one step better than the loss to them we suffered earlier in the season but it’s still a humbling experience for a team that was dreaming of being 4th right now and preparing for the Champions League. We have been well and truly brought down to earth us Villans have and allowing Middlesbrough to score more than 10% of their goals for the entire season against us is poor. Especially when you remember that we are a bogey team for them at the Riverside; since 2000 we have recorded two 4-0’s, a 3-0 and a 5-2 win there, amongst others.
We were out of shape from the off, thanks to a recurrence of Luke Young’s toe injury and James Milner was placed at right back, so we never really got the game by the scruff of the neck and actually played very scrappily. Just look at Carew’s goal (highlights video below), it was just a scrap, with us trying anything to get the ball goalwards and Boro defending very poorly, looking very much like a team that are going down.
We now have one game left in which to try and regain 5th and ensure that this season sees us improve our league position for a 3rd year running. But we are now relying on Everton to drop points at Fulham and for us to win against a Newcastle side that will be relegated unless they win, so will be fighting fiercely. We haven’t shown anything recently that makes me think we can withstand Newcastle’s final throw of the dice, so I fear that we are destined for another 6th placed finish.
Yeah, I’m being down on the Villa today, I won’t lie, and I think ‘we’ (you can decide who or what has caused it) have thrown away a golden opportunity of 4th or at least 5th. Now, had you said to me at the start of the season; ‘Would you take a season of staying 6th?’ I might’ve said ok, but after how high we flew and how uncermoniously we have bent over and took a shafting, I feel aggrieved. But then, when has being a Villa fan been anything but this?! (As I said, I’m feeling down on them today)
Anyway, here are the highlights of the game for those masochists who want to relive it:
John Carew wins the ‘Ashley Young Trophy’
[This was written yesterday, but I've been ill so didn't end up finishing it. That's why it says 'last night' for something that was the night before. I'm much better now, thanks for asking but my head is throbbing now, so I guess I'll go pop a few pills... feel sorry for me 
]
As you should all be aware, Villa finally won a game last night. It’s been a long time coming and it feels weird, like a long lost emotion, but we have 3 points, we’re back 5th and we have secured a Europa League spot for next season.
Villa took the game to Hull, with Milner looking especially keen to get on the scoresheet, but the only goal of the game came from an Ashley Young cross and a John Carew touch that made sure it eluded Myhill. Carew ran straight to Young and celebrated by picking him up and holding him aloft, as if he was the FA Cup! It was hilarious to see the big man lift Young with such ease. Celebration of the season, I reckon.
The game
It was the battle of the out of form teams, who’d both been punching above their weight at earlier times in the season. Villa had been 4th until this bad run began and even flirted with 3rd and Hull had been 3rd near the start of the season and remained in the top half for a good while before their plummet. But Villa won the game and regained 5th off Everton, who’d jumped in while we waited for our game to roll around, and Hull’s freefall continues as they stay just 3 points off the drop zone and still have Man Utd to play in their last 3 games.
Villa put a lot of pressure on, but Hull also had a decent go at us, particularly in the last quarter of the game. The one goal cushion looked very shaky for the last 10 minutes as Villa’s goalmouth was pummelled by a desperate Hull. Were it not for some great saves by Friedel, they could’ve got a point, but the old guy had a great game and kept a well deserved clean sheet.
Villa’s problematic position of centre-backs saw Knight and Davies play, but neither of them seem able to play well unless they have Laursen alongside them. Last night they were average. Not great but not as poor as they have been in some previous games.
Young and Milner prowled on the wings and both looked eager, Milner especially was trying a lot of belters. None went in, but I do like to see players having a pop, so he’s in my good books today.
It wasn’t Villa’s most convincing performance of the season but the important thing was that we got back to winning ways. Now we need to carry it on for the remainder of the season. Three more wins will secure us 5th place and that is an improvement on last season. If we slip up and finish 6th, it will be debatable amongst Villa fans whether to be proud of the team. We won’t have upped a position and we also threw 4th away so shockingly. I know what tough expectations many Villa fans set the team against.
What we’ve learnt is that we don’t have the squad to finish top four and that we don’t have the squad for a good Europa League attempt, so unless some spending takes place over the summer we will not be able to see an improvement next season.
Back once again for the Rengade Master; Young, There’s only Juan Pablo Angel and Bolton game
Hi all, sorry for taking a few days off, I’m back now and there’s plenty of Villa fluff around the internet that is worth a mention.
