JoshVilla

Yet again, a lesson in what happens when we don't take our chances (yeah.....like we really needed another one). I had a feeling that penalty miss was gonna bite us on the arse. That, Weimann tripping over himself while one on one with the keeper, Gabby's chance, all chances that would have maybe been converted had they been Everton's chances. The frustrating thing is that, yet again, I feel like we were playing so much better than the scoreline suggested. The first half was incredibly tight, and the second half was looking as though we were the favourites to get the first goal, but in the end, it just adds a bit more sting to the fact that there's only one statistic that matters at full time. Delph was MOTM again for me. Tonev did a lot better in the second half than he did in the first. As for Weimann, well, it's a massive shame. He was my favourite player last season due to his work rate and his decent scoring record, but he only really seems to be showing one of those so far. He appears to have lost his composure again. Everton are a better team than us and I can't say I expected us to win, but I certainly didn't expect another 2-0 loss at home. Onto the next one though. UTV

Interesting Line up. I would have probably swapped Sylla in place of KEA instead of Tonev, but it's obvious what Lambo's intentions are here. I do worry that the midfield will be over-run, so Gabby and Weimann are gonna have to drop back and help out rather a lot. There's a lot of nervous excitement about this.

10 points taken away from them now would be effing comedy gold. They don't have the quality to get those points back, and it'd whack them right at the bottom with 6 points needed just to move up to 23rd. They can say what they like about us, but the hard facts that they need to face are that we're an improving team in the top division whilst they're a rapidly declining 'team' that are grasping at very thin straws to stand a chance of staying in the championship. It's a shame that such an embarrassing club defaces the city's name. I must say though, debating with bluenoses is gradually becoming even more fun since they literally have no way of defending what they have any more.

Really not sure about how this will pan out. For me, Everton don't really have as much of a "fear factor" about them as other teams in the top half, regardless of the unbeaten run they had for a bit. Keeping Lukaku quiet will obviously be the main job, and this is the 2nd bloody time we'll have had to do that in fairly quick succession, with us playing Chelsea earlier on. Benteke will hopefully be back for the entire game which'll give us a better chance than Sunday, but I find it really difficult to predict how it'll pan out when we play Everton.

Strange game. I thought we had a much better first half than the scoreline suggested, and it did seem to have knocked the wind out of our sails. We had brief periods where we looked like something might happen but, as previously mentioned, there's only 1 thing that matters overall and that's who scored the most goals. Again, it's a matter of taking our chances. It was similar at Hull, where I felt like we maybe rushed our shots a little too much (Weimann especially). Sometimes I think our forwards have a bit more time than they think they do to just take a moment to steady themselves before shooting. Can't say I expected us to get something out of it, but onto the next one with fingers crossed!

I wish a mod would just delete all those silly posts. Ruining the thread. Agreed, the mods usually crack down on this sort of shit.

I think, given time, he'll become a solid player for us. I don't want to always use the "needs time to settle" card, but I think it's going to take him some time to bed into the Villa style. After seeing him for these 3 games, he seems a bit more of a "tap-in" striker than one who creates chances and space for himself, but I think that'll change. We play a more high-tempo running game that requires our attackers to be very mobile, and, because of the way Benteke moves and creates space for himself, we haven't really been used to using a goal hanger, so to speak. I just think it'll take a little time for Kozak to get used to our fast paced style of play, but once he does, he'll be some player. He's got the attributes to be a great centre forward and the coaches will no doubt work hard with him, as they have done with Benteke, to get the best out of him. I doubt he's gonna be Benteke 2, but I reckon he'll still prove a great striking option for us.

It's funny how, during the summer transfer window, this was the signing that I was the least excited about. It popped up pretty much out of the blue and didn't have quite as much hype surrounding it as the other deals. Now, Bacuna is probably one of the most exciting for me out of the new ones. What a difference some gametime makes!

Great to hear that he's back. I wonder if Lambo will start him next week or start Kozak and then bring the beast on if we're trailing? I guess it really depends on whether he gets any gametime during the week.

I struggle to see Spurs losing 2 on the bounce, and us being undefeated in 4 games is also quite a big ask, but as this season has shown so far, anything can happen. I can't help but think that we kind of have a bit of revenge to take after they put 4 past (albeit quite a different squad) us at Villa park in the cup. I think we'll put in a good performance, but I'm not sure which way it'll go. 2-1 either way

Bacuna's looked a lot more solid defensively so far this season, and it does make me wonder what's gonna happen with Lowton. He hit some fantastic form towards the end of last season, and he's capable of producing some brilliant crosses. I have a feeling Lambo will just keep pushing Bacuna back and forth from RB to RM depending on whether he decides to put Lowton back in or not. It'd be good to keep Bacuna at the back and push Lowton into midfield, but there's so much competition for midfield places already and there's no guarantee that it'd work out well. I'm a fan of Lowton and would love to see him hit form again and be back starting, but it's difficult to see at the moment.

