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Dean Smith

Demitri_C

By Demitri_C
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Zatman Grand Master

Zatman

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6 hours ago, foreveryoung said:

I guess your expectations have dropped somewhat over the years. Not me, I still expect the best, we are a massive club remember, have billionaire owners and one of the best players in the league, why should we not want more than be happy with midtable mediocracy.

expectations have dropped? Did you think we should also have qualified for Europe 2 years ago when we were in the Championship?

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TrentVilla
TrentVilla

Absolutely, utterly delighted. I've really admired Smith's work for some time now, both at Walsall and Brentford and anyone who witnessed our games against the later in recent times should be the

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VillaChris Grand Master

VillaChris

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Always find it a bit bizarre when people have a go at him when we actually play really well in games like yesterday and West Ham. Players execute his gameplan really well but just can't finish at the key moments, it happens given we've been pretty clincial in 4 other games this season.

Only disappointment was again leaving the first and only sub until pretty late on again but it's not like we had a bench overflowing with game changing options and he probably didn't want to give Davis too long given he's been out injured for a few weeks and we'll probably need him again at some point on Sunday.

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VillaChris Grand Master

VillaChris

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12 hours ago, nick76 said:

Probably because he doesnt get the service, we just dont provide service to our central strikers.  How many chances we created for Ollie last night.  Considering we had 27 shots, how many were in to Ollie.  We know the guy can score, I think your assessment that he hasnt got a ruthless streak is wrong, when he has been given chances he has scored this season but we are just not a team that provides chances to our central striker over the last two seasons. 

As I said last night, we do the creative stuff in midfield but when we get close to the box we often have the player go on a solo run and try themselves like Jack did before he skyed it over or El Ghazi did a number of times.  We dont cross into Ollie, we dont pass into Ollie, we dont slide in Ollie.  Ollie either has to drop deep or he ends up being a decoy for the player with the ball. 

So many times I saw waiting for the pass as the other player was closing in on goal and him not receiving the ball.  Was he in the right position or best position for a pass.......no, not always but there were a few I thought "pass to Ollie".  

I think it's hard to judge Ollie sometimes because we arent feeding him enough balls

Yeah a few times we should've squared to him but I also though he at times passed the buck a bit by passing to AEG or Traore when he should've had shot from 20 odd yards.

Not saying it would go in but again look at someone like Kane or Rashord and they're always having shots from long range, plenty miss but a few go in so again I'd like to see him back himself more in those type of situations. He may not always get a decent cross but he gets into plenty of those type of situations drifting out wide during the game.

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VillaChris Grand Master

VillaChris

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7 hours ago, foreveryoung said:

If we are as good as most think, why don't we raise our expectations a little and expect Europe this season. Wolves did it Why should we take midtable as a success, after the start we had and performances we are putting out

I doubt Southampton will be happy with midtable the way they have started.

As I posted yesterday we're actually doing better points wise after 11 games than 07/08 and 09/10 two seasons when we were certainly challenging for europe.

The table is just odd currently. Not helped by Sheffield United being a complete points sieve so they're inflating the points totals of everyone pretty much as you never get a team that bad after 13 games, even our 15/16 vintage had 6 points after that number.

We've also been handicapped by having two less chances of 3 points than 80% of the league. Even a draw in the postponed Newcastle game would have us 9th and then it's a completely different intepretation as top half seems to be seen as amazing and bottom half as average even though there's hardly anything in it.

Hopefully we get at least 4 points from next two though as late December right through to early February is a very tough period so not expecting too many wins from that batch of games. I get the horrible feeling the league will put Man. City away in that aswell even before we get to play the Newcastle one given Man. City will be playing in europe again from mid February so little chance of it being played then.

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Rightdm00 Grand Master

Rightdm00

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1 minute ago, Keyblade said:

I'm not even exaggerating when I say I think we've been the second best team in the league this season behind Liverpool. What an amazing turnaround from being the worst PL team (of the ones remaining) at the end of last season.

Must not set unhealthy expectations 😂😂

Over It Reaction GIF by Women's History Month

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villa4europe Grand Master

villa4europe

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Just now, PieFacE said:

Wasn't really required tonight. West Brom sat so deep we didn't really break a sweat. 

100% this

What are we making a sub for? We were in complete control and not busting a gut, stuck with what we were doing and got 2 more goals out of it 

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Keyblade Grand Master

Keyblade

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2 minutes ago, YouUnastanFren said:

Another game played, another team dominated, another Smith masterclass. The media won't give him the plaudits because he's got an unfashionable name and accent but he's made Villa a top team that look good near enough every week.

Smitten

It's actually quite funny how we're flying under the radar. After the game the host mentioned that we have 20 points which is the most since 2008. We actually have 22.

Then going through the table they note we move up to 9th and that we have a game in hand. We actually have 2. I kind of like this to be honest because that means we'll be sneaking up the table and teams won't take us as seriously. We're an absolute threat.

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TrentVilla Proficient

TrentVilla

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I say this without exaggeration, that is one of the best performances we've seen under Smith and one of the best we've seen in the last 10 years.

It wasn't spectacular like the Liverpool game but it was control domination from the first minute to the last. We started on the front foot, we dominated in every area of the pitch and not one player had a poor or even average game. When they opened up we put them to the sword.

That was a hugely impressive performance from Smith and Villa, it could easily have been 4/5 or even 6 as well.

That was a mature performance, no matter the ability of the opposition we would have beaten the majority of the teams in the league playing like that tonight.

A few special mentions, AEG and Traore both were excellent, Targett was also again and Hause won ever single header that there was to win. When players in the squad start improving like this and stepping up when needed it makes a huge difference.

January is going to be very very interesting, if we've money to spend then players will be a lot more open to coming to us than before.

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