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Ratings and Reactions: Villa 1-2 Arsenal


limpid

Man of the Match  

114 members have voted

  1. 1. Who was your Man of the Match?

    • Guzan
      0
    • Lowton
      6
    • Luna
      1
    • Clark
      3
    • Baker
      2
    • Vlaar
      49
    • El Ahmadi
      0
    • Westwood
      4
    • Benteke
      14
    • Agbonlahor
      4
    • Delph
      1
    • Bacuna (for Baker 21)
      26
    • Weimann (for El Ahmadi 73)
      4
  2. 2. Manger's tactics

    • Very poor
      11
    • Poor
      19
    • Average
      53
    • Good
      29
    • Very Good
      2


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Had to leave for work about 10 mins into the second half.

 

I wasn't overly perturbed with how we played in the first half - until baker went off Arsenal had 1 half chances and no shots on goal. We had 2 very, very good chances falling to Delph and KEA. Sadly, neither could put it on goal (Delph in particular had the time and space - should do better).

 

Yes, Arsenal had the ball. Yes, we were camped in our own half. But they produced very little by way of opportunities and we had the better chances. In fact, by the time I left, we had just as many shots as Arsenal, but were 2 goals down. I hate 5-3-2 and it's difficult to watch, but we were doing it comfortably.

 

That aside, 2 passages of play in the first half summed up the game for mine:

 

- Lowton releases a wonderful ball for Agbonlahor who gets in behind the Arsenal defender. The defender brings him down in a professional foul and cops a yellow. Situation diffused.

- Arsenal forward gets in behind Lowton in a dangerous position. Lowton tries to cover - but does not foul. Situation escalated - he crosses and Arsenal score.

 

We showed our naivety there. A cynical foul from Lowton - just as the Arsenal defender did on Gabby - would have been the correct decision.

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Just back. Did it come across on the TV just how one sided Kevin Enemy made the game _again_? I don't know how he gets away with being so obviously bent.

 

He ended El Ahmadi's competitiveness in midfield after 2 mins with a ridiculous booking. We couldn't tackle them because they'd fall over and get a free-kick, then Mertesacker manhandles Benteke all night and nothing is given.

 

Good performance in the 2nd half. Really feared for the score after the 2nd went in.

 

But if I ever see another long ball up to Benteke again it'll be too soon. I'm a Lambert fan but please, I beg you, stop doing this. It doesn't work against anyone. Just keep the ball and play it around, the players can do it, Benteke is good with it at his feet. Hoof it every time and you just invite whoever has been told to rough Benteke up to put him under pressure and we lose the ball again.

 

edit: Oh and I knew people would be desperate to say that Arsenal sat back and let us have the ball. They really didn't. We penned them in and they couldn't get out. They couldn't do anything but pull people back to defend.

Edited by darrenm
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I thought we were holding them off pretty well until Baker went off. Having to switch things up like that turned us into a bit of a rabbit in the headlights, but it looked a lot better after half time when we had the time to organise the back properly during the break. If only we could play like we did in the second half all season.

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Pretty poor play in the first half after 10 minutes, very pleased with the second half, thought we was  the better team then. They deserved to win but this went much better than expected. Also again many of the faults really highlights that we need some players that can make a difference today. It`s really vital and I still find myself disappointed by the lack of ambition from the owner. All in all, this is a defeat that I don`t worry too much about, we looked better today and we really need to go on from here, show more intent. Really looking forward to the west brom game because that will be huge in many ways, we need that victory there, it`s one of the biggest games Lambert will have this season. UTV

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I know it was due to Arsenal sitting back, but that Arsenal side playing at a canter are still better than a lot of the sides we've played this season. So it begs the question why we csan't play even close to that second half the rest of the time?

 

Motivation? Confidence? Tactics? All of the above?

 

I genuinely don't know.

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It was between Bacuna & Delph for MOTM. Went for Bacuna in the end. He has to start v Liverpool. More so to put to bed his dreadful debut against them earlier this season.

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Just back. Did it come across on the TV just how one sided Kevin Enemy made the game _again_? I don't know how he gets away with being so obviously bent.

 

He ended El Ahmadi's competitiveness in midfield after 2 mins with a ridiculous booking. We couldn't tackle them because they'd fall over and get a free-kick, then Mertesacker manhandles Benteke all night and nothing is given.

 

Good performance in the 2nd half. Really feared for the score after the 2nd went in.

 

But if I ever see another long ball up to Benteke again it'll be too soon. I'm a Lambert fan but please, I beg you, stop doing this. It doesn't work against anyone. Just keep the ball and play it around, the players can do it, Benteke is good with it at his feet. Hoof it every time and you just invite whoever has been told to rough Benteke up to put him under pressure and we lose the ball again.

