OxfordVillan

Smith isn’t going anywhere, and rightly so. He’ll be manager next season, whatever league we end up in, and there’ll be one or two tweaks in the background. Hopefully Suso and Terry move on, and Dean Smith has more of an input in replacements and transfers. UTV

Another twist with Pearson getting sacked. That makes Watford weaker in my opinion, a bit of turmoil to unsettle the squad. Fingers crossed that they come up against a chastised Man City team seeking to impress their manager once again. As long as they lose we go to the final game for a survival shootout. UTV

Fantastic result for us today, takes Bournemouth out of the equation. If Man City could now hand Watford a bit of a tanking we might only need one win from our next two to stay up. Fingers crossed. UTV

We’ll deservedly go down. Dean Smith and the coaching staff must take the blame for allowing their players to sit deep and allow chances to start raining in, they just stopped playing after taking the lead. The equaliser was so obviously coming that it’s painful, I simply can’t fathom why either the coaching staff or players keep doing it. To simply retreat into our own half is so stupid. We’re desperate for a Watford win at West Ham now, not that we’ll get anything from the Arsenal game. For me, we’ve just killed ourselves. Typical Villa

Where do we buy a goal from? Samatta just doesn’t remotely look like causing any sort of goal threat, it’s bewildering. We have to score, I think I’d go with Davis in place of Samatta for his better aggression and link play.

Lol. After all my defending him, he goes and puts in a pretty awful 1st half at Everton! Think we’ll have to get ElGhazi on in his place for this one.

The thing is, West Ham won’t be relaxed and on the beach if they beat Watford. Their following game is at Man Utd, who are going full tilt for top4. So the very real likelihood is that they’d need something from the final game against us. Best result for us is Watford win or draw, Watford win preferably for me. Two draws and a win at West Ham might then be enough, depending on what Bournemouth do. The best way is for Villa to win all three of our remaining games, do that and we stay up.

I certainly think Arsenal can be “got at” more than Everton. I’m certain we’ll see Coleman in the starting lineup for Everton, and he has the type of ability and character that can drag his teammates along with him. My prediction is we’re in for a really robust Everton opening 20mins or so, and we’ll really have to be prepared to start fast and aggressive ourselves to meet the challenge.

Nobody can have any criticisms about McGinn looking match rusty, off the pace. I think, though, we are entitled to raise concerns over his weight and conditioning. To me he looks like he has at least a stone of excess weight, and it’s not a particularly encouraging sign that he seems to have ballooned to the size he has. Excess weight obviously leads to more stress on the body. Just seems not very professional, I’m surprised that the club were not on top of this type of thing, monitoring the players closely.

The aim has to be midfield and defensive solidity at Everton, which to be fair has been mostly what we’ve seen from Villa since the restart. What we would do for a remotely in form centre forward, maybe Everton is the game that Samatta finds his wings? Keep a clean sheet and you’ve always got a chance of 3pts. Fingers crossed for another big performance from Douglas Luiz, he’s the man of the moment for Villa and we have to hope he retains his energy and fitness. If just one forward player could step up to Luiz’s level of performance we’d be looking so much better. As I say, though, keep it tight first and foremost.

Mike, I really hope our players don’t go into this fixture with the same mindset. We’ll get beaten if they do.

The fact we won a game is enough to take into the following fixture. Taking into account that our defensive preparation was severely compromised by injuries both before the game and then only a handful of minutes into the game, we done ok. Everton are without doubt a more dangerous opposition than Palace because they have more players capable of scoring goals. We’ll need to find our best performance yet to win the game. But it is winnable.

Not a chance you’ll see Luiz in the championship. Forget about that now would be my advice, save yourself getting disappointed

If we stay up ElGhazi becomes backup. I don’t think the lad has any sort of stomach for a fight whatsoever. A shame because he undoubtedly has technical ability.

There are going to be unexpected results, I’m sure. In my mind we have to win our final 3. I see Watford beating Arsenal, and I can now see a relieved ManCity being off their best as they now start to focus on Champions League and FA Cup. The dynamics seem to keep changing, even if only in the smallest of ways. The Watford/West Ham fixture is our one saving grace.

I’d prefer a Watford win or a draw in the West Ham game, it would put our destiny back into our own hands. A draw would be great. If we can squeak a win at Everton then it’s back in our own hands, I’d be delighted to go to WHU on the final day needing a win to save ourselves. There’d be immense pressure on WHU, what with them not knowing (apart from a win) what they might need, and with everything to lose. Villa would have everything to gain. However, that’s getting too far ahead of ourselves. We first need to get 3pts at Everton, and I think that is probably the biggest hurdle in our final 3 games.

