Ratings and Reactions: Villa 0-2 Everton

[romavillan]

I didn't get much of view of the McCarthy challenge - should he have gone?

late and with studs showing, a lot of refs would have shown a red but the ref was very lenient today, that challenge was the first yellow card he gave in the match.

 

Should have left Baker at CB - thought he had lukaku in his pocket

100%.

 

clark at left back then? or do you play bacuna there and bring lowton on or something?

[PaulC]

When you miss three great chances early on there's likely to only be one result. I thought Howard was taking the piss with the amount he moved before Benteke took his penalty, but Benteke needs to be smarter than that. Mcarthy should have been sent off for that foul on Westwood.  A return or one goal for the season between Weimann and Agbonlahor is clearly not good enough but who do we replace them with. Helenius or Kozak. Sorry but that isn't really giving us options. Last season we had Nzog and Bent as competition! Lets hope we get Nzog back soon because although he's frustrating he does make things happen on the ball. I just hope he's not another player Lambert wants rid of.

[Thrice]

Red Bull Villa sounds OK right now 

 

That would never ever sound OK.. Would rather see our club go bankrupt and disapperar in to thin air.

I think we were unlucky to not score atleast one or two in the first half. I we did, it would change the whole game. We were the better team until they scored in my opinion. Evertons squad is so much better than ours so while I do understand the dissapointment, I think some people are having unrealistic expectations considering the weak squad we have.

[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

[Harry]

Very very disappointed with today. We out played them in the first half and got mugged twice in the second half.

 

All Everton did was convert their chances while we morphed into our spineless mode. Midfield remains a mess allied with one woefully out of form striker in Weimann, Gabby doing his best headless chicken imitation and Benteke clearly not fully match fit whilst trying to do too much. In terms of the players:

 

Good: Delph, Vlaar, Baker (in the middle), Bacuna Guzan and Tonev

 

Average: Beneteke, Luna until he went off.

 

Better but still poor: Westwood

 

Bad: Clark - not sure he good enough and what was with the shouting at everyone? Gabby who ran round in circles.

 

Hopeless: Weimann - needs to be dropped.

 

 

As for the next game I would rather see a 4-4-2 with Lowton back at RB and Bacuna on the right with Weimann dropped. Delph and Sylla in the middle and Tonev on the left (?) with Benteke and Kosak / Gabby partnering him.

 

Just glad I am having a few beers tonight.

[Rugeley Villa]

by the time they had their first chance we should of been out of sight, first half we were good second half we were shit, I loved it when everton were 1 nil up and we were playing like we were 1 nil up by sitting back, absolutely have no plan b, had a good laugh in the pub before and after game though so all aint that bad,

[AVFCAM]

For 60 odd minutes, we were by far th better side. 2 'Villa' moments cost us, which was a shame, the defence were brilliant in the main.

Howard penalty save excellent. Guzan excellent (although beaten on the near post twice...due wrong footing).

Delph MoTM again, by a huge distance. Tonev looked better. Wiemann low on confidence. Westwood was very poor.

Honestly not sure what Helenius does, wasn't on for long by didn't jump once...one of the tallest players on the pitch.

If we can pull out a performance like that consistently, ten ok, but if we just fall back to shit and lose again next week we are in trouble.

[AVTuco]

Voted for Delph, but other than him difficult to say who did better than others, I thought they were pretty even.

Poor performance by Benteke, hope he is ok next week.

Luna was also poor, as was Baker especially after switching to Luna's place.

Tonev was funny a couple times, flying up in the air when beng tackled. He made some good plays too, I'll give him that.

And Helenius, who I've wanted to be given a chance, didn't do anything.

Edited October 26, 2013 by AVTuco

[AntrimBlack]

First half was tight, thought we shaded it. Second half we were the better side until they scored, then as usual we looked clueless.

We could have won it with the chances we had. Our strikers let us down badly. Weimann was awful, Agbonlahor was even worse, Benteke was poor.

And unfortunately these look to be the best we have.

Hopefully Benteke was only rusty, but how long will we have to wait for Weimann to get his form back.

And must we wait for two thirds of every season for Agbonlahor to find his form.

Delph my man of the match, thought Vlaar and Bacuna also were good.

Westwood showing improvement, Tonev shows glimpses of something.

 

Good run of games coming up, no excuses, need to pick up points from them.

[Rugeley Villa]

Anyone wanting a ticket for Cardiff please PM me, £15 K1 Upper Holte Wings , can't be watching that again rather do something productive with my weekend instead, same old same old week after week.

don't be daft, I know it seems bad at the moment but were better than last season just about,

[whitsend]

Anyone wanting a ticket for Cardiff please PM me, £15 K1 Upper Holte Wings , can't be watching that again rather do something productive with my weekend instead, same old same old week after week.

You'll be back just like the rest of us.

[supernova26]

Shiit. I'm going to tick to watching Dortmund from now on.

 

BVB!!

[Rugeley Villa]

we were so much better today than we were against spurs, at least we looked like scoring 3 or  4 goals, but lets face facts played 5 at home and lost 4

[Rugeley Villa]

Shiit. I'm going to tick to watching Dortmund from now on.

 

BVB!!

verrater,

[chappy]

Voted Delph because there isn't an option for Howard.