First off, Ashley Young has been crowned PFA Young Player Of The Year, which some may see as a bit of a shock as we have been off form of late and so has he. But the PFA Awards are actually decided around February-ish from what I hear and that would make perfect sense as up till then he was flying high and playing superb. There may be some detractors around who aren’t convinced he deserves the award but I am a big fan of the boy and though he may be in a bit of a lull, I believe he will come back and be great some more for us (that’s if he doesn’t trap to Chelsea).
Next up, our old friend Juan Pablo Angel has popped up on the Villa site talking of his delight for our recent success (y’know, back when we were winning games and in the top four). Angel says he still has a lot of love for Villa and has been watching us maintain a top five position with joy. It lead me to thinking;
How would Angel fit into the current Villa set up?
I began imagining a 4-5-1 with Barry, Milner and Young supplying the South American with some tasty balls… and I couldn’t help but like the thought. He could get on the end of the crosses from our wingers and also get hold of through balls from Barry and Petrov. Maybe I’m glorifying him in his absence; remembering the good seasons and forgetting the bad.
Finally, the Bolton game. It wasn’t great was it? We played ok. I won’t give them any more praise than that but I won’t be any harder on them than that either. We created chances but not in the abundance we often do. We scored what can only really be described as a fluke goal and we conceded another cack goal.
Cuellar’s marking is very poor and I hold it to blame for the goal and the dropped 2 points. Harsh maybe, but man-marking is the first lesson you learn when you are 6 and you say to the PE teacher that you want to play in defence. So with an £8m international centre back it should come as part of the package surely. Cohen was left entirely free in the box on the free kick, and as bad luck had it for us the ball fell to him. Maybe it’s not all on Cuellar, but as the senior centre half he really should be either marking loose men or organising the boys to get it done.
All in all, things still are in a lull for Villa but we are now unbeaten in 3 games, which is certainly an improvement after the 4 game losing streak. The ‘easy’ run-in we had doesn’t look so likely to help us beat Arsenal to 4th now does it? But as long the Gunners only gain1 point from their last 4 games and we win all of ours then 4th is ours. Easy.
Heskey answers his critics, as our defence continues to disappoint
Emile Heskey scored the goal that almost won the game for us, but our inability to find the net again and the continuing defensive disappointments meant we allowed West Ham in for an equaliser. So still victory eludes us, now having taken just 3 points from the last 24.
The goal came from a lovely passing movement between Petrov, Milner and Heskey, with the big man giving us exactly what we want from him but have received so little of; goalscoring instinct. When we signed Heskey there was some diappointment amongst fans as scoring isn’t a huge part of his game and it was plain to everyone that that was what we needed. The creating of chances we already had in abundance. Is this a sign of things to come from Heskey? More killer instinct? Not judging on the way he hashed a chance early in the second half that Carew had done superbly to set up for him.
Much like in a lot of this season; we dominated this game, creating dozens of chances, but failing to score as many as would expected and then, much like the last 2 months; our defence had some poor moments and we let in a silly goal. This last month I have sometimes wondered if we’d be better off playing 3-5-2. Just have one central defender because we know full well they will concede anyway and then we get to have another midfielder to help us attack and score more and maybe win some games.
Obviously it’s a pipe-dream and not a sensible one at that, but it’s a testament to the lack of confidence in our centre backs, when I’m thinking “Screw it, let’s just admit that we’ll concede and try to score more than we let in”. If Brad Friedel can play that well every week it may even work. The old guy was superb against West Ham, especially towards the end when the Hammers came alive and almost stole the points.
You HAVE to take your chances…
…especially at Old Trafford.
Villa created more chances than Man Utd yesterday but failed to convert as many into goals. Which adds up to a loss.
The way that we lost was heart-breaking, made even more so by the fact that half of my family are from Stretford and are therefore (bona-fide) Man U fans, and they gave me loads of stick.
But… (and it’s a big but)
I was proud of the way our boys bounced back.
We are in the middle of a disastrous losing streak and this was the first game since our scalping, but we came out and played great. We played the way we played that got us 4th. We made many chances. We attacked fiercely and were excellent in midfield.
And we didn’t even drop our heads when we went one-down either.
We rallied and through perseverance and determination and teamwork we got ourselves in front. Not many teams can go behind at Old Trafford and then go on to win the game. If the game had been 80 minutes long then we would’ve.
In fact, if the game had been 90 minutes long we’d have surely got something.
