Team shape, tactics and personnel

[TRO]

1 minute ago, VillanousOne said:

And having wingers/width quite often worked under Smith, but this season due to a horrific non existent preseason and injuries, Dean barely had a chance to play wingers because they were all injured and he was toiling with a front two and back three experiment. He never got to really play the new signings in the positions he presumably bought them for.

Gerrard has and doesn't.

 

It worked with Jack and without him it didn't.

2021 was horrendous, so I don't know how you can say it worked.

I can't remember the last time one of our wingers give the opposition a torrid time, or got around the back of the defence often.

I thought Bailey, was a speed merchant, he was reputed to be mega quick.....are they having a laugh....I simply haven't seen it.

We seem to think wingers are the holy grail.....they come to us and turn in to passengers.

If we could get one who did what it says on the tin.......I might be convinced.

[picicata]

8 minutes ago, M_Afro said:

Why do people describe having wingers as one of our strengths? All of our wingers are crap. Bailey may come good but he has shown nothing so far. A narrow system suits us because it gets our better players into the team. I shudder every time I think of a Smith side with Traore and AEG flanking Ollie. Utterly horrible.

What ever you think of our wingers the fact is that the squad is set up to play with wide forwards, including spending £65m on two only last summer. That is one, of several, reasons why employing Gerrard as our manager was an odd choice.

But he's here so now every thing rests on us having a summer to end all summers in terms of signing the players Gerrard needs to implement how he wants us to play. History suggests that buying in the 5 (or about that i'd guess) players needed and them all being a success is highly unlikely. 

Let's keep everything crossed as I think we are going to need to be very lucky

[M_Afro]

16 minutes ago, picicata said:

What ever you think of our wingers the fact is that the squad is set up to play with wide forwards, including spending £65m on two only last summer. That is one, of several, reasons why employing Gerrard as our manager was an odd choice.

But he's here so now every thing rests on us having a summer to end all summers in terms of signing the players Gerrard needs to implement how he wants us to play. History suggests that buying in the 5 (or about that i'd guess) players needed and them all being a success is highly unlikely. 

Let's keep everything crossed as I think we are going to need to be very lucky

Buendia is not really a wide forward. He is an inside forward really and better suits our formation now than the one we played under Dean. Bailey has just not done anywhere near enough to justify a place in the team. He has been a massive disappointment to be honest. He could still come good but my gut feeling tells me that it’s more likely that he won’t.

To be fair, our squad may have been set up to play with wide forwards but every time we have tried that formation, without Grealish, we have been awful. We just don’t have the quality to do it at this level. Everybody talks about it as if Gerrard is really missing a trick by sticking to his system instead of reverting back to a system that consistently failed every time that jack was unavailable. People have incredibly short memories.

[VillaFaninLondon]

2 hours ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

Buendia has had his best performances for us, under Gerrard?

Granted, he's since dropped him as well, so it's a difficult one.

Was only months ago people were writing him off and calling him a waste of space and 40 mill or whatever etc though.

But yeah, we need to find a system to ustilise the best of what we've got.

Buendia's been hit and miss under Gerrard but did show some promising signs before he was benched. Bailey hasn't done anything of note since September/October but we all know there is a player in there somewhere.

 

I actually wouldn't be opposed to trying out Bailey and Buendia either side of Coutinho with a double pivot of Nakamba + Luiz/McGinn/Ramsey but he'd definitely have to rein in the FBs attacking if he was going to make that work.

[ciggiesnbeer]

1 minute ago, VillaFaninLondon said:

Buendia's been hit and miss under Gerrard but did show some promising signs before he was benched. Bailey hasn't done anything of note since September/October but we all know there is a player in there somewhere.

 

I actually wouldn't be opposed to trying out Bailey and Buendia either side of Coutinho with a double pivot of Nakamba + Luiz/McGinn/Ramsey but he'd definitely have to rein in the FBs attacking if he was going to make that work.

Would love to see this. Injuries granted, it just seems silly to me to have two of our biggest signings on the bench.

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

5 minutes ago, VillaFaninLondon said:

I actually wouldn't be opposed to trying out Bailey and Buendia either side of Coutinho with a double pivot of Nakamba + Luiz/McGinn/Ramsey but he'd definitely have to rein in the FBs attacking if he was going to make that work.

