Ratings and Reactions: West Brom - Villa

[Chap of Steel]

Happy days for WBA. Having our worst era in decades and they still struggle to win against 10 men.

Bye Richardson.

Indeed. DVD release to follow!

[tonitottakai]

We truly are an awful, awful team. Painful to watch, week in week out. Also, why are people still thinking Benteke can single-handedly make the difference in these kind of matches? The worst player for us today, after Richardson of course.

[OutByEaster?]

Team was a little bit flat. Okore was excellent I thought, Benteke picked a bad day to have an absolute stinker. 

 

Once Richardson got sent off it was always going to be difficult, but our second half mentality where we seemed to want to go into our shells and start defending from about the 48th minute contributed - we let them build up a head of steam and eventually we were always going to break. Once they had we tried to play a bit more and got ourselves back into it, creating chances that could have seen a point on any other Benteke day but this one.

 

Ho hum. Richardson should get a rollocking and a big fine, Benteke should get an afternoon of watching videos.

 

Fair play to the Albion, they did enough, I still hope they go down, but then I'm sure they feel the same about us.

 

Fans were good, back line looked okay, manager did alright in terms of shape and tactics with the exception of the very odd late double change - although in fairness to him if we'd put one of the chances away that would have come off.

 

A kind word also for the referee who I thought was excellent. 

[chappy]

Game completely changed with the red card.

Sanchez motm.

Not much else to say.

[VillaCas]

Don't think we would have won that even if Richardson wasn't sent off.

 

 

Don't think we would have won that even if Richardson wasn't sent off.

Posts like this annoy me. The whole game changes with a sending off that early. We've no idea how the game would have gone.

 

 

You're clearly right. Impossible to say what would have happened - we still had more possession with 10 men, so with 11 I think it is more likely we would have won

[Rob182]

Don't worry guys, in 3 years time we'll be back in Europe.

Was it you in the match thread that guaranteed that we'd win 2-0? If so, I hope you didn't put too much money on it

[roonst83]

Once again, we are our on worst enemy. A stupid tackle that ensured that we couldn't win the game. Hadn't done much up until that point but I'm convinced we wouldnt've lost if we had a full XI.

The fact that we had more possession with a man less and were somewhat comfortable ll game shows how terrible Baggies are.

Can't see us getting a point from any of the next two games so we're looking at Sunderland before we have the chance to get a much needed win.

[supernova26]

We'd have won that with 11 for sure.

 

Okore is soooo strong, excellent player.

 

Delph looked good coming back on.

 

Not actually too disappointed, good to have a lot of the players back. 

 

Why are the uneducated having a go at Benteke? Yes he messed up his technique at the end but otherwise he ok alright given the circumstances.

Edited December 13, 2014 by supernova26

[The Fun Factory]

Oh well we couldn't expect to go 6 unbeaten in this Villa era. Still 5 points from the drop zone.  A minus 10 goal difference indicates that we are not really a mid table side- but I believe there are at least 3 worse teams than us, probably including the boggies. Just remember that when we are in the Europa league by 2017. If you believe Fox. On to United then.Still painfully goal shy.

[kurtsimonw]

Surprised the vote for the refereeing is "average". That's one of the best officiating displays I've seen in a long time. Didn't really get a single thing wrong IMO.

[tinker]

Would've won that with 11 men. Guzan at fault for the goal, but that aside, the team played decently being a man down. Richardson, do us a favour and f' off.

Guzan's handling and decision making is suspect, he needs to work on it he seems hesitant in situations when the balls in the air in the 6 yard box. Richardson was silly, it was a a yellow card for me though. After that we never played that badly. Sanchez played some lovely cross field passes and Okore and Clark were very strong at the back, Benteke should have scored in the last few minutes, it was more or less an open goal, their keeper was that far off his line......Next

[sonic_bouma]

Well we really made Gardner eat his pre match words.

Help yourself to a winning goal for your comments.

Bottlers yet again

[villalad21]

Surprised the vote for the refereeing is "average". That's one of the best officiating displays I've seen in a long time. Didn't really get a single thing wrong IMO.

As the commentators said, The ref were the best man on the pitch

[heid3ster]

Meh.

[maqroll]

does anyone else just feel a bit....'meh' after that? Just feels like a complete non-event for me.

Quite the opposite. We had a great chance to win our third consecutive match, and threw it away.

 

Major event, IMO.

 

5 games unbeaten and we chuck it all way at West Brom, FFS.

 

Terrible event

[Villanun]

I'm annoyed by the lack of intelligence shown all round in this game. Richardson by getting himself sent off for a stupid tackle that he was never going to make. The other players for continuing to play the ball out from the back after we went down to ten men because that's obviously what they've been told to do in training, even though doing so meant that they were putting themselves under more and more pressure. Benteke for being a professional striker who seems unable to stay onside. And Lambert for once again failing to react to the changing match until it was too late.

 

Some poor individual performances out there. Benteke had an absolute stinker, especially when that chance for the equaliser fell to him at the end. His touch and control was rotten. But that's the risk with people saying "It'll be fine when Benteke gets back" - all we need is for him to have a bad day and we simply never look like scoring. Cleverly's crossing was atrocious; how hard is it to beat the first man? Gabby was his usual inconsistent self; we know he can show pace and strength, but he does it so rarely. And of course Richardson, of whom no more shall be written.

 

That said, I thought Hutton gave a good performance and Okore was excellent. Clark has improved massively too.

 

We should have won that, but the sending off changed everything. After that it was all about how well we withstood pressure and attacked on the break. Unfortunately we didn't do that very well. Ovrall a poor performance. 

[maqroll]

Vlaar was a wasted substitution. Bring on another attacking player, not Concrete Feet

Edited December 13, 2014 by maqroll

[Supervillan78]

Looking forward to beating them at home, with eleven man...Richardson!

[PaulC]

Who knows what would have happened without the Richardson red card! He let the team and the fans down big time. To play for so long with only 10 men is very difficult. Hard to judge the performance after that. West Brom deserved to win. I thought Okore and Clark once again did a terrific job at the back. Benteke and Agboholor were both off their a game today. Delph did pretty well when he came on. 

[maqroll]

The team were unprepared for this one, it's pretty obvious. That's down to the manager. 

 

Momentum shot.

 

Back to square one.