 

edit: Oh and I knew people would be desperate to say that Arsenal sat back and let us have the ball. They really didn't. We penned them in and they couldn't get out. They couldn't do anything but pull people back to defend.

Watched the game on the TV the yellow card was a strange one. It looked like the two players just ran into each other.

Benteke didn't look interested, and I don't think Agbonlahor and Benteke passed a singl ball to each other the whole game!!

The Arsenal players seemed more experienced in influencing the decisions of the referee. Why don't any of our players go and complain to the ref when Benteke gets pushed in the box? Why don't the players complain about the yellow card? We desperately need some leaders out there.

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Plenty of positives from tonight, a lapse in concentration and a slip inside 60 seconds ultimately killed the game. For all their possession, Arsenal didn't have that many shots on goal. Shame some sections of the Holte chose to boo at half time.

 

Thought Vlaar and Clark did well, as did Bacuna and Westwood.

 

Hopefully the second half performance will instill some badly needed confidence into the team.

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At least we came out of it with some credit, but so much of our supposedly better second half play was just lumping the ball from Guzan to Benteke.

Wigan got relegated and got credit. Yes we rallied in the second half, but only when Arsenal sat back and let us. It's good that Benteke got back to scoring ways but we need to show that desire in all games not just the ones that we are 0-2 down in. Lowton also showed once again how he's our most creative player. Great cross for Benteke. Benteke thrives on those sorts of crosses so we need more of that.

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Just back. Did it come across on the TV just how one sided Kevin Enemy made the game _again_? I don't know how he gets away with being so obviously bent.

 

He ended El Ahmadi's competitiveness in midfield after 2 mins with a ridiculous booking. We couldn't tackle them because they'd fall over and get a free-kick, then Mertesacker manhandles Benteke all night and nothing is given.

 

Good performance in the 2nd half. Really feared for the score after the 2nd went in.

 

But if I ever see another long ball up to Benteke again it'll be too soon. I'm a Lambert fan but please, I beg you, stop doing this. It doesn't work against anyone. Just keep the ball and play it around, the players can do it, Benteke is good with it at his feet. Hoof it every time and you just invite whoever has been told to rough Benteke up to put him under pressure and we lose the ball again.

 

edit: Oh and I knew people would be desperate to say that Arsenal sat back and let us have the ball. They really didn't. We penned them in and they couldn't get out. They couldn't do anything but pull people back to defend.

Watched the game on the TV the yellow card was a strange one. It looked like the two players just ran into each other.

Benteke didn't look interested, and I don't think Agbonlahor and Benteke passed a singl ball to each other the whole game!!

The Arsenal players seemed more experienced in influencing the decisions of the referee. Why don't any of our players go and complain to the ref when Benteke gets pushed in the box? Why don't the players complain about the yellow card? We desperately need some leaders out there.

 

Guzan was on at the ref the whole time. Gave him some right lip. It was great.

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Darren, Kevin Friend wasn't the ref tonight. It was a bloke with a weird surname.

 

 

Neil Swarbrick BOF.

 

He was shite though.

 

I'm genuinely shocked. He looked just like that clearing in the woods Enemy from where I was sat.

 

Hmm suppose I can be forgiven:

 

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I don't buy the argument that Arsenal sat back in the second half as there was some fairly desperate defending at times from them which is not 'sitting back'. Yet again we were undone by a couple of silly mistakes, in fact we conceded two goals in the time it took me to go for a piss and get back to my seat! If you look at the match stats Arsenal did not create that much more than us and having seen them live they are way off a PL title winning side. Arsenal still flatter to deceive IMO.

 

Our problem was was as ever doing something with the ball when we had it, the link between midfield and the strikers is still sadly lacking  On the plus side there was less passing sideways and backwards and we did play much more positively and on a good day we would have got something out of the game. Lowton made some silly errors as did Luna but the latter was much better than he has been. Clark and Vlaar looked very strong in defence, we just looked so much more organised. Bacuna had a very good game as I think did Westwood. I am still reminded of an enthusiastic puppy when I watch KEA. I love Delph's commitment and his ability to push forward but he marries that with an annoying ability to run into blind alleys.

 

Really pleased for Benteke, hopefully this is the start of his return to form, Gabby as ever was a credit to the shirt. Overall I came away from VP feeling pretty positive. I thought it would be a cricket score but we played better than I have seen us play for some considerable time.

 

Just a few gripes:

 

The referee? Did he have the Arsenal badge on his shirt? I doubt it affected the result in the end but the one sided decisions were little short of astounding. Arsenal player goes to ground = a free kick. Villa player goes to ground = play on. A classic example of a ref being overawed by a so called 'big club'.

