Villa vs West Brom – When the weakest can be the strongest

January 10, 2009 by Martin Banks
Filed under: Aston Villa, Match Previews

0pic11 West Brom are bottom of the league, by rights that should mean they are the easiest team to beat. Vill are fourth in the league, so there are just 3 teams able to beat them and they will thrash the bottom team. Right?

Wrong.

This is football and one of the great joys of football is it’s unpredictability. Villa are the home team and unquestionably the better team in this morning’s match, but does that mean we’ll win? No, in fact if the players go into the match with that kind of attitude then we’ll probably lose. Cockiness doesn’t have a place in football (who said ‘Ronaldo’ then?), it can be your undoing. Villa need to take West Brom as a serious threat if we are to stand a chance of diffusing that threat.

It’s bloody complicated stuff, this football lark isn’t it?!

Statto time

West Brom come into the match off the back of 2 wins in 3 games and the one in between that they lost was to Chelsea so they can be let off for that. In other words, they are in fine form. But when we played them earlier in the season they were in fine form too, they won 3 games in four, just a loss to us sandwiched in the middle of a good run for Mowbray’s boys.

West Brom have never beaten us in the Premier League and they haven’t beaten us at Villa Park in a league game in my entire lifetime!

The stats make it look simple then. Bring it on.

Team News

Villa are still sweating on the fitness of a number of key players so it’s hard to know what selection or even formation will walk out today. Laursen, Cuellar and Barry are hoping to play but are all looking more likely not to. Luke Young is most likely back, so the back line will probably be Young – Knight – Davies – Shorey and then Reo-Coker will step in for Barry if he’s out, with O’Neill either making a 4-5-1 with Aggy alone or putting Young or Milner up there with him in a 4-4-2.

The Baggies are also likely to be short a number of players; Zuiverloon, Morrison, Teixeira and Meite are all unlikely, whilst Miller and Clement are definite no-no’s.

The player Merry-Go-Round

There will be three players playing against their old club today (if they get picked):

Scott Carson

Liverpool loaned us this ill-fortuned England keeper for a year then demanded £10m from us for his signature. MON wasn’t having any of that shit, so Carson ended up down the road in West Bromwich. He will almost definitely feature for the Baggies today and will be eager to show us that he can keep the ball out of the net.

Luke Moore

Luke and his brother were both touted as the boys of the future for Villa at one point, but in the end neither of them quite lived up to thier potential. Luke had a great run when MON first arrived, playing on the opposite wing to Gabby, but then he injured his shoulder and never managed to regain the form that had him in the team for the first few months. Eventually Moore gave up hope of getting back into the team he loves and moved a few junctions up the M6 to the Baggies. After a bad start for the Baggies, getting sent off, he struggled to get into their team but has recently found himself on the field and even opened his account for them. He will be desperate to get a start and then desperate to get a goal.

Curtis Davies

Davies initially came to us in loan from the Baggies, opting for the hope of top four success at Villa over the ‘Boing Boing’ ride that West Brom seem to have in and out of the Prem. Curtis had a very successful time at West Brom, making it to the captaincy at the tender age of 20. Davies still thinks fondly of his old club but won’t hesitate to head one past them if he gets a chance.