[Avflife]

 

Anyone wanting a ticket for Cardiff please PM me, £15 K1 Upper Holte Wings , can't be watching that again rather do something productive with my weekend instead, same old same old week after week.

You'll be back just like the rest of us.

 

Haha dependent on the West Spam result, lose I'm staying at home in my flat, draw I'll decide closer to the time and if we win I'll be getting pissed before we play the red sheep

[Philosopher]

Played okay and matched Everton until they scored.  Should've been at least two up by then.  We have 4 great chances and normally at least one of those would go in. Benteke was not at his best today, but still a handful in the first half.  Everton are a strong team and will do well this season.  All the home games so far this season highlight the fact we need a quality playmaker.  We are definitely stronger this season, so I am sure the guys talking about relegation dog fight are wrong. We are a midtable team and have had that kind of start!

[poitier]

Bad result today rather than a bad performance. We were the better team for long periods of the game. I gave Vlaar motm, he did a lot of good work today.

Weimann and Luna on the same flank was not good.

[heid3ster]

Encouraging first half, but the game is 90 minutes long and these guys have got to start playing for all of it.

 

Guzan: Some great saves in the first half, but is it possible Everton have found his weakness? Both goals were low rollers into the corner, and they had two more shots just like it that fortunately went wide, Brad didn't get near those either.

 

Bacuna: switched off (along with Tonev) for the first goal. Encouraging play going forward and gave us much-needed width.

 

Vlaar: Decent enough game, but about gave me a heart attack the few times he got caught in possession and tried (succesfully) to play his way out of trouble.

 

Clark: Completely left Lukaku all alone for the first goal. Naive play. Might have been better suited on the left.

 

Baker: Should not play left back again, ever. He is woeful going forward and was caught out of position constantly, and is much much too slow to get back. Also, this is the second time in two games that he's passed the ball directly to the opposition's best player. I would like him to stop doing this. Hey Nathan, our guys are wearing the claret and blue shirts.

 

Tonev: With Bacuna, switched off for the first goal, but to be honest he did a lot better than I would have expected against Baines & Pienaar. Less said about his wild shot the better, but he played several great balls forward today that no one latched onto. He's starting to get his head up more and look for teammates, which is encouraging.

 

Westwood: Much better today in open play, decent defensively and was positive in his forward play. But he needs to STOP. TAKING. CORNERS. Last year he was probably our best option on set pieces and he picked up a couple of assists, but this season he has been terrible and we have other options now. I'd like to see Bacuna taking corners, or even Tonev. Maybe even a combination of all three sometimes -- mix it up a little. We're way too damn predictable from set pieces.

 

Delph: Hardest-working man on the pitch, but still lacking that final product. When Delph gets the ball, one of three things will happen: Dribble, dribble, lose the ball; dribble, dribble, can't find a forward moving so pass backwards; dribble, dribble, draw foul. I feel like this guy has goals bottled up inside him and once that first one gets out we will see him playing with a confidence we've not yet seen.

 

Weimann: (pats bench) Have a seat, son. I'm a big fan of Andi but he needs to be dropped, for his own good. That was the worst game I've seen from him.

 

Agbonlahor: I actually forgot he was playing until he had that miss. Should have scored. Very disappointing from him today. Wouldn't actually mind seeing him dropped also.

 

Benteke: If I'm kind I could say he looks rusty. He should have scored the pen (maybe Howard got lucky guessing the right direction; it was a well-struck ball but at such an easy height), and should have buried his other first half chance. Obviously the game would have been very different if either or both of those goals had gone in. His touch was absolutely atrocious today, and in the second half he looked very tired indeed.

 

Luna: Had a torrid time against Mirallas and Coleman until he came off, although he didn't get much help from Weimann at all. If his injury keeps him out for a bit I'd like to see Bennett given a go again.

 

Helenius: Didn't have enough time to make an impression. Would like to see him get a start and see what he can do with a bit more time to settle into the game. In place of Weimann for example.

 

For all the complaints this season about our midfield and our lack of creative spark, the problem today was down to our forwards, 100%. We created some great chances and we simply didn't take them, and we were punished for it. To me the most disappointing thing was the way heads dropped once we went 2-0 down. At 0-1 I thought we were still in it, but after the second goal all the heart went out of the team and we gave up. Hard to watch.

[Avflife]

Guess as a freelance sports journalist something good can come out of this; another idea for an article We lost the match as we didn't take our chances (Benteke and Weimann's one-on-ones in the first half and Gabby's 2nd half howler) if we had we would of beaten Everton; Howard's save from Benteke and Guzan's from Lukaku's header were world-class. 

The back four looked a lot stronger, Vlaar in particular and Baker also, before he was wrongly switched to left-back, was winning the physical battle against the monster that is Romelu Lukaku. 

But looking it at overall other big issues were present, the formation was right (4-2-3-1) but not the personale, if we want to play that formation we need to play Sylla alongside Westwood, he protected him towards the latter end of last season so why can't he do it again; Sylla's record when starting is immense. Also why does Lambert persist with Weimann, he hasn't done anything this season, expect score a pretty easy goal against City, Tonev needs to be given a chance in the team in a midfield three just behind Benteke of him, Delph and Gabby.

Edited October 26, 2013 by Avflife