This sounds very good.

I've also mentioned a couple of times that, Baileys best recent performance i've seen, was for Jamaica, on the right of a middle 3, strangely enough.

Edited April 18, 2022 by JAMAICAN-VILLAN

[VillaParkAvenue]

4 minutes ago, Peter Griffin said:

This is a question I ask myself quite a lot. Do we really want to find a system to utilise the players we have or should we be putting in place the system we want from a footballing strategy perspective and getting the players to play to that system and if they can't then replacing them. Let's say SG wants to play system 'A' and he is forcing the players to play to that system as long term we believe system A will get us top 4 and Europe if we stick to our principles. However, we don't have the players to play system A properly and our players would be better suited to system B but we know system B will not bring us long term success albeit it may have us getting some better results this season as the players are better suited to it. 

There is a merit in the argument to stick with system A and ship out the players that don't fit and bring in ones that done. Over time we will develop into a team that is good at playing system A. But if we look for the short term gain to suit the players we have that could stop us ever getting the system in place that we believe is correct. Could this be what is happening at Villa?

This is probably what is happening exactly. But imo, it’s not sustainable unless you are Man City or maybe Liverpool and can attract any player you want. And you must be able to economically handle buying expensive players and selling them at a loss.

Other clubs will probably have to at least partly make do with what they have. If you don’t have all the players needed for system A, then at least tweak it. Michael Owen had a clip where he talked enthusiastically about ”weeding players out”, that’s not possible for most clubs.

Also, players are usually able to adapt. Conte’s teams often end up playing much the same way wherever he goes, even before he’s made that many signings.

[Delphinho123]

2 hours ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

This sounds very good.

I've also mentioned a couple of times that, Baileys best recent performance i've seen, was for Jamaica, on the right of a middle 3, strangely enough.

Is it that strange? Isn’t that the positing where he excelled before we signed him!? 

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

2 minutes ago, Delphinho123 said:

Is it that strange? Isn’t that the positing where he excelled before we signed him!? 

You might be right, but I've always thought him more of a wide forward/winger who played as part of say a front 3?

I might actually need to look into it and circle back lol.

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

@Delphinho123I found this . If it's to be believed, his lowest ratings have come from the front right ( Where it seems he is played most often ), and his highest ratings have come from him being a CAM , CAM Rightsided, and wait for it...... An appearance as a DCM! Lol

We could be missing a trick here...

Edited April 18, 2022 by JAMAICAN-VILLAN

[PussEKatt]

In that case he should be playing more games in the front 3.Try starting him in the middle instead of Ings,with Watkins on the left.

[BOF]

Interesting to note that we only out-possessed 2 teams in our first 18 games this season and since then we've out-possessed 8 of the last 13. So the style seems to be changing.

[Delphinho123]

39 minutes ago, BOF said:

Interesting to note that we only out-possessed 2 teams in our first 18 games this season and since then we've out-possessed 8 of the last 13. So the style seems to be changing.

That is interesting. It’s also worth noting that as much as myself and others criticise the formation and the tactics, we did outplay Spurs for large parts of the game. 

I do hope that perhaps the system is right but just falls down on personnel. That would make me more excited for the Summer.

[TRO]

20 hours ago, VillaFaninLondon said:

Buendia's been hit and miss under Gerrard but did show some promising signs before he was benched. Bailey hasn't done anything of note since September/October but we all know there is a player in there somewhere.

 

I actually wouldn't be opposed to trying out Bailey and Buendia either side of Coutinho with a double pivot of Nakamba + Luiz/McGinn/Ramsey but he'd definitely have to rein in the FBs attacking if he was going to make that work.

Nakamba and Luiz have been tried umpteen times, to no avail.

Buendia has been hit and miss full stop......misses Pukki, who made the runs.

as for Bailey, we don't know there is a player in there....its what we have been told, or seen at another club.

Players respond differently to other players around them.....thats why scouting is tricky, but the good ones, crack it.

Edited April 19, 2022 by TRO

[CVByrne]

19 hours ago, VillaFaninLondon said:

Buendia's been hit and miss under Gerrard but did show some promising signs before he was benched. Bailey hasn't done anything of note since September/October but we all know there is a player in there somewhere.

