VillaJay

What Ollie lacks in technique and composure he makes up for in spades with hard work. He's hugely important to this team and I get the frustrations with his inconsistent dribbling and first touch but we still have a way to go before we as a team outgrow Ollie.

I'd back him to score 20+ in all comps this season.

I'm a naturally cautious villa fan, even when we're a few goals up I'm never usually at ease.

Under Unai though, I've got complete confidence in him and how he sets out our team, going into today's game I expected us to win comfortably and we did.

I've always liked Brian Little and John Gregory, some of my fav villa managers, but Unai is on a completely different level.

He has overseen a huge infrastructural change off the pitch and the style of play he has imparted on this team in such a short space of time is incredible.

An absolute don and a gentleman too.

Interesting to see a small minority of Newcastle fans starting to question Bruno G's form over the last 9 months, Dougie just going from strength to strength and felt confident in him on the pen today.

Top top player who can do it all.

He's an important cog, even if he's not as strong defensively as Ty, it hopefully shouldn't matter as much if we can dominate the ball more and build from the back similarly to Man City, who have had a huge array of centre halves under Pep who look average defensively but strong in posession.

Very comfortable on the ball and had very little to do, Everton never really pressed us today.

Hard to judge too much today, was a little lax at the end of first half for Danja chance.

Played very well and he's a very good footballer, with top technical ability. I still don't think he's suited to how we want to play though, Moreno has that ability to beat a man and cut back from the byline, similar to the Bailey assist today, Digne is better suited to a team with a strong Target man.

Get him out to Mallorca robbing speedboats every week!

I expect us to win this comfortably, we're a much better side than them and this is a game we should be winning. No excuses for the players today.

What a window so far, injuries take a little gloss off it, but have we ever signed so many established players in one window before? All playing in or have played in Europe very recently.

Acuna and another RB/FW and we couldn't have asked for much more.

2 minutes ago, Steero113 said:

This is a staggeringly amazing look. 

Rocking up to your new club with a bin bag with some boots, t shirt and toothbrush. 

What a fella. 

 

Looks like he's just coming back from a night out raving in the 90s!

5 minutes ago, GeordieVillan said:

I’m staggered people think we don’t need another centre back (in general rather than Maguire specifically). We currently have -

Konsa who is proven, although the general consensus seems to be that he needs Mings alongside him to be effective.

Torres who is potentially excellent, and I thought looked good against Newcastle, but who knows if he will settle and how good he will be in the Prem.

Carlos who again, might be great, but we don’t really know, and we don’t know how badly his injury has affected the player we signed a year ago.

Chambers who is back up at best and I don’t think we can consider a starter.

Dendonker as a last resort ok, but we can’t rely on him to play every week at centre half surely.

Before Mings injury, I don’t think we were “stacked”, we had a solid proven partnership with two potentially very good players as back up.

We need proven premier league experience alongside Konsa IMO.

I hope I’m wrong and Torres and/or Carlos tear it up, but even if that’s the case, one injury to either of those or Konsa and we are basically down to bare bones at centre half.

Maguire was a suggestion as he ticks a lot of boxes, is proven in the league and has played at the highest level. Granted though, he may not fit the system of playing the high line.
 

There must be other options though.

We've invested heavily in our centre backs for this very reason, it's time for them to step up or be given the chance to step up. We've got 2 CL level centre halves waiting to play.

We've got other areas of the team that need that sort of depth as a priority.

Digne is a good player, just doesn't have the athleticism needed for Unai.

If Unai wants him, I'd trust in that and to be honest it wouldn't take much to improve on Digne in this setup.

I'd guess we are or were waiting on some of our top targets, it really is like Domino's, clubs won't let someone leave until they get their replacement or players waiting on cl level clubs before committing etc.,

Could see a loan obligation deal for Ferran Torres or Felix on loan being a possibility.

Just now, Adam2003 said:

To be fair Kiwi, while I am no expert on this lad, I don’t think anyone else was particularly trying to sign Emi Martinez, Ollie Watkins, John McGinn (other than Celtic in the same league I guess), Tyrone Mings, Ezri Konsa, Matty Cash or Douglas Luiz from what I remember…

Agreed, and Zaniolo is a world cup winner and his potential is huge, if it works out for us, he's a very exciting player and the only way we can sign players of that quality, rough diamonds with huge potential.

Zaniolo would be the most exciting signing for me, and offers something very different to Ollie. I think Emery will see him as a flexible forward option.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/08/15/aston-villa-verge-signing-nicolo-zaniolo-marcos-acuna/

Percy confirming Zaniolo and possibly Acuna with Digne going to Saudi.

A player Newcastle were very interested in too, before they got Gordon.

On loan, this would be a clever pickup, hopefully Zaniolo too, who can play further forward.

1 in 5 in the pl from left wing, hard working and quick. Add Zaniolo in too and this would be a good loan deal.

55 minutes ago, Random Precision said:

 

 

Worth a read re UE’s tactical style.

Arsenal fan with a bias against Emery, wouldn't read too much into his thoughts, plenty of contradiction in his own posts.

Freak result yesterday, very reminiscent of our 7-2 against Liverpool.

We caused them problems and at 2-1 it genuinely could have gone either way, we deserved to lose but I expect we will be back on it next week.

Looks to be an opportune time to start him alongside Pau, and break up the Mings/Konsa partnership due to the unfortunate injury to Ty, and drop Ezri to third choice. We most likely would have persisted with that partnership for quite a while and rightly so due to their form last season.

Bring Moreno back in and suddenly we look a whole different proposition in our build up play.

One game. Terrible result, but it really was a game of moments, in the end we deserved to lose, 5-1 flattered them, we crumbled but signs were there that we can score goals.

Defensively and tactically though today was a real off day.

Win the next 2 and the mood changes hugely, Newcastle are a good side and as strong as anyone at home in this league, but this felt a little like a freak result like the Liverpool 7-2 game.

1 minute ago, Villatillidie95 said:

newcastle have man city and liverpool next, we have everton and burnley....perhaps we can be above them in a couple of games time

We will be. Bad day at the office, but hysteria is over the top, awful game but we're better than that scoreline.

close this thread.

Been battered but could and should have scored at least 2/3 goals.

Most teams will go here this season and lose, no need to lose the heads over one game.