Annoying that we failed to produce anything when Hodgson is on MOTD tonight. I was hoping Gabby would grab one to show him up a bit. Dull performance, but we were defensively pretty solid. Strange that I've just finished watching yet I seem to have forgotten most of it. A point's better than nothing I suppose. 3 wins, 3 losses, 1 draw, decent start.

Not a great bench, no real game changers there. Maybe Tonev if we're trailing and need someone to take some shots and perhaps Sylla if we're getting walked over. Hopefully we won't be in such a desperate situation though.

I'm in the "think he'll come good for us eventually" camp. I think the most frustrating thing with him at the moment is decision making. More often than not, when he attempts a long shot, there's always been a better option available, i.e. a good pass, and the shot ends up fizzling out the attack. Once he settles in a bit more then I'm sure that he'll know when to unleash one, as it seems at the moment that he's still finding his feet, playing in one of the most intense/difficult leagues in the world, so he's playing very 'panicky'. IMO, he had a much better game against Spurs in the Cup the other week. He produced an absolute peach of a cross and attempted a long strike at the perfect time and caught Friedel off guard. If someone was in the box in the right place then they could have possibly got on the rebound. Once he's had more game time and has settled/begun to relax a bit, I reckon he'll become a decent player for us.

Winning tomorrow will be a huge boost. That'd mean 3 wins on the bounce, 4 wins in total from 7 games. It'll take the sting away from a loss against Spurs (not guaranteed though, you never know!) and will have given us a rather good start to the season considering what we've had to face. Realistically, I think that around 13-16 points is do-able, which would put us on 22-25 points. That'd be a pretty healthy return and set us up nicely for December. There's some important (winnable) games around December/New Year so a good points tally before then would see us with a good shot at achieving that upper mid-table finish that we crave.

Hope he's back for tomorrow (only if it's risk-free of course, in terms of injury). He's the kind of player who will cause Hull a lot of problems with his pace.

Still haven't quite gotten over this win. I still have a smile on my face every time I think back to Saturday! It's not just the 3 points that were so important, but the statements it made. We won a game without Benteke and shut the doubters up, and it wasn't just any game either, it was facing Champions League and title contenders. Our entire squad costs a tiny fraction of what theirs does, so beating a side that is financially way ahead of us (and a side that rely on finance so much) through sheer hard work and determination is massive. City looked arrogant and complacent, as though this would be a walk in the park for them, yet Villa looked passionate about giving it 100%. You could see what it meant to our players when they scored. El Ahmadi runs to celebrate with the bench, Bacuna straight to Lambert, and Weimann with arms out wide infront of the Holte with a huge smile on his face. You can see how much it really means to them and just what a true team this is, not just a collection of expensive, overpaid players thrown onto the pitch. I love how, for once, the Midlands comes out on top over the 2 Manchester clubs that are always such media sweethearts and won't have a bad word said about them. Moments like this, no matter how few and far between wins against teams like this may be (although, you never know...), really emphasise what a club this is. We may not have the quality in the squad that the top 6 clubs have, but we have a hell of a lot of team spirit.

This'll most likely be a lot tougher than we expect. Playing these newly promoted teams infront of their home crowds can be tricky, as it'll most likely be packed out (though I haven't seen their home attendances so far so I could be wrong) and the fans will be very vocal and trying their best to make it a real fortress. Fortunately for us, our away form is what we seem to really thrive off, and surely (if we play in the usual formation) our front 3, even without Benteke, should be a bit much for them to handle. We'll need a solid defensive performance, but if we take our chances and play good counter-attacking football then we really should be winning this. I reckon 2/3-1 to Villa.

Thank feck for that. Yay Redskins!

TD! Go Skins!

Redskins have started to switch it on a little in that 2nd quarter. Praying that we pull this off, 0-4 would be balls

Defying the odds like this feels awesome doesn't it Everything was pointing towards a City win today, and being able to turn it around whilst missing 2 of our most important players is an achievement and a half. Proving wrong the doubters who thought that we'd be f**ked without Benteke (can't wait to have him back though) is just what we needed to do.

Didn't have the best of games overall, but an assist and a sublime free-kick kind of makes me forget about that. Makes me feel that he just needs to continue growing into the game like he's doing. There's something about him that's for sure, very happy for that lad!

Mourinho said after the match that the referee's decision was wrong and that he should be very "upset" with that. I wonder if he'll get fined.......