 

I actually wouldn't be opposed to trying out Bailey and Buendia either side of Coutinho with a double pivot of Nakamba + Luiz/McGinn/Ramsey but he'd definitely have to rein in the FBs attacking if he was going to make that work.

He won't do that. One thing he can take from the 20 games so far is how the full backs and JJ / McGinn have adapted to the big changes asked of them. The issues are CB / CDM and our forwards not in form. Along with lack of leaders / experience in the team.

If he were to switch to a 4 2 3 1 now it means full backs need to be less attacking and one needs to tuck into midfield if the other gets forward. This is such a change for the midfield and full backs it doesn't make longer term sense this late in season to do it if he won't be carrying over the changes to next season. 

If Gerrard had come in and gone with 4 2 3 1 / 4 3 3 from the start we would most likely be higher up the table and have performed better. The squad has been built for that formation through two summer windows under Smith. 

[CVByrne]

1 hour ago, BOF said:

Interesting to note that we only out-possessed 2 teams in our first 18 games this season and since then we've out-possessed 8 of the last 13. So the style seems to be changing.

I do think the stats are skewed in that we have been behind in lots of those games and opponents defending a lead and counter attacking means we have more of the ball. We have improved in our possession game for sure, it's just not as drastic as it appears imo.

[BOF]

24 minutes ago, CVByrne said:

I do think the stats are skewed in that we have been behind in lots of those games and opponents defending a lead and counter attacking means we have more of the ball. We have improved in our possession game for sure, it's just not as drastic as it appears imo.

We haven't really.

Brentford, we were only behind for the last 7 minutes
Man U, out-possessing them is a feat anyway and we managed a draw there.
Everton we beat.
Newcastle is one. Down after 35.
Watford we were only behind for 12 minutes.
West Ham is debatable as we were also only behind from 70 onwards but we'll call that one a maybe.
Wolves yes that's 2.
Spurs, again, I think out-possessing them is a decent job anyway, and we battered them for the first half with them only 1 up so I don't think that was them sitting back and letting us go at them. We just out-played them.

So I'll say 2 and a half of those games. Newcastle, Wolves and maybe West Ham, of the 8 are games where the opposition might have sat back and embellished our possession stats.
 

And anyway, as always, stats are just stats and can be used whatever way the reader chooses. You could equally say it shows we're prone to counter attacks and that where we need to fanny around with the ball, we've a soft enough centre that we can be run straight through in no time.

[CVByrne]

56 minutes ago, The Fun Factory said:

I have said it before but Smith has been the only coach for years at Villa who actually improved several players during his time at the club.

How much of that was Smith and how much of that was players with no Prem experience gaining it and learning from it? 

[barry'sboots]

17 hours ago, TRO said:

I honestly believe, with a few of the right players in the right positions, will affect the others in a positive way and some players, we have lost faith in, their form will come back.

........

sadly, we are easy to beat....and that has the opposite effect.

We saw the significant impact that having a proper DCM can have on Stevie's set up in the first few games before Marv got injured.  4 wins out of 6 and the two losses were narrow defeats to two of the best sides (if not the best - we'll see soon!) in Europe.  I will be the first to admit that I was not a huge fan of Marv but with Stevie's influence and set up Marv looked very effective.  I am more than happy for Marv to stay as back up (possibly whilst Tim gets some first team minutes on loan and builds up his CV) but I think adding a Bissouma/Kondogbia/Phillips/Kamara (?) will elevate our midfield to a new level and will allow Dougie (if he stays?), SJM and Ramsey to focus on what they do well.  SJM has consistently looked fantastic for Scotland in a more advanced role that he hasn't been able to consistently play for us.

Equally, an upgrade at CB to bring in a leader like de Vrij and better back up at full back (Kessler's return plus, ideally, Hickey to compete with Digne) would strengthen our defence.

I think you are spot on - get the platform right and other players will also benefit from this.

I make it 4 signings in the summers - de Vrij, Bissouma, Hickey, Coutinho (or equivalents) - with more exits and I think we could be very competitive. 

[Dale]

3 hours ago, barry'sboots said:

We saw the significant impact that having a proper DCM can have on Stevie's set up in the first few games before Marv got injured.  4 wins out of 6 and the two losses were narrow defeats to two of the best sides (if not the best - we'll see soon!) in Europe. 

I think time will tell. Certainly looks like a new manager bounce now though!