 

Phil McNulty's match report on the BBC website. I honestly think we went to different games. I think he must have been tossing himself off into an Arsenal towel as he wrote it it was so biased and one sided.

 

Arsenal's shameful time wasting and trying to get the game stopped with 'injuries'. The hypocrisy of it, had Arsenal lost, we would never have heard the last of it from Wenger

Edited by Harry
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Just back. Did it come across on the TV just how one sided Kevin Enemy made the game _again_? I don't know how he gets away with being so obviously bent.

 

He ended El Ahmadi's competitiveness in midfield after 2 mins with a ridiculous booking. We couldn't tackle them because they'd fall over and get a free-kick, then Mertesacker manhandles Benteke all night and nothing is given.

 

Good performance in the 2nd half. Really feared for the score after the 2nd went in.

 

But if I ever see another long ball up to Benteke again it'll be too soon. I'm a Lambert fan but please, I beg you, stop doing this. It doesn't work against anyone. Just keep the ball and play it around, the players can do it, Benteke is good with it at his feet. Hoof it every time and you just invite whoever has been told to rough Benteke up to put him under pressure and we lose the ball again.

 

edit: Oh and I knew people would be desperate to say that Arsenal sat back and let us have the ball. They really didn't. We penned them in and they couldn't get out. They couldn't do anything but pull people back to defend.

Watched the game on the TV the yellow card was a strange one. It looked like the two players just ran into each other.

Benteke didn't look interested, and I don't think Agbonlahor and Benteke passed a singl ball to each other the whole game!!

The Arsenal players seemed more experienced in influencing the decisions of the referee. Why don't any of our players go and complain to the ref when Benteke gets pushed in the box? Why don't the players complain about the yellow card? We desperately need some leaders out there.

Guzan was on at the ref the whole time. Gave him some right lip. It was great.
Super, I would love someone in the middle of the park to do that. Just to show everyone who the boss is and drive the team on
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I thought we were decent in both halves - moving Bacuna into an attacking position made a great difference in the second half though because they couldn't build from that deep midfield position. I thought Vlaar was good and the whole team gave it a good go.

 

The referee (Mr Swarbick according to the programme) was abysmal - we should have had a penalty in the second half, Wilshere could and should have been booked for a couple of fouls before his booking, he's constantly going in over the ball and I thought Flamini's challenge on Gabby in the first half was disgraceful - somewhere between yellow and red (he didn't give a foul.)

 

Arsenal play some beautiful football, they're a joy to watch at times, but a more unlikeable bunch you couldn't hope to find. If by some freak of luck somebody clatters Wilshere before the world cup and the poor little imp misses out, I for one will be breaking out the bunting - he really is a mouthy, dirty, nasty little boy.

 

They were better than us, they are better than us and they deserved the win, but I thought we did what we do very well and there's plenty of positives to be taken out of tonight.

 

The half time boo from the Holte End was really disappointing and completely unearned, as was the sarcastic applause for  El Ahmadi's substitution and I don't think the support covered itself in glory tonight - I was as disappointed with that as anything else. 

 

A defeat, never a good thing, but a decent showing and I can't say as I'm unhappy.

Good post, agree with all that, particularly the comments about booing and KEA.

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Up until Baker went off I thought we looked pretty organised and held our shape a lot better than we have recently. Yes we were outplayed for large periods, it's top of the league Arsenal, what the **** do you want from them. That said we still managed to create some decent chances of our own on the break. Conceding a second straight after the restart was pretty unforgivable but again it was good to see them rally in the second half and they deserved their ovation at the end. 

 

It's far from a perfect situation at the moment but I still don't buy into the all encompassing doom and gloom that seems to surround a lot of people at the moment. Despite the result I can honestly say I enjoyed being on the Holte today. On another positive note it was good to see the boost getting back on the score sheet gave Benteke. Hopefully he can go some way to recapturing last seasons form with the confidence that consolation seemed to give him.

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agree ref was shocking, so many similar fouls with absolutely no consistency, im assuming rosicky was actually cut seeing as he changed his shirt but that was great play by him, stay on the ground, take the sting out of the game, one of those games where you are grateful he didnt have a big decision to make because he would have got it wrong, not sure if wenger's "villa are a physical team" comments influenced him, worst of it was wilshere throwing himself to the ground every chance he got and winning free kicks, such a little bitch

 

was good listening to talkshite on the way home, villa were described as a good young attacking team by goldstein and cundy, followed by around 8 villa fans shooting them down, made themselves look a right pair of clowns

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