Player Match Ratings: Victory to defeat in 2 minutes!

[John]

Their two goals may have had varying slices of luck about them, but they dominated this game from start to finish. We have got to be more positive from now, we probably would have been ripped apart yesterday, had we tried to take the game to our visitors. Instead, we appeared to bank on getting a second successive clean sheet within a week and perhaps even scoring a goal against the run of play, ourselves.

We achieved the second of those two objectives when Hause scored on 43 minutes. The chances of our team, which have conceded the most goals in the Premier League, achieving the first objective yesterday, was always slim to none. We put men behind the ball, but it was too easy for the visitors and we only succeeded in delaying the inevitable for an hour, at the end of the day.  

At half time, some of us dared to dream for a moment, that we might beat a top four team for the first time, since we beat yesterday’s visitors in 2014. Reality soon kicked in though. The ball hitting the back of our net during the second half looked inevitable. The longer we could keep them out, the better our chances, would be of just conceding one goal and of hanging on grimly to a precious point. Things were going to plan for an hour and then in two painful minutes, our cunning plan was left in tatters.   

Dean surprisingly fielded an unchanged team yesterday. The new rule which allows two extra substitutes, was seen to work well for Chelsea yesterday. Had they only been able to have brought on 3 substitutes, they might not have made a double substitution as early as they did, on 55 minutes and within 5 minutes one of those substitutes had brought them level. The ruling helps the big sides and does nothing positive for the rest. Just look at the options that they had on their bench, compared to the ones that were available to us.    

A goal was always going to come for Chelsea yesterday. Unfortunately, like the Clapham omnibus, you wait an hour for one and then two come together. We just sat back and invited them forward. They had 74% possession, 19 shots to our 8 and 10 corners to our two. There are lies, dammed lies and statistics. Yesterday the stats showed there was only ever going to be one winner and it was not going to be us.         

At half time we were outside of the bottom three, will we be able to get ourselves out of it again this season and if we do, can we keep outside it? To have any chance of doing both, we will need to win a couple of games and to gather around 10 points from our remaining 8 games. Games will start running out fast now. We could really do with winning on Wednesday, but we will need to play for a win, and we face a team that won 3-0 yesterday, which will have given our next opponents confidence. Hopefully, our former manager, will choose to play for a draw!   

My player ratings from a game that would have left the crowd restless very soon after the start, had there been one, are:

Orjan Nyland – 5 – Saved with his right hand on 20 minutes, from a Mount shot which was hit from just outside of the box. Pushed out a 31st minute Mount cross at his near post. Fumbled a 32nd minute Kovacic shot from just outside of the box and having failed to catch it, gathered the loose ball at the second attempt. Pulisic was unmarked at the far post when he somehow hit Azpilicueta’s 60th minute cross in the space between Nyland and the crossbar. He was left static on the line, when Giroud turned inside the box and hit a 62nd minute shot that deflected off Hourihane, past Mings behind him (who might otherwise have blocked it) and into the net for their winner. Touched an 84th minute Willian shot from outside of the area over the bar.    

Ezri Konsa - 5 – Doing as well as can reasonably be expected in his present role.  

Kortney Hause – 6 – MOTM – Put us ahead against the run of play (to put it mildly) after 43 minutes. Douglas hit a nice ball towards the far post that he stretched a foot to reach, Arrizabalaga blocked it at close range, but Kortney reacted quickly to hit the ball into the far side of the net. Could not quite get over the ball when he headed a 68th minute free kick, that Grealish had flighted into the box over the bar.     

Tyrone Mings – 6 – Had a solid game in the centre of a defence that was under constant pressure.     

Matt Targett – 4 – Too many crosses came into the box from his side of the field yesterday.             

Anwar El Ghazi - 4 – Hit a 32nd minute shot from outside of the penalty area that Arrizabalaga parried at his right-hand post. Anwar was again disappointing. His starting place should be in jeopardy by now, but no-one has consistently impressed in a wide role this season. Perhaps, we should take a leaf out of Sir Alf’s book and try being wingless?           

John McGinn – 4 – We needed John to hit the ground running, with hindsight that was never likely to happen following a six-month absence. John could still make the difference in the games that are to come, but he again ran out of steam today and was unable to play the all action role that he played so well at the beginning of this season and last. Could not get enough on his 34th minute header on a nice cross from El Ghazi that drifted well wide of the far post.                    

Douglas Luiz – 6 – He is looking increasingly like the player that we had hoped that we had signed, since the restart. If only he could add a couple of those tremendous goals that he scored earlier this season, to what is a quickly improving midfield contribution.           

Jack Grealish – 5 – He really needs to play in the centre, where he will be more involved. We are currently wasting him; he is not a wide player! He is the player, that is most likely to unlock a defence, but he does not look likely to do that, too often currently. He can do much more than this. Chelsea appeared to be under instruction, to take turns to bring him down, during the game.  

Conor Hourihane – 4 – Quite a drop in his performance from what he produced on Sunday, but if we were going to attempt to play like this, then surely Marvelous would have been the right choice from the start.                         

Keinan Davis – 5 – Put himself about, but he needs someone playing alongside him if we are to score the goals that we need to. I would have started Samatta, in a game like this myself.                        

Substitutes:

Mbwana Samatta – 5 - Replaced Davis after 57 minutes. Needs to start games now.   

Mahmoud Trezeguet – 5 - Came on for El Ghazi again, this time a minute later, on 70 minutes. Was not able to make any positive impact during the time that he had on the pitch.

Marvelous Nakamba – 5 - Replaced Hourihane on 70 minutes and did not make a noticeable difference when added to our non-existent midfield.

Jota - Replaced the usually irreplaceable John McGinn on 87 minutes. He was not on long enough to earn a rating, but he did have a late opportunity to steal us a point, with his first touch of the game on 87 minutes. Mings hit a free kick from just inside his own half, that Samatta headed into the box and Jota hit the ball inches wide of the far post.

Stay up Villa!

John Lewis