Player Match Ratings: We’re not winless anymore!

[John]

We have played better this season and lost. We have played better this season and drawn. I cannot recall us playing any worse for a very, very long time and winning. We may have won ugly at the end of what was a scrappy game but we did win it and that belatedly gave us our first win of 2017.  

We now face what is a 6-pointer with Bristol City at Villa Park on Tuesday before travelling to bottom club Rotherham next weekend. These two clubs are now 6 and 22 points behind us respectively. Two more wins against these two clubs would give us three consecutive wins for the first time this season as well as take us to 45 points and that has been good enough to stay up in all but one of the last 6 seasons.    

It wasn’t pretty yesterday. We had only 29% of the possession and only 2 shots on target. Steve McClaren (who could have made very good use of his trademark umbrella yesterday) said “I don’t know how we lost the game”. They lost it because they managed only one shot on target and because as we know to our own cost you don’t win games without scoring goals.      

Derby are on the crest of their usual slump in results that appears to happen on or around this time of each season and which ruins their promotion hopes. Our season has been one long slump that was shortly interrupted by a new manager bounce.

We never really got going yesterday and when we went ahead we seemed to spend the rest of the game trying to hold on grimly to our slender one goal lead. We managed to do so and claimed a rare clean sheet in the process although we were holding on desperately in the last 15 minutes to the extent that we looked like the away side. We defended too deep in the second half and surrendered the initiative to the visitors all too readily. Having said that, I said before the game that a dour 1-0 win would do nicely and that is just what we got!           

My player ratings from a game that brought back that winning feeling to Villa Park after a dire run of 7 defeats from our previous 8 games are:

Sam Johnstone – 6 – Although our visitors had a lot of the ball Sam was only really tested once. He came through that test well touching a good Bent header over the bar on 75 minutes. This clean sheet cannot do any harm to his confidence.       

Alan Hutton – 6 – A solid defensive performance. Someone other than Alan might have scored on 59 minutes when the ball dropped to him inside the box but he took far too much time before pulling the trigger and his eventual shot was blocked.         

James Chester - 7 – MOTM – Solid as usual at the back. James had a 7th minute header from a Lansbury free-kick into the box touched over the bar by Carson after Jedinak had headed the ball on to him. He then went on to score what turned out to be our winner on 24 minutes. Kodjia got a touch to a Lansbury corner that took the ball into Chester’s path. The ball flicked up off our captain’s left thigh for him to then head in from close range.   

Nathan Baker – 6 – Solid alongside Chester but was fortunate not to concede a 34th minute penalty when he brought down Bent inside the box.     

Neil Taylor – 5 – Looks to be more comfortable when defending rather than when trying to get forward. Needs more games under his belt to show his best but he needs to show more than this to keep Amavi out of the first team reckoning by his performances alone.  

Albert Adomah – 5 – Some way off his best yesterday and made only a limited impact up front.

Leandro Bacuna – 4 – Surprisingly found himself playing up front as a loan striker after Kodjia was substituted on 88 minutes and was then walking off the pitch 4 minutes into stoppage time having deservedly been sent off. Might have settled things on 89 minutes when Carson’s attempted clearance when under pressure from Gardner found him near the edge of the box but his first-time effort was high, wide and far from handsome. He then reacted wildly to what looked a very poor decision by a linesman to give a throw in against him by going forehead to forehead with the official. Once he did this having lost control of himself we were left playing out the rest of this game and no doubt at least the next three games without him. Any positives he might have otherwise taken from this game were therefore undone by one moment of madness.            

Henri Lansbury - 6 – Looked good particularly in the first half.    

Mile Jedinak – 6 – Played a major role in trying to hold us together in the middle yesterday when we were under pressure as we often were. We miss him badly when he is out of the side.  

Andre Green – 6 – Very quiet during the first third of the game but then made a couple of decent first half runs. Andre was very unlucky not to give us a second goal on 47 minutes when he stretched to get a diving header to a Bacuna cross that struck the post.

Jonathan Kodjia – 5 – Lacked service and although he held up the ball well on occasions, worked hard and will claim an assist for our winner the lone striker role did not look well suited to him.

Substitutes:

Jordan Amavi – 5 – Replaced Adomah on 72 minutes. Jordan continues to look a shadow of the player he was before he was involved in transfer speculation. I assume his reaction to this speculation led Bruce to sign another full back who is currently starting games instead of him.       

Birkir Bjarnason – 4 - Replaced Green on 74 minutes and made little if any impact on the game.      

Gary Gardner – Replaced Kodjia on the 88th minute. Put himself about and looked lively in the very limited time he had available to do so which was not quite long enough to gather a rating.

Up the Villa!

John Lewis

[osmark86]

Solid write up. I think Bacuna deserves a higher score for his performance, he fought like a beast. Real shame he had to go and spoil it.

[John]

2 hours ago, osmark86 said:

Solid write up. I think Bacuna deserves a higher score for his performance, he fought like a beast. Real shame he had to go and spoil it.

Thanks. Bacuna dropped points due to getting himself sent off which might have cost us on the day and will make him unavailable for selection in future games. As you say he spoilt what he had done up until then.  

[villaglint]

Took my 5 year old girl to this game. It's probably about the 7/8th game she's been to.

However at this one she asked me about 780 questions. I really don't think I'm exaggerating either. Approx 500 were about the game. I was exhausted by the end of it.

When she's bored she tends to fill the void with her own voice. I really wish we were more exciting to watch. 

[John]

1 hour ago, villaglint said:

Took my 5 year old girl to this game. It's probably about the 7/8th game she's been to.

However at this one she asked me about 780 questions. I really don't think I'm exaggerating either. Approx 500 were about the game. I was exhausted by the end of it.

When she's bored she tends to fill the void with her own voice. I really wish we were more exciting to watch. 

There was a young lad sitting behind us who did much the same with his father and they both ended up missing the goal to boot. Things can only get better (I hope).  

[Nigel]

Hmm dont often disagree with you John on how i see a game;  However even with the red card Bacuna deserved more than that score, he had a really good game up untill the 92nd minute.  Future bans shouldnt affect his score.

Then theres Green.....offered nothing all game and looked weak and slow. He will have better games but it wasnt saturday.