Yep, we need to be ready for a fiery backlash, an Ancelotti team is not going to take a 3-0 gubbing and not respond. They undoubtedly have forward players that can hurt us, they have plenty of pace. We’ll need to put in a very solid, error free, defensive display. If we underestimate this game and think they’re on the beach we could easily lose by 2 or 3 goals. I think we need to look to shut them out and frustrate them for what’ll be a fast start from them. If they gain encouragement early on then we’re in trouble. Take the sting out of them in the opening half and look to build pressure thereafter. Given our problems in the striker department we have to look to 1-0 wins as our best hope.

You know, I think you’re onto something with this. Rodgers is someone that I’ve waxed lyrical about previously, and wanted us to get as Potato Heads replacement. But now I’m not so sure. Rodgers does seem to buy into his own hype, and that seems to be the starting point for his clubs slide. Given where Villa currently are (lots of changes in the background to youth football, likely heading back down a league etc) I’m more than content to get behind Dean Smith and allow him the time to oversee the big changes going on, I’d much rather the manager was a man with Villa in his blood and our very best interests at heart. To make yet another change, another step into the unknown, would just seem like another step backwards and another 2yrs wasted.

Dean Smith, like most of the players, has been learning on the job. Mistakes have been made and he hasn’t been beyond criticism from me. But what I have witnessed since the return from lockdown is evidence that he and they (the players) appear to have learnt from previous mistakes. They’re undoubtedly improved defensively, conceding far less chances in games than previously. The UTD game aside, nobody has looked like whipping us. What we continue to struggle with is quality up front, and that’s a personnel issue rather than a managerial issue. We should back Dean Smith in the same way that Burnley stood behind Dyche.

Dean is right and you are wrong. Dean has precedent to base his comments on, in both circumstances. Let’s start with the Grealish penalty; there was contact, not enough to warrant the swan dive that Grealish produced, but there was a contact of feet for which the referee awarded a penalty. It was no more a clear & obvious mistake than the Fernandes penalty awarded against us 3 nights ago, which didn’t get overruled. So Dean Smith can legitimately argue that was a decision that shouldn’t have been overturned, with PRECEDENT as evidence. Now let’s talk about the disallowed Palace goal for handball; let me remind you of our last game before lockdown, away at Leicester: a penalty was awarded against Tyrone Mings for handball, when he cleared a cross with his shoulder. VAR looked at it, replays showed that it was his shoulder, the penalty decision stood. The Palace “goal” yesterday was scored via almost exactly the same part of the shoulder. So once again Dean Smith has credible precedent to back up his comments. Dean Smith was correct with the comments he made, he is fighting Aston Villa’s corner in the face of some pretty poor decisions being made against the team. Every Villa fan should give him their support for doing so.

Trezeguet wouldn’t be such a bad option as back up, the ability to sneak goals at the back post isnt such a bad trait to have. He does work hard, no denying that. The team yesterday looked better in the absence of ElGhazi, if only he had the work rate and desire that Trez has!

I guess we’ll be playing Arsenal at as close to the best time as possible, hopefully just after they’ve been through an extra time FA Cup semifinal. Which hopefully they lose and will be on a downer. Fingers crossed. Small details could make all the difference in the relegation run-in. We’ve got 3 full days to prepare for the Everton game now, so hopefully everyone gets a day to rest today and then two full days of match preparation. It’s not going to be as easy as some people think, even if they have little to play for. We must look to improve on the Palace display and take at least the same level of desire into the Everton game, desire could be the defining difference between the teams. If we could somehow sneak a win then us fans (and the players) could actually relax the following day and watch Watford and West Ham scratch each other’s eyes out on Friday night. If we want our destiny back in our own hands then we have to hope for a draw or Watford win. We HAVE to win Everton game to put any sort of pressure on, though. One point really won’t cut it at this stage.

Deserves the plaudits for a match winning display, and that’s all people should be saying. Seems to be a lot of comments giving reluctant “well done, thx, but not good enough “. I really don’t know why some of us can’t just give praise without the snide comment bolted on. Lovely finish for the opening goal and a calm finish for the 2nd. Well done Trez, match winner.

Yep. 7pts has to be the minimum goal.

I thought Eddie Howe looked sheepish during post match interview. Odd. A bit like Leicesters 2nd half performance. Out of the ordinary.