My dad said to me after Ronaldo equalised “You watch now, the ref will allow an hour of injury time so that Man U can win”. And whilst an hour is obviously an exaggeration;
Where did FIVE minutes come from?
Five minutes of injury time usually occurs when someone gets seriously injured and has to be stretchered off. It seemed unjust to me. I’m not the type to claim ‘cheating’, but I’d be interested to know how it was made up.
But I won’t spend too long being down because our boys did us proud. Now we have to take that performance to the last games of the season because that would get us plenty of wins. Fingers crossed Arsenal slip up, but I’m far from expecting it, I’m more interested in Everton results now.
Or maybe we’ll get thrashed 5-0 (plus Fabio Capello’s Villans)
Yesterday was the first game of the season I haven’t watched (I took my dear old mom out for Mother’s Day) and I think I’m actually glad I missed it! Now I normally will re-arrange almost anything to make time to watch the boys (me and the wife even planned the date of our wedding around football fixtures!) but my brother booked the table and I could hardly say “Nah mom, I won’t be there cuz I wanna watch my crap-form team in a game they’ll most likely lose”. So I had my mates get on the text-case to keep me updated with the game. My battery almost died from the amount of dismal texts I got!
On top of the game sucking, the restaurant was freaking boiling and my little daughter cried almost the entire time, so all in all yesterday afternoon sucked big time! I’ve been told by my wife enough times that my mood is too heavily affected by Aston Villa, but a long face at a Mother’s Day meal was maybe a bridge too far! Oops. Sorry Mom.
I watched the highlights (make that lowlights) on MOTD and it looked like we gave a fair push in the first half but let ourselves down with poor mistakes; Nigel Reo-Coker being the main culprit. I was actually hoping he’d get a start, but not at right back. I was delighted to hear Carew got a start and it looks like he posed the most threat and will hopefully now start more. But I would’ve preferred to see him alone up top with NRC in a 5-man midfield. Surely MON knows that Liverpool are excellent in the middle and the only way we could even try to match them would be to outnumber them. Obviously not.
Heads down
We got thumped. We know. I’m sure that during the course of the day I will be reminded many times of this fact too. And now we go to Old Trafford with our heads well and truly down. The only comfort we can take there is that they are off form too. But before that…
Fabio Capello’s Villans
As would be expected, the England squad for the upcoming games is low on Villa players. With 6-7 of them having got in contention during Capello’s reign, he now overlooks almost all of them… and I can’t say I blame him. There’s no point taking players who are very low on confidence. Unfortunately it will only serve to kick them while they’re down, but Capello isn’t an Aston Villa motivational speaker, he’s an England manager.
Gareth Barry is in the squad which I fully agree with and right now he must be thinking that he can’t wait to get out of the Midlands. It will get better for Villa again Bazza, it may not be the next game but after that I expect normal service to be resumed. It won’t make any difference though, he’s as good as gone in my opinion. Only time will tell but I believe he’ll be a Liverpool player not long after the window opens.
The surprise in the England squad is Emile Heskey. Most Villa fans can’t see why he still gets in the Villa team, never mind play for his country. But I suppose, as I’ve said, it’s not that I think Heskey isn’t a good player, he just doesn’t fit into the Villa team. Maybe Capello has a plan to utilise his potential better than we do.
Heads up
But try to take defeat graciously Villa fans, this glitch won’t last forever. And even if we end up 5th it’s still a step forward from last season. Even 6th wouldn’t be a step backwards, though it will definitely feel like one after flying so high at points.
So heads up Villans, we have achieved a lot to be able to disappointed at being 5th.
MISSING: Nationwide search now on – Has anyone seen Aston Villa’s confidence?
If found please return to the 11 men in Aston with their heads down
For a team built on danger, last night we didn’t even look capable of scaring my cat (my cat is a great big fanny btw, a proper little chicken s**t). We spent the majority of the first hour whaling the ball upfield like a Sunday morning pub team, and almost everytime it was won by a blue head anyway.
Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t encourage the long ball game, but if it will help us through a few games and get us wins when we are having a rocky period then OK, I’ll take it. So surely this is a big part of why we bought Heskey; to win the header and bring it down for someone like Gabby to run onto. Did he do that even once last night? I can’t think of an occasion. So we ended up playing ‘poor long ball football’, one of the ugliest styles of football there is!
So with our back up plan failing and our usual game stifled, Villa looked seriously low on confidence pretty soon into the game. The goal reinforced our dropped heads and for the next 45 minutes we played very bluntly. We didn’t cave and let City in all that much, to our credit, but we also didn’t look sharp or likely to score. A lot of the game took part in the middle of the park, with us giving the ball away cheaply far too much.
When we reached the hour mark, our midfield perked up, beginning to pass the ball (and actually reach the intended target at last) taking control of the game, and for the last half hour we dominated the game. But for all that domination, we never really looked like we were going to score unless a chunk of luck came our way.
Our defence looked pretty shaky, particularly on the counter and we relied on Brad Friedel a few times, then when Milner went to right back I feared the worst, but the midfield mostly held the ball away from the defence (excepting the second goal of course).
Yet again Ashley Young was wasting surges with crosses that went to no-one, Aggy was very inneffective and Heskey did very little of beneficial consequence. Carew came on in the second half for Curtis Davies which helped to pluck us up and, if we had the fabled-goal-poacher I keep harping on about, we could’ve at very least got a draw last night. But no-one on the pitch seemed all that likely to put the ball over the line.
Another disappointing result in a very poor few weeks for Villa. We all knew a rocky patch was going to come, but we all hoped it wouldn’t last this long, or come right before a tough string of fixtures. Both have happened. Should we panic now?
Villa 2-2 Stoke City – Why Villa didn’t beat Stoke
GGGGGRRRRRRRRR
2-a-piece. Nobody saw that coming.
With 3 minutes to go we were 2-0 up, heading for victory and an 8 point safety net in the top four. We sat back and put it into cruise control and got punished. This season Stoke have snatched a win and a draw from our clutches in injury time.
So what was the problem?
The big problem for Villa is one that has been ringing round the club for a long time, and inspired so much speculation in the run up to January, linking us with just about every striker in the game; we don’t score enough.
You’d think that being the 5th top scorers in the league and averaging more than 1.5 goals per game might be enough, but if there was a tally of the amount of attacks we have had, you’d see how many opportunities we fail to convert.
For the vast majority of the game the ball was in Stoke’s half and we didn’t make it count enough.
Ashley Young is constantly getting down the wing and putting in crosses, but we aren’t very good in the air in the box. Really he should either cut inside more or play the ball along the floor. Very few of our goals actually come from crosses.
What we need is a poacher. Now, I like Heskey, don’t get me wrong, but we need a Ruud Van Nistelrooy/Michael Owen type. Someone who does very little else but score. Or a great headerer of the ball, like err….. can’t think of one right now. Comment with a good headerer 
Oh and next time we play Stoke, can someone make our team aware that football games last 90 minutes please!
CSKA Moscow 2-0 Aston Villa – Out but not down
We lost. That’s the short story.
We went to Moscow with a team that was likely to lose and they did. That’s the medium story.
But look a little deeper and you find a game with a number of youngsters who did themselves proud. I’m talking mainly about the three 19 year olds; Albrighton, Bannan and Delfouneso. These are young lads, still largely untested (the Fonz a little less so) and they suddenly found themselves thrown in at the deep end… and they swam, with competence.
Performances
Albrighton and Bannan played wide midfield roles, areas which are well secured in the first team for the time being, but they both made good impressions last night and will no doubt be pushing their way into contention more and more if they keep getting experience such as this.
Delfouneso found it hard up top on his Todd Terry, but he worked hard and showed once again that he has natural talent and just needs a little more experience to follow in Gabby’s path.
Salifou and Sidwell in the middle of the park were average. Not crap, but certainly not great.
Gardner, as ever, gave his all and had a good chance which he brought down superbly, but hit straight to the keeper.
The defence was as full strength as we had available and they put on a solid display.
Harewood and Isiah Osbourne both came on as subs but neither made a real impact on the game and this proved to be where MON needed to have Barry, Young and Gabby on the bench. At 1-down, those boys could well have swung the game in our favour (not having these available is my gripe with O’Neill controversial plan).
The ‘B-team’ played much better than in some of the previous games and in some ways I admire O’Neill’s balls to put out such a side. The short story has to kick back in there though; ballsy, experimental and superb experience it may have been for some, but we lost and are out of Europe. The dream we chased last season is over. Forfeited to chase a new, bigger dream, so now the pressure is on.
Many Villa fans are miffed about the way in which we ‘conceded’ exit, but what we all need to do is unite and back the team / manager and be delighted that we have raised our standards. We have gone from Intertoto-chasers to Champions-League-chasers. Lets put aside an feelings of anger and get loud and supportive for the run in.
-
Categories
-
Archives
-
Links
-
Meta
